TEXTILE FABRICS OF ANCIEMT PERU. 13 



The bit of gobelius showu in Fig. 7 represents on a large scale a por- 

 tion of a figure of a bird and the ground surrounding it. The warp 

 threads are shown projecting above and below. On these the colored 

 threads of the figure were carried back and forth. In the first place, 

 perhaps, the bird was partially or entirely outlined by carrying a black 

 thread around it. Beginning at aiiy point within the outline, say, for 

 example, at a in the lower margin of the section given, the black 

 thread — or two black threads if a solid outline were desired — would 

 be carried obliquel}^ npward to the left across the web until the turn at 

 the throat were reached. Above this point the outline takes a vertical 

 direction and is parallel with the warp. Throughout this vertical dis- 

 tance the black thread must be wrapped about a single warp strand, 

 entirely inclosing it-, and the same thing must occur whenever a vertical 

 line is to be employed as at the other turns of the neck, at the end of 

 the beak, at the back of the head, and on the right and left of the eye. 

 When the outline is all sot, the filling in of the color areas begins.^ First, 

 supposing the head is to be red, a red thread is inserted and carried back 

 and forth, omitting the eye space. N"ow, when in the process the ends 

 of the beak or the back of the head is reached, we discover no means of 

 connecting the red yarn with the black vertical outline strand without 

 covering or obscuring the latter, and the red yarn must therefore be 

 turned about the last free thread and then be carried back across the 

 head, and so on. Vertical slits are thus left between the red and the 

 black, and the same thing occurs along all vertical outlines. It will 

 further be seen that when the ground is put in about the figure, cor- 

 responding slits are left on the outside of the black lines, so that the 

 wrapped part of the black outline remains quite free or unattached. 



The effect, in cases where no outline of a distinct color is used, is 

 shown in the vertical line of junction between the color areas of the 

 ground at the right and left of the bird. In Fig. 8, the yarn of the 

 color areas passes around contiguc^s strands of the web without con- 

 necting across, and an open slit, the whole height of the ornament, 

 results. In pieces where many long vertical lines are employed, the 

 fabric is much weakened, and in many cases in this Peruvian work the 

 sides of the openings have been stitched together with a needle as in. 

 dicated at the right. The transparency effect of this work when placed 

 against the light is shown in Fig. 9, which represents in silhouette a 

 portion of the border from which the preceding figure is taken. 



Large, elaborately figured pieces are extremely interesting when 

 viewed as transparencies. Similar but very simple open-work effects 

 are occasionally secured in ordinary weaving, patterns employing two 

 or more colors being woven in patches independent of each other, the 

 ground being filled in by ordinary methods of woof insertion. The work 



1 It is possible that these figures were formed step hy step as the fabric advanced, 

 the workman carrying each color one step forward with each movement of the healds, 

 if such were used, but the peculiarities of the goods will be as clearly understood 

 from the point of view I have taken. 



