Ceramic: McElmo Black-on-white (Early style), bowl, AZRU-00008/4975

McElmo Black-on-white (Early style), bowl (fragmentary), Accession AZRU-00008, Catalog #4975, Morris FS 3793. Analyzed by Lori Reed 2006. Temper is granular igneous rock, sand, and other crushed rock suggesting the bowl was manufactured at Aztec. Bowl fragment represents only about 30% of vessel. Measurements: 25.5 cm orifice diameter (estimate); height unknown. Image AZRU8-4975 A: interior view of bowl fragment showing painted design. Image AZRU8-4975 B: exterior view of bowl fragment showing lug made from looped coil. Recovered from Earl Morris excavation of Room 145, Aztec West Ruin. Morris’ description of Room 145 states: “The floor of Room 145 was black from long use. In the center was a fire pit…excavated into clean sand…The lowest stratum of the fill was refuse with artifacts that included a copper bell. The surface of the deposit had been smoothed and an adobe floor laid upon it. In the center thereof was a circular fire pit, slightly smaller than the one directly beneath it, and midway between this one and the northeast corner was another, walled with cobblestones” (Morris 1928:393).
Reference: Earl Morris, 1928, Notes on Excavations in the Aztec Ruin, Volume XXVI, Part V, Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, New York.