NO. 7 ARCHEOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS IN TEXAS ROBERTS II 



The piece of netting obtained from the cave ^ is too small to permit 

 the determination of what it may have been used for, but because 

 of the many similar fragments which were dug out by various speci- 

 men hunters it is possible that it may have been a small section 

 from a rabbit net such as the peoples in the Pueblo area farther north 

 and west used/ It is different from the latter in its weave, however, 

 and is quite suggestive in a general way of the technique used in the 

 manufacture of the foundations for the fur and feather cloth blankets. 

 In the latter the weaving was much finer than that of the El Paso 

 specimens, which give no indication of the attachment of either fur 

 or feathers. The fragment may possibly be from a carrying net. 



The netting was simply made, although two kinds of material were 

 used in its manufacture. Double warp threads of tightly twisted, two- 

 ply apocynum cord are in marked contrast to the weft of loosely 

 twisted agave fiber. The weft was held in place by a double twist 

 of the warp between each weft cord (pi. 4, fig. 2). The weft was 

 looped back at the edge and carried along until its end was reached, 

 when a new cord was spliced on. The warp strings were placed at an 

 average of every two inches. The double twist which held the weft in 

 place made an average space of one- fourth inch between the strands 

 of the latter. The width of the fragment obtained by the writer is 

 20 inches but its original length cannot be determined. Netting of the 

 same type was found in caves near Carlsbad, New Mexico, and a 

 portion of it presented to the National Museimi.^ 



Twisted apocynum fiber was used for other purposes than making 

 netting and cords for sandal ties. One of the specimens from the 

 large cave was a cord apron consisting of a waist string to which a 

 series of short cords had been attached (pi. 4, fig. i). The latter 

 hung down in front in a kind of fringe. Kidder and Guernsey, as 

 well as many other investigators, have found large numbers of similar 

 aprons and have determined that they were a woman's garment. Many 

 have been found on female mummies but none has been observed 

 on a male. 



Curved clubs from the caves are comparable to those from the 

 Basket Maker caves of northeastern Arizona and to some of those 

 found in southeastern Utah bv Mr. N. AI. Judd." Thev were fashioned 



'U. S. Nat. Mus. Cat. No. 340797- 



' Guernsey and Kidder, he. cit., p. 77, pi. 31, c. 



* U. S. Nat. Mus. Cat. No. 330643- 



* Guernsey and Kidder, loc. cit., p. 88, pi. 36. 



Judd, N. M., Archeological Observations North of the Rio Colorado. Bull. 

 82, Bur. Amer. Ethnol., Washington, 1926, p. 147, pi. 51. 



