ON THE POTTERY OF THE MOUND-BUILDERS. 103 
The pottery found at Aztalan, Wisconsin, is of a coarse texture, 
and crude in its ornamentation, like that of the European Stone 
Age.* In the first example (Fig. 25, a) the ornamentation is ef- 
fected probably by a twisted band pressed into the plastic clay ; 
and in the second example (Fig. 25, b), by a square-pointed in- 
strument, similar to that used by the Laporte Mound-builders 
(Fig. 20). 
may be remarked in the nature of a generalization, that in 
the region of the confluence of the Ohio and the Mississippi as 
the supposed centre of the Mound-builders’ empire, the pottery is 
` composed of much finer-tempered materials, is distinguished by a 
greater variety of form and outline, and the artistic conception is 
of a far higher range and fidelity of execution than are to be 
found in the specimens from what may be regarded as the frontier 
regions of Wisconsin, Northern Indiana, and Northern Ohio. 
I have said in the introduction to this article, that the Mound- 
builders, in the selection of the materials, and in the moulding of 
them into artistic forms, were far in advance of the inhabitants 
of the Bronze Epoch of Europe. The evidence on which that 
opinion is founded is contained in the illustrations which I have 
: given. While the inhabitants of the European Bronze Age were 
content, in their artistic delineations, with simply curved lines and 
chevron-like markings, the Mound-builders adopted not only the 
bold swell of the scroll-like ornamentation, but grappled with the 
‘ delineation of the human figure and human face,—the highest 
a perfection of art; and in this range of modelling, it will be ad- 
i mitted, from the examples submitted, that they soared far above 
mere caricature,—that they imprinted upon the plastic clay the 
characteristic features of their race. 
*Specimen a is almost identical in its markings with those on = pottery from 
West Kennet, En ngland (Vide Lubbock’s “ Prehistoric Times,” p. 162, fig. 154). Com- 
bare this also with specimens of aeni from New Jersey, ei by Abbott, fig. 86, in 
tbe AMERICAN NATURALIST for April, 18 : 
