Effigies at the Museum

[CMD]

This is part 4 of a series on a visit to the Robbins Museum in Middleborough, Ma., in Feb., 2018.

Part 1 is here:

https://forums.arrowheads.com/forum/...able-artifacts


Part 2, recently revised:

https://forums.arrowheads.com/forum/...e-island-frame


Part 3:

https://forums.arrowheads.com/forum/...ook-paleo-site


These are some of my favorites, and I think most collectors would gravitate to stuff like this. In some cases, these relics are illustrated in the Massachusetts Archaeology Society's Handbook of Indian Artifacts from Southern New England, allowing me to provide closely accurate scale on what's seen here. Effigies, and other things.

Various effigies, pendants, etc...


In the bottom row, the figure on the far left is interpreted as a bear. Steatite, about 2" tall. It's drilled on the backside, about level with the bridge of the nose on the front, but not drilled through to the front. The MAS guidebook on artifacts speculates(actually, probably charter member and avocational archaeologist William Fowler's speculation, from the earliest editions of the guidebook) that it might have been mounted on a staff as a "ceremonial wand". The human figure is ceramic, and is c. 2 1/2" tall. The figure far right on the bottom row is interpreted as "possibly an owl".

[Lindenmeier-Man]

At first glance I thought mtn lion instead of bear. Amazing artifacts !

[CMD]

Yeah, I could go mountain lion, too. They were present then, but bear looks right, too...

[CMD]

For scale, the small pendant far left is c. 1 1/2" tall. And notice it has what seems to represent a meeting house. This is likely 17th century. Massachusetts Bay Colony established what were known as "praying villages", where natives who had converted to Christianity lived . The native who fashioned this was very likely a convert. On the top is a sandstone shaft abrading stone. Look closely, and you can see the image of a tortoise. Interpreted as an owner's mark, and signifying membership in the Turtle clan. It's
c. 3 3/4" long. Other pendants show a bird, and a coiled snake.


Nice! The smaller of the marine critters seen here is a porpoise, and c. 5 1/2" long:

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Glad you pointed the tortoise out on the sandstone. I’d not seen it.

[CMD]

Thunderbird petroglyphs! The thunderbird is one of the iconic images of native America. Specimen on the right is 3 3/4" tall:


Wowzer! The middle specimen is a tie-on, and 5 1/2" long. In the MAS guidebook, it is shown on the page describing what are called whaletail pendants, but it's more likely they were atlatls.


Finally, get outta town, love it!



To be continued in future installments....

[Hoss]

Sweet thanks for sharing the pictures Charlie. Love that Bifurcate.

[redrocks]

Awesome post Charlie

[tomclark]

My PRECIOUSSSSSSSS!!!!!

[Tam]

Love it Tom

[Pointhead]

This makes me want to go to the Robbins museum this week!!

[Pointhead]

Charlie I’m going up today!! Can’t wait

[CMD]

Excellent. I'm sure you will be blown away, and you will love that RI frame even more once you've seen it in person!

[CMD]

Not sure I've caught you in time, but bring your suspected slate whaletail if you can!

[CMD]

Ben, the largest, and IMHO, the best Hardaway Side Notch that Boudreau included in his guide is in the same display case as the bifurcate shaft scraper. I only realized this on my second trip:

[Pointhead]

Charlie, I didn’t think to bring my suspected whale tail, but was thinking of going to visit jay on Sunday to do some flint knapping, so perhaps we could stop by while we’re in the area. I’ll remember to bring it this time! Lol. There was too much to take in all at once while I was there.. I was shocked by the number of gouges the mueseum has..... and the effigies are something to drool over.. I was surprised they didn’t have more sinew stones on display..

[Tam]

Thanks Charlie , nice to see these never being in a museum with them yet . I would wear that red jasper one with pride .

[OnewiththewilD]

The red snake Tam? I believe it’s a polished red slate, I’ve seen it in person myself too. And it’s one of my favorite things in the whole museum

[CMD]

Yes, I believe that must be red slate, Jay. Love all those pendants!

[OnewiththewilD]

I love these museum posts Charlie, I never get tired of seeing the stuff there. When I was a kid my cousin had a first edition copy of New England Indians by Pequot press, the big sized version, and he used to let me borrow it all the time till he finally just gave it to me, I somehow lost it along time ago,argh, but I have the second edition now, anyways as you know a lot of the illustrations in that book is stuff that’s in the museum. So you’s can all imagine how mind blowing it was to have finally seen the real things in person as an adult having stared at the black and white drawings of these things almost my whole life.

[CMD]

That's cool, Jay. And it was only in creating this very thread that I realized how many more artifacts, from just this one display, were illustrated in the MAS guide. Which was great, since these things are under glass, making it impossible to provide scale in my photos. But, since the MAS guide illustrations are drawn to scale, I was able to provide the dimensions for several of the pieces in the display case. And yeah, Wilbur's book is a super resource, which I refer to all the time. I agree completely with your opinion of that book!