INDIAN POTTERY. 347 



About six years ago, wliile living in the west, I was much gratified by the 

 discovery of a place in the AroericiUi Bottom where the manufacture of earthen- 

 ware was evidently carried on by the Indians. The locality to which I allude 

 is the left bank of the Cahokia creek,* at the northern extremity of Illinois- 

 town, opposite St. Louis. At the point just mentioned the bank of the creek is 

 somewhat high and steep, leaving only a small space for a path along the water. 

 When I passed there for the first time, I noticed, scattered over the slope or 

 protruding from the ground, a great many pieces of pottery of much larger size 

 than I had ever seen before, some being of the size of a man's hand, and others 

 considerably larger ; and, upon examination, I found that they consisted of a 

 grayish clay mixed with pounded shells. A gieat number of old shells of the 

 unio, a bivalve which inhabits the creek, were lying about, and their position 

 induced me to believe that they had been brought there by human agency 

 rather than by tlie overflowing of the creek. My curiosity being excited, I 

 continued my investigation, and discovered at the upper part of the bank an 

 old fosse, or digging, of some length and depth, and overgrown with stramo- 

 nium or jimson weed ; and upon entering this excavation, I saw near its bottom 

 a layer of clay, identical in appearance with that which composed the fragments 

 of pottery. The excavation had unmistakably been dug for the purpose of ob- 

 taining the clay, and I became now convinced beyond doubt that the fabrica- 

 tion of earthen 'vessels had been carried on by the aborigines at this very spot. 

 All the requisites for manufacturing vessels were cm hand ; the layer of clay 

 furnished tlic chief ingredient, and the creek not only supplied the water for 

 moistening the clay, but harbored also the mollusks whose valves were used in 

 tempering it. Wood abounded in the neighborhood. All these facts being as- 

 certained, it was easy to account for the occurrence of the large fragments. 

 Whenever pottery is made, some of the articles will crack during the process of 

 burning, and this will happen more frequently when the method employed in 

 that operation is of a rude and primitive character, as it doubtless was in the 

 present c^se. The sherds found at this place may, therefore, with safety be 

 considered as the remnants of vessels that were spoiled while in the fire, and 

 thrown aside as objects unfit for use. 



I did not succeed in finding the traces of a kiln or fireplace, and it is proba- 

 ble that the vessels were merely baked in an open fire, of which all vestiges 

 have been swept away long ago. The occurrence of the broken pottery was 

 confined to a comparatively small area along the bank, a space not exceeding 

 fifty paces in length, as far as I can recollect. They were most numerous in- 

 the proximity of the old digging, and at that place quite a number of them were 

 taken out of the creek into which they had fallen from the bank. Farther up 

 the creek I saw another excavation in the bank, of much smaller dimensions, 

 and likewise dug for obtaining clay. Among the shells and sherds I noticed 

 many flints which had obviously been fashioned to serve as cutting implements ; 

 tliey were, perhaps, used in tracing the ornamenlal lines on the vessels or in 

 smoothing their surfaces. 



I did not find a single complete vessel at this place, but a great variety of 

 fragments, the shape of which enabled me to determine the outline of the uten- 

 sils of which they originally formed parts. This was not a very diflScult matter, 



*This creek runs in a southwardly direction through Madison county and a part of St. 

 Clair county, and empties into the Mississippi four miles below St. Louis, near the old 

 French village of Cahokia. 



