IJSTDIAJ^ POTTERY. 



BY CHAftLES RAU. 



Tn former times, when the aboriginal inhabitants of this country were still in 

 possession of their own lands, and their mode of living had not been changed 

 by the intrusion of the pale-faced Caucasian, the art of pottery was practised 

 by them to a considerable extent. This branch of industry lost, however, much 

 of its importance among the Indians so soon as they discovered the superiority 

 of the vessels of metal, which they obtained in trafficking with the whites, and 

 the durable kettle of iron or copper soon replaced the fragile and far less ser- 

 viceable cooking utensil of clay. The beginning of the decline of this aborig- 

 inal art is, therefore, of an early date, and at the present time it may be consid- 

 ered as almost, if not entirely, extinct among the tribes still inhabiting the ter- 

 ritory of the United States, excepting some in New Mexico and Arizona, who 

 have not yet abandoned the manufacture of earthenware. As late as 1832, 

 when Mr. Catlin visited the nations of the Upper Missouri, he found the Man- 

 dans still diligently practising the ceramic art ; but the ravages of the small-pox 

 have reduced their number to a few, and it is probable that vessels of clay arc 

 no longer made in those regions. 



The Iroquois, of New York, those survivors of the once powerful Confedera- 

 tion Avbo have escaped the fate of being driven toward the setting sun, and are 

 still permitted to dwell upon their native soil, have ceased long ago to fabricate 

 "earthen vessels. So I am informed by Dr. Peter Wilson, De-jih-non-da-weh- 

 hoh, grand chief of the Six Nations of New York. " The manufacture of pot- 

 tery," says my correspondent, " has long since been discontinued among our 

 people ; like most other utensils, clay vessels have been superseded by utensils 

 of the manufacture of the race who introduced among us the implements which 

 are more durable and convenient. Such implements and other articles used 

 among us only remain, or are being manufactured, as are not superseded by ar- 

 ticles which the ingenuity of the pale face replaces." The same remark can 

 probably be applied to the other tribes east of the Kocky Mountains. 



That the fabrication of earthenware was once carried to a great extent among 

 the Indians, is shown by the great number of sherds which lie scattered over 

 the sites of their former villages and on their camping places ; but they are, 

 perhaps, nowhere in this country more numerous than in the " American Bot- 

 tom," a strip of land which extends about one hundred miles along the Missis- 

 sippi, in Illinois, and is bounded by the present bank of that river and its 

 former eastern confine, indipated by a range of picturesque wooded hills and 

 ridges, commonly called the " Bluffs." This bottom, which is on an average 

 six miles wide and very fertile, was formerly the seat of a numerous indigenous 

 population, and abounds in tumular works, cemeteries, and other memorials of 

 the subdued race. Among the lesser relics left by the former occupants may 

 be counted the remnants of broken vessels, which occur very abundantly in 

 various places of this region. These fragments are, however, mostly small ; 

 and, according to my experience, entire vessels are not found on the surface, 

 but frequently in the ancient mounds and cemeteries, where they have been de- 

 posited with the dead as receptacles for food, to serve on their journey to the 

 happy land of spirits. 



