Ancient art of the province of Chiriqui, Colombia: Sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1884-1885, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1888, pages 3-188Holmes, William Henry
History
Ancient art of the province of Chiriqui, Colombia: Sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1884-1885, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1888, pages 3-188
Holmes, William Henry
Chiriquí (Panama : Province) -- Antiquities; Indian pottery -- Panama; Indians of Central America -- Panama
The presence of life forms in relief has produced important
modifications in the appearance and the arrangement of the painted
devices, and in many cases there is a manifest correlation between the
plastic and the painted forms: as, for example, when the body of the
vase was thought of as the body of the animal, the extremities of which
were placed upon its sides, the colored figures carried out the idea of
the creature by imitating in a more or less conventional way the
markings of the body. This will be understood through reference to the
examples presented in the following pages.
I will present, first, a series of bottles, selecting at the beginning
those decorated in the more purely geometric style and gradually
approaching those upon which animal forms are treated in a literal
manner. The few pieces selected for illustration are totally inadequate
to the proper representation of the group and must be regarded only as
average specimens, more or less typical in character.
I give first a number of examples in which the decorative devices are
arranged in horizontal zones. In Fig. 163 broad bands of ornament,
consisting of scalloped and plain lines, encircle the neck and the body
of the vessel. In finishing this piece the whole surface was painted a
rich red and highly polished; then a black coat was applied, covering
the body from the lip to the base of the design; and finally the
delineating fluid was applied, removing the black, as shown in the
narrow lines, the sharply dentate bands, and the broad, plain band
between. The second example (Fig. 164) varies somewhat in shape and
design, but is identical in color and manipulation. The dark figures are
merely the interspaces, although they appear at first glance to have
been intended for the design proper.
[Illustration: Fig. 163. Small red bottle with horizontal bands of
ornament consisting of plain and scalloped lines--½.]
[Illustration: Fig. 164. Small red bottle with encircling geometric
devices--½.]
In a numerous series of vessels the decorated bands are divided into
compartments or panels, often four in number, which spaces are occupied
by lines and figures of greatly diversified characters. In the example
shown in Fig. 165 the ground color of the principal zone is in the light
yellow gray tint of the slip, the remainder being red. This lends
brilliancy to the effect.
[Illustration: Fig. 165. Bottle with zone occupied by geometric
devices--½.]
[Illustration: Fig. 166. Bottle with broad zone containing geometric
figures--½.]
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