Pueblo And Navaho Pottery And Silverware
Primitive Processes. The primitive industries of a primitive people are always interesting to the student. They are more; they often reveal more than appears at first sight. We, with our present knowledge of improved mechanical methods, stand and watch an Indian silversmith or potter, and we laugh at the crudity of the methods employed, naturally comparing them with our own. But this is not the proper way to look upon the work of the aborigine. Rather let the gazer imagine himself without any of his advanced knowledge. Let him project himself into past ages, and find himself groping his way out of the darkness of primitive ignorance. He will find himself seeking for many centuries, ere he invents and discovers even the rude processes used today by the Indian. As an inventor, the aborigine has laid us under great obligation, for he discovered the first steps of mechanical progress, without which all later steps would have been impossible.

Hopi Pottery. In the Hopi House, the processes of making pottery and silverware by primitive methods may be seen in active operation, though in the manufacture of silver, some modern appliances have taken the place of the ancient ones. In the pottery, however, everything is exactly as it used to be before the white race appeared on the American continent. The Hopi woman brings her clay with her from some pit or quarry in Hopiland, where experience has demonstrated a good pottery clay is found.