OCR Text |
Show THE ANCIENT BASKET MAKERS OF SOUTHEASTERN UTAH On the first or lower shelf of the Wetherill collection there is a series of eight baskets that were probably used as food trays or Food Trays mea^ bowls. Some may have been used as gambling or Meal trays with which to toss the bone and wooden dice, Bowls. while others were, possibly, ceremonial objects that were used only on special occasions. This series is composed of specimens that are practically of the same form. They are made of willow stalks and splints and are of the " three- rod founda-tion" type, as illustrated and described by Professor Otis T. Mason in the American Anthropologist, N. S., vol. 3, No. i, p. 122. Since almost all of the baskets made by these people are of this type, Mason's description of this particular form of weave as given in the article cited may be quoted here. " Three- rod foundation This is the type of foundation called by Dr. Hudson, bam tsu wu. Among the Porno and other Mode of tribes in the western part of the United States the Manufac- most delicate pieces of basketry are in this style. Dr. ture. Hudson calls them the " jewels of coiled basketry." The surfaces are beautifully corrugated and patterns of the most elaborate character can be wrought on them. The technic is as follows : Three or four small, uniform willow stems serve for the foundation. The sewing, which may be in splints of willow, black or white carex root, or cercis stem, passes around the three stems constituting the coil, under the upper one of the bundle below, the stitches interlocking. In the California area the materials for basketry are of the finest quality. The willow stems and carex roots are susceptible of division into delicate filaments. Sewing done with these is most compact, and when the stitches are pressed closely together the foundation does not appear." Accepting this description as covering the generalities of manufacture, we may proceed to the examination of a few of the individual peculiarities. Beginning with the second specimen from the right of this part of the case we have a basket seventeen inches in diameter, which is slightly concave. The stitch is the ordinary " wrap stitch" with the exception of a space about an inch and one- half from the end of the outer coil, where the 16 |