Adobe Gallery Blog
Late 19th-century Cochiti Pueblo Serving Bowl - C3753.15
Pueblo potters devised a method by which to start the construction of a new vessel that made use of a previous vessel. The bottom of a broken olla or an old bowl was used to form the beginning of a new jar by placing the clay in the older vessel and molding it to conform to the shape of the older one. The old broken vessel or any other form for starting a new vessel is called a puki.
The weight of new rolls of clay gradually caused the jar to expand out over the edge, forming a ridge or bulge as it rose above the top of the old vessel. This bulge was generally overlooked in historic pottery until around the turn of the 19th to the 20thcentury. It was then that potters sanded the outer wall of the vessel to eliminate the "puki line" or bulge. It is the existence of such a puki line that helps provide a time period when an item was made.