628 ANNUAL EEPORT SMITHSONIAN" INSTITUTION, 192 8 



Materials used in weaving. — Textile garments have been woven 

 from a large number of native vegetable or animal fibers prior to the 

 introduction of sheep into the southwest by the Spanish missions. 

 The wool of the mountain sheep had formerly been used as a yarn 

 by the tribes of the Pacific northwest coast. These tribes also had 

 utilized the hair of the mountain goat and that of an extinct variety 

 of dog. Buffalo hair had been used as a yarn in the valley of the 

 lower Mississippi, where the Natchez also wove a cloth from the 

 fiber of the mulberry. In Mexico and in Central America generally 

 no animal yielding an available supply of hair or wool existed, so 

 that the native use of cotton as a textile fiber prevailed. Even in 

 Peru, where the wool of the llama, vicuna, and alpaca was widely 

 utilized, the weaving of cotton cloth prevailed. We see from this 

 that the utilization of cotton as a textile fabric exceeded that of 

 native wools derived from the pelts of animals. Cotton lends itself 

 readily to spinning and was cultivated to some extent throughout the 

 entire weaving area of Central and South America. 



Fabrics of hark. — Indian tribes of the Pacific Northwest coast, 

 and of the Pueblo and Central American areas fashioned garments 

 from bark. The bast fiber was either plaited, as in basketry, or was 

 beaten into a thin sheet, sewn together, and painted much as were the 

 skins of animals farther north. Cedar bark fiber was plaited on 

 the Pacific Northwest coast as far south as the Columbia River 

 and used as articles of dress, matting, and associated objects. Tribes 

 of the Plateau or Rocky Mountain area employed the ,bark of the 

 sagebrush as a weaving fiber, while the Shoshonean tribes extended 

 this practice far into the SoutliAvest. Farther north the bark of the 

 willow was used as a textile fiber. Tribes occupying the region east 

 of the Mississippi obtained a fiber from basswood bark. Even corn- 

 husks were plaited into several objects of dress by the Iroquois of 

 the Northeastern States. (PI. 1.) This practice reappears among 

 the Hopi of Arizona in the shaping of circular plaited coils used as a 

 hairdress frame by the unmarried girls. In California and Oregon, 

 also in the Southeastern States, Apocynum or Indian hemp and 

 various grasses were plaited or woven. 



In Central and South America the number of uses of bark fibers 

 increases only to be supplemented or entirely supplanted in the 

 forestecf tropical lowlands of Brazil by the use of bird feathers. A 

 bark cloth finishing tool is used by the Guaymie Indians of Chiriqui, 

 in western Panama, in the preparation of bark cloth. The final 

 beating and smoothing of the bark cloth is accomplished by means of 

 this instrument. The handle is of wood, while the working part is a 

 heavy ribbed shell perforated at the apex, where it is secured to the 

 roughly constructed wooden handle. (Cat. No. 272604, U. S. N. M.) 



