ABORIGINAL AMERICAN BASKETRY. 



247 



E. Rod and welt foundation. 



F. Two-rod and .splint foundation. 



G. Three -rod foundation. 

 H. Splint foundation. 



I. Grass-coil foundation. 



K. Fuegian coiled basketry (see p. 258). 



These will now l)e taken up systematically and illustrated, 

 tiu-. 41.) 



A. L'()Ued uy>rl- ir!tJi<'ut f()undatt()n. — Specimens of this class 

 been already mentioned. The sewing material is babiche or tine 

 hide thong- in the cold north, or string of some sort farthei- south, 

 the Mackenzie Basin will be found the former, and in the tropica 



(See 



have 



raw- 



In 



1 and 



Fig. 41. 

 cross sections of v.\kieties in coiled basketry. 



subtropical areas the latter. If a plain, spiral spring be coiled or 

 hooked into one underneath, the simplest form of the open coiled 

 work will result. An improvement of this is effected when the 

 moving thread in passing upward after interlocking is twined one or 

 more times al)out its standing part. (See tigs. 41 A and 100.) 



The technical process just mentioned is practiced among the Atha- 

 pascan tribes of the Mackenzie River drainage. It is doubtful whether 

 anciently the predecessors of these Indian women did such tine work 

 in rawhide. The steel-bladed knife made slender babiche possible, 

 and the thrift brought about l)y the Hudson Bay Company made it 

 desiral)le. But it will be seen that the Mound-builders had the weave 

 and could produce in flax texture even more delicate than the muske- 

 moots or huntino- baas of the northern tribes. 



