Seed Jar with Painted Motifs

This elegant jar was made by the Ancestral Puebloan peoples of the American Southwest, who used such vessels to store seeds for planting. Working with very fine brushes made of yucca plant fibers, an artist painted the jar with complex geometric designs that include two bands of interlocking frets, composed of tiny white squares with dots at the centers, separated by white lightning patterns. The square shapes may represent kernels of corn, and the lightning motifs may symbolize thunder and rain, all references to the agricultural cycle. Given the dry climate of the American Southwest, the user of this jar may have been reassured of the ongoing cycle of fertility by the symbols on the jar.