THE YAKUTAT BLANKET 



By Carolyn Osborne* 



The blanket remains which were recovered from a shaman's grave 

 on Knight Island, Yakutat Bay, were cleaned between two frames 

 of plastic screening with sprayed detergent suds and clear water. 

 Even though unfolding was done carefully the largest fragment meas- 

 ures a very ragged lOj^ (warp) inches by 12}^ (weft) inches. This 

 fragment, which is apparently from the main body of the robe (or 

 ceremonial blanket), contains neither warp (top and bottom) nor 

 weft (side) selvages. Fragments of both warp (top) and weft (side) 

 selvages do exist, but I was unable to piece these to the other frag- 

 ments to give continuity of design or weave or to give an indication 

 of size of the blanket. There can be no doubt that all of the fragments 

 belong to a single blanket. The many fragments have been placed 

 with a high degree of accuracy, in the following order: i.e., the heavy 

 geometric-patterned twined fragments with the fur binding as top 

 selvage; the twilled-twined gold or yellow with the concentric rec- 

 tangles of dark brown and with multiple tassels as the main body of 

 the textile; the heavy warp wise-twined rows and the attached fringe 

 and the wi'apped bundles as side border. One fragment of this side 

 border had a section of three-strand braid attached (?) to it; it may 

 possibly have been part of the lower border. 



DESCRIPTION 



Materials.— Samiples of the various yarns (warp; light-colored 

 weft; decorative yarn used both weftwise and warpwise; tassels; fur 

 edging) were sent to the laboratory of the Federal Bureau of Inves- 

 tigation, which very kindly consented to identify the fibers used in 

 this and other local aboriginal textiles. Their findings are as follows: 



Warp yarn: Goat (includes mountain goat) dyed light brown. [There is a 

 possibility that this might be burial staining; it seems probable that the original 

 color was either natural white or light yellow.] 



Weft yarn: Goat (includes mountain goat) dyed light brown. [This is the same 

 color as the warp yarn.] 



' I wish to express my gratitude to the following: Mr. J. Edgar Hoover, who directed the laboratory of 

 the Federal Bureau of Investigation to identify the fibers; Dr. Kaj Birket-Smith, who supplied photographs 

 of the Copenhagen blanket; and the Portland Art Museum for lending the Tsimshian blanket from the 

 Rasmussen Collection. This paper was read, in part, at the 1957 meetings of the Society for American 

 Archaeology, in Madison, Wis. After this reading Dr. Arnold Pilling kindly sent me his notes on the 

 original catalogs of the Cook and Vancouver Collections in the British Museum. 



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