ABORKUNAL AMERICAN BASKETRY. 843 



northern Calif orniii a larg'c collection of designs on their basket hats 

 arc shown in Plates o, 4, and 5 in the Ray collection from the Hupa 

 Reservation," and on Plate 6 of the same paper will !)e shown the 

 relation of i)asketry to foot gear. (See Plate 88.) 



Excepting the head gear and the foot gear, the American Indian in 

 places needed protection from rain and cold. I'he rolx^s made from the 

 tender skins of rabbits and other small animals by cutting tliem into 

 strips and making them into l)lankets by twined weaving were widely 

 diti'used in Morth America from Virginia to the Pacific. Wherever 

 the tough cedar bark abounded soft capes and rol)es were made there- 

 from by the same women who made the liaskets. The rain cloaks of 

 middle America, if they are not of oriental origin, are knotted and do 

 not belong to basketry. Other ])asketry dress was chietiy ornamental. 

 Leggings reaching to the knees made n\) by well-known processes are 

 to be found. A great deal of ceremonial regalia, even that from buck- 

 skin, is put together by ])asketmaker's [)rocesses. 



IN FINE ART AND CULTURE 



Basketry has been most useful as the patron of tine art and culture. 

 Like all other human activities, it passes from the homely useful to the 

 useless ))eautiful, and in so doing combines the two qualities whose 

 union was long ago said to be the acme of excellence. The best art 

 critics will saj^ that in man}' of their productions the American Indian 

 woman had, l)y obeying the voices within, attained a high degree of 

 excellence. The practice of this superb work, and the admiration of it, 

 elevated her; her abject state is not her fault. 



There is no doubt that in the centuries of sorrow men have suH'ered 

 more than women, since all their old occupations in which they excelled 

 have been destro3'ed and hope with them; but the pride of excellence 

 remained with the woman, who easily surpassed the whites in the work 

 she was allowed to continue. That thousands of children are now 

 being taught her art is witness of this. 



Plate 89 shows two coiled baskets from Tulare Count}", California, 

 specimens of the combined art of three or four well-known basket- 

 making stocks wdio have united at this point — the Shoshonean from the 

 east, the ^Mission Indians from the south, and the makers of coiled 

 basketry from the north. In the upper figure the basket ])owl is in 

 open sewing over a grass foundation, with ornamentation in plain 

 vertical stripes. Every item of form, color, and design in this speci^ 

 men has in it the true element of art. 



The lower basket is jar-shaped, in closer weaving and more uniform 

 in texture, but its design is especially attractive. The base is a rec- 

 tangular outline, but the pattern is made up of hourglass form 



« Smithsonian Report, 1886, pp. 205-2:!8. 



