Ethridge Collection Page One

Page 1

The oldest ceramic piece in the collection is the Lino Black-on-Gray bowl, an early Anasazi pottery type in use during the late Basket Maker III and Pueblo I Periods (ca. A.D. 600-900). The Basket Makers apparently acquired pottery-making techniques from the people of the Mogollon Culture with whom they came in frequent contact along their southern border. Lino Gray ceramics were fired in an oxygen-reducing atmosphere, a technique unique to the Anasazi.

The Red Mesa Black-on-White pitcher typifies a distinctive ceramic type which is decorated with a mineral based pigment applied over a clear white slip. Originating during the late Pueblo I Period and continuing through Pueblo II (A.D. 900-1100), this type is found mainly in sites of the eastern Anasazi area, although it was traded beyond those bounds. Pueblo II times are characterized by considerable shifts in population and a great variety in house structures. In some areas, pithouses and individual surface structures were used for habitation, but in others--such as Chaco Canyon--complex community structures were built of stone. In these pueblos, pit structures developed into subterranean ceremonial rooms called kivas.

The Wingate Black-on-Red pitcher, another Pueblo II ceramic type is also associated with the Chaco Canyon occupation. Black-on-Red vessels are relatively uncommon in the eastern Anasazi area but, when found, they are usually of this type.

The Pueblo III (or Classic) Period, dating ca. A.D. 1100-1300, is characterized by fewer but increasingly well-planned sites. Puebloan architecture was predominant in the Southwest at this time, and old boundaries marking the Anasazi, Mogollon, and Hohokam culture areas were nearly nonexistent. Finds of canals, terraces, and grid systems suggest that a large portion of the people's diet was derived from agriculture. Ceramics reflect numerous local variations; the use of black-on-red, black-on-orange, and polychrome pottery during this period is especially important in defining regional differences. Four major geographic divisions of the Western Anasazi region are distinguishable: The Navajo Mountain/Black Mesa area, the Mesa Verde area, the Hopi washes/Middle Little Colorado River area, and the Upper Little Colorado River/Zuni area. Puebloan regional centers also developed in the Eastern Anasazi region along the Rio Grande drainage and between the Salt and Gila Rivers; these centers became much more important when sites in the Four Corners area were abandoned about A.D. 1300. Anasazi influence can also be seen in wares of the Mimbres who occupied the former stronghold of the Mogollon in southwestern New Mexico. The Ethridge Collection has several fine examples of the pottery types made during the Pueblo III Period.

Although pottery in general reached a high level of perfection throughout the Southwest during the Classic Period, some of the best made and best fired ceramics came from the Kayenta Anasazi. These ceramics were widely traded. Two types are included in this collection: a Tusayan Black-on-Red pitcher which represents the Black Mesa focus of the Kayenta Anasazi and is dated to ca. A.D. 1050-1150, and Jeddito Yellow-ware bowl which was made in the northern Kayenta area near Navajo Mountain ca. A.D. 1250-1300. The Mimbres area is also known for its fine pottery during the Pueblo III Period, and is represented in this collection by two Black-on-White bowls dating ca. A.D. 1100-1200.