232 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 1 33 



sections of colihue poles. Swords (qarewe) are of luma wood made 

 smooth with glass and stones, and are of varying lengths and widths. 

 One weaver at work on a blanket had seven swords: two (29 x 3 

 and 18 X i^ inches) she used in beating down the woof ; five others 

 (17 X I, 13 X -I, 9 X f, 8 X I, and 7 x | inches) she used toward the 

 end of the weaving — after the heddle had been removed — to pick up 

 alternate strands of warp. Each of the seven swords was approxi- 

 mately one-half inch thick, and each had the edge used in beating 

 thinner than the opposite one. Each one was flat on one side and 

 convex on the other, and had both ends pointed. Another implement 

 used is a heddle (tononwe). A second heddle (raijinelwe) is used 

 when weaving a blanket. Both woof (dijwewe) and warp (witraliin) 

 are yarn. 



Women sit while weaving and work from the bottom of the loom 

 upward. When the area of weaving is no longer within convenient 

 reach of the weaver, she rolls the woven part onto the lower beam 

 and lowers the upper beam. When the article is nearly completely 

 woven, she loosens the beams from the poles, reverses their positions 

 on the frame, and then proceeds to weave again from the bottom 

 upward, and ends at the part already woven. 



An Alepue woman (pi. 59) in setting up her loom leaned two 

 8-foot saplings against a fence near her ruka, and tied a 4-foot beam 

 close to the top of these and another of the same length close to the 

 bottom. She used heavy twirled yarn for tying, but could have used 

 thongs or voqui, she noted. She then sent a child to fetch a nearby 

 quila pole and with it measured the distance between the beams on 

 the pole at her right. She marked the measure on the quila pole with 

 a finger moistened with saliva. Then she measured ofif the same 

 distance on the upright pole at her left, and adjusted the upper beam 

 to equalize the distances between the beams on both poles. She was 

 now ready to stretch the warp to weave a choapino. She tied together 

 the ends of two balls of white yarn and fastened the combined ends 

 to the lower beam at the right. Then, to provide for even- and odd- 

 numbered strands, she passed one ball under the lower beam (clock- 

 wise) and over the upper beam (anticlockwise), dropped it, and did 

 the same with the second ball (pi. 59, /). She continued this opera- 

 tion, alternating the balls, until she had sufficient warp. She now 

 spread the strands into the positions in which she wanted them when 

 she began to weave. To make certain that the width of the spread was 

 what she wanted, she measured it with hand stretches. She counted 

 the strands, and remarked, "I have here 120 double strands : 120 even 

 ones and 120 odd ones. It will probably take two kilos of wool to 



