Art in Shell of the Ancient Americans: Second annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1880-81, pages 179-306Holmes, William Henry
History
Art in Shell of the Ancient Americans: Second annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1880-81, pages 179-306
Holmes, William Henry
Indian art; Indians -- Antiquities
The gorget presented in Fig. 1, Plate LI, belongs to the collection of
Mr. F. M. Perrine, and was obtained from a mound in Union County, Ill.
It is a little more than three inches in diameter and has been ground
down to a uniform thickness of about one-twelfth of an inch. The
surfaces are smooth and the margin carefully rounded and polished. Near
the upper edge are two perforations for suspension. The cord used passed
between the holes on the concave side, wearing a shallow groove. On the
convex side, or back, the cord marks extend upward and outward,
indicating the usual method of suspension about the neck. The cross
which occupies the center of the concave face of the disk, is quite
simple. It is partially inclosed on one side by a semicircular line, and
at present has no other definition than that given by four triangular
perforations which separate the arms. The face of the cross is
ornamented with six carelessly drawn incised lines, which interlace in
the center, as shown in the cut--three extending along the arm to the
right and three passing down the lower arm to the inclosing line. I have
not been able to learn anything of the character of the interments with
which this specimen was associated.
Fig. 2 of the same plate represents a large shell cross, the encircling
rim of which has been broken away. The perforations are still intact.
The cross is quite plain. This specimen is very much decayed, and came
to the National Museum inside of a skull obtained from a grave at
Charleston, Mo. Beyond this there is no record of the specimen.
[Illustration: PL. LI--SHELL GORGETS--THE CROSS.
1. From a mound, Union County, Ill.
2. From Charleston, Mo.
(1/1)]
In Fig. 1, Plate LII, I present a large fragment of a circular shell
ornament, on the convex surface of which a very curious ornamental
design has been engraved. The design, inclosed by a circle, represents a
cross such as would be formed by two rectangular tablets or slips, slit
longitudinally and interlaced at right angles to each other. Between the
arms of the cross in the spaces inclosed by the circular border line are
four annular nodes, having small conical depressions in the center.
These nodes have been relieved by cutting away portions of the shell
around them. In the center of the cross is another small node or ring
similarly relieved. The lines are neat and deeply incised. The edge of
the shell has been broken away nearly all around. The accompanying cut
represents the ornament natural size--one and a half inches in diameter
and one-sixteenth of an inch in thickness. It was obtained from a mound
on Fain's Island, Tennessee.
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