From the earliest times the Hohokam were skilled workers in stone. Two distinctive traits were: the manufacture of “palettes” and of stone jars. The palettes have been so called, although we are not sure of their actual function, because the center portions contain traces of ground pigment and there is usually a slight depression which might have resulted from grinding and mixing. They are the most common of Hohokam funerary offerings. In Pioneer times, they were much simpler than in later periods. At first they were plain stone slabs, but, by the close of the period, they were being made with raised borders. The polished stone vessels were sometimes plain, sometimes incised, and in one case the incisions had been filled with paint. Late in the period carved life-forms appeared. One effigy represents the figure of a man squatting and holding a shallow basin. Other stone implements include manos and metates, mortars and pestles, and highly polished grooved axes with raised ridges on either side of the groove. As has been previously noted, there was a scarcity of projectile points. Most of those which have been found are light enough to suggest the possibility of the use of the bow and arrow. There are also some heavy, stemmed points which may have been dart-points or knives. Some stone was used in the manufacture of ornaments, although shell was more abundantly utilized for this purpose. Beads and pendants were carved from stone, and there was some use of turquoise, particularly in mosaic work. No ear plugs have been found in levels earlier than those of the Sedentary period, but they are shown on Pioneer figurines, and it seems reasonable to suppose that they may have been worn at that time. Shells provided many ornaments. Whole shells were utilized as beads by grinding off the ends to make it possible to string them; some disc beads were made. Bracelets were made of shell. They were usually thin and rather fragile and were not carved until late in the period. Bone was much less widely used by the Hohokam than by the Anasazi, but one distinctive type of object was made of this material. This is an incised bone tube, usually decorated with rectilinear designs but sometimes utilizing curvilinear patterns and occasionally life-forms. There are some indications that these tubes were painted. Their use has not been determined. Pipes were not made by the Hohokam in any period. Since these people were not as dependent on the vagaries of the weather as were the Anasazi, who depended to a great extent on flood irrigation, it is entirely logical that cloud symbols should not have been as important to them. THE COLONIAL HOHOKAM