42 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



of primitive designs and motives in fictile ware, including the adaptation of myth- 

 ologic, animal, bird and feather, insect, and reptilian figures. Many of these are so 

 highly conventionalized that they would have been practically uninterpretable 

 without the knowledge of Tusayan mythologic and sociologic concepts which Dr. 

 Fewkes fortunately possesses; consequently he has been enabled to make sub- 

 stantial contributions to knowledge of the development of artistic concepts, the 

 results of which are incorporated in two memoirs for publication, respectively, in 

 the seventeenth and nineteenth annual reports. 



In connection with other researches, Mr. W J McGee has made inquiries from dele- 

 gations of Indians visiting Washington concerning the symbolic use of feathers, 

 especially in connection with headdresses. It is well known to students that the 

 use of feathers, which, at first sight, would seem to be decorative merely, is essen- 

 tially symbolic ; but the meanings of the symbols have not been ascertained hitherto, 

 save casually and among a few tribes. During the year, the feather symbolism of 

 the Ponka and Ojibwa tribes has been discovered and recorded with tolerable com- 

 pleteness. 



WORK IN TECHNOLOGY. 



Arts and industries are correlated factors in human progress, and the lines of con- 

 ceptual development traced through the study of art motives elucidate the growth 

 of industrial devices. Accordingly, the work of the collaborators in connection 

 with art motives has contributed both directly and indirectly to aboriginal technol- 

 ogy. During the year special attention was given to lines of technical development, 

 as indicated in previous reports and in the acquisition of material for study and 

 preservation in the Museum. Especially valuable is the Steiner collection, from the 

 mounds of Etowah Valley, Georgia. It comprises 3,215 specimens of stone imple- 

 ments, earthenware, and symbolic and decorative objects of copper, shell, and stone. 

 The Indians of this district, builders of the great Etowah mound and other monu- 

 ments, were peculiarly fertile in artistic and industrial devices. In this region the 

 progressive tribes of the Siouau stock, the vigorous Cherokee, one or more of the wide- 

 ranging Algonquian tribes, the little-known Yuchi, and some of the Muskhogean 

 tribes came in frequent contact, while the influence of the arts and industries of the 

 key-dwellers of Florida was constantly felt. Here, as elsewhere, ideas and ideals were 

 stimulated by contact, whether peaceful or not, and the devices representing the 

 rapidly growing concepts are especially significant and useful in tracing the course 

 of industrial development among the aboriginal tribes. Another noteworthy acqui- 

 sition is the Morris collection from Arkansas, comprising 181 pieces of pottery, 

 together with a number of stone implements and other objects. The collection is 

 especially valuable as an illustration of types of pottery hitherto rare or unknown. 

 But the most important acquisition of archa?ologic objects procured during the year 

 is comprised in the collections made by Dr. J. Walter Fewkes from the ruins of Kin- 

 tiel, Pinedale, Four-mile, Solomonville, and others in eastern and southern Arizona 

 and southwestern New Mexico, an elaborate report on which is now being prepared. 

 Like the collections obtained at Sikyatki, Awatobi, and other Tusayan ruins, these 

 include fictile and textile products, stone, bone, and wooden implements, and objects 

 of shell and stone used for personal adornment. In symbolic decorative features 

 the mortuary food and water vessels, as well as many of the utensils recovered from 

 the houses, are exceedingly rich. The collections have been deposited in the 

 National Museum. 



The process of culture in all the five departments is by invention and accultura- 

 tion. The invention is at first individual, but when invention is accepted and used 

 by others it is accultural, and the invention of the individual may be added to tbe 

 invention of others, so that it may be the invention of many men. Objects may be 

 used without designed modification, or they may be designedly modified for a purpose. 

 The use of objects without the designed modification of them has been appplied 

 to Seri stone implements by Mr. McGee, when he calls such modified implements 



