SA VILLE— GLAZED WARE 



mens of ancient American ceramics thus far brought to light. It is of 

 this same glazed ware, and was found in a tomb in the vicinity of 

 Tepic in western Mexico, the northernmost limit of the area in which 

 the ware has been found. This veritable treasure, which has been 

 illustrated in colors by Lumholtz, is "designed and decorated in 

 imitation of a turkey," and is further embellished by the addition of 

 gold-leaf applied over a thin coating of white stucco. This sizing is 

 placed on surfaces where the "glazed" surface has been ground off. 

 This application of gold-leaf was probably accomplished after the 

 vessel was brought to this part of ancient Mexico by trade; gilded beads 

 and potsherds have been found in the region of the present state of 

 Michoacan by Plancarte, and this type of decoration of pottery 

 artifacts seems to be unique in this culture area. 



Lumholtz had an analysis made of several small pieces of the 

 base of this jar by Prof. Morris Loeb, of New York University, who 

 found "that the smooth, glistening surface was not a glaze. . . . 

 The analysis did not convince Professor Loeb that the 'glaze' and the 

 body are of widely different material; nor that the glaze is more 

 fusible than the body — rather the reverse. The body, although grey, 

 contains very little carbon, whereas the glaze contains a large amount 

 of it." 1 



In 1900 the writer obtained two magnificently mottled specimens 

 from the ruins of Teotihuacan, in the valley of Mexico, and these are 

 now in the collections of the American Museum of Natural History. 

 Several years later a number were found in a tomb in the same ruins, 

 and are figured by Batres in his report on Teotihuacan published in 

 1906. 2 He describes one specimen as having "reflections of bronzed 

 metal, color of Barbedienne patina." In various other publications, 

 which we need not cite here, vessels of this type have been illus- 

 trated and it is safe to say that more than a hundred vessels of this 

 ware exist either in private hands or in public museums. They have 

 been found in the region embraced between the republic of Salvador 

 in Central America and the territory of Tepic in Mexico. 



More recently, in 1915, Spinden published his "Notes on the 

 Archeology of Salvador," 3 in which he has attempted to classify 

 the antiquities of that region by his system of art development, 

 under "Archaic", "Transition between Archaic and Maya", "Maya", 

 and "Post-Maya" periods. Dr Spinden assigns this "glazed-ware" 

 pottery to the "Post-Maya" period, and illustrates several vessels of 



1 Unknown Mexico, vol. II, pp. 295-299, pi. vii. 



- Plates i-vlii. 



' American Anthropologist, N. s., vol. XVII, no. 3, pp. 446-491. 



[ 42.3 1 



