Native American, Southern United States, Arkansas, Arkansas County, Benson site, Mississippian / Caddo culture, ca. 1200 to 1700 CE. A hand-built pottery bowl in a warm beige-brown with an incised shoulder, a repeating program of linear and geometric markings. Caddoan pottery was the finest produced by the Mississippian culture, with very thin walls, intricate motifs, and well-proportioned shapes. These ceramics are largely considered the apex of the art of the Southeast. Size: 7.75" Diameter x 3.75" H (19.7 cm x 9.5 cm)
According to the Sam Noble Museum (Oklahoma's Museum of Natural History), "We will never fully understand the underlying social and spiritual significance of the meanings intertwined within the designs of Caddo pottery. This knowledge was passed down orally and was not recorded by early European explorers, so it has since been partially lost through attempts by the United States government in the 19th and 20th centuries to overwhelm and assimilate the Caddo people. Caddo people began an earlier rapid change after their first contacts with Spanish colonists in the 1500s. Smallpox, measles, cholera and other European diseases ravaged the Caddo and reduced their population by 95 percent before 1700. Archaeological evidence reveals larger villages along the Arkansas, Red, and Ouachita rivers were abandoned and a change from burial of elites only in mounds to community mortuaries during this time period."
Provenance: private Santa Fe, New Mexico USA collection; ex-Michelle Torrez collection, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
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#178706
Condition
Chips to rim and hole to basin as shown. Light mineral deposits. Overall great condition.