ABORIGINAL AMERICAN BASKETRY. 



395 



oil the Lower ^'ukon River ])y Lueieii ^I. Turn(>r. Diameter, Si^ inches; 

 heig-ht, 6f inches. 



It is a long' way from middle Alaska to the Hupa Valley, northern 

 California. The basket here shown is No. 126520 in the U. S. National 

 Museum, collected by Captain Ray." It is introduced to show a single 

 wonderful coincidence between the work of Tinne and Hupa, who speak 

 languages of the same family in regions wide apart. It is coiled work. 

 (See tig. 132. 



Fig. 132. 



tobacco basket. 



Hupa Indians, California. 



Collepted by P. H. Ray. 



ESKIMO BASKETRY 



Baskets not only have an infinite variety of uses from village to 

 village, but among each people the}^ have a nuiltitude of uses. From 

 the shore of Norton Sound to the Kuskokwim the women are expert 

 in weaving grass mats, baskets, and bags. Grass mats are used on 

 the sleeping benches and for wrapping around ])edding. They are 

 used also as sails for umiaks. The}^ now frequently serve as curtains 

 to partition off the corners of a room or sleeping platform. Small 

 mats are placed also in the manholes of kaiaks as cushions. The bags 

 are used for storing fish, lierries, and other food supplies, or for cloth- 

 ing'. Smaller bags and ])askets are made for containing small articles 

 used in the house.'' 



Two types of basket work are found in close proximity among the 

 Eskimo in the neighl)orhood of Norton Sound and Bristol Bay, north 

 and south, the twined and the coiled. In the former (fig. 133) the 



« Smithsonian Eeport, 1886, Pt. 1, pi. xv, fig. 67. 



&E. W. Nelson, Eighteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1900, pi. 74. 



