American Indian Basketry

The origins of basketry are lost in the mists of prehistory, but making baskets is certainly one of the oldest and most nearly universal crafts of mankind. In the Americas, basket artifacts found in caves in Utah have been dated at 7000 B.C., while twined baskets said to be at least 5,000 years old have been uncovered in Peru. In the American Southwest, an entire Indian culture (ca. 100–700 A.D.) is known as "Basket Maker" because of the distinctive baskets it produced. This exhaustive survey (two volumes in one) of American Indian basketry, perhaps the finest book ever published on the subject, documents basketmaking throughout the Americas — in Eastern North America, Alaska and the Pacific Northwest, Western Canada, Oregon, California and the Interior Basin, as well as Mexico, Central and South America. Spanning a wide range of indigenous cultures (Aleutian, Tlinkit, Shoshonean, Athapascam, etc.), the detailed, carefully researched discussions in this book offer a wealth of information about woven and coiled basketry, watertight basketry, materials, basketmaking techniques and preparation, ornamentation and symbolism, as well as the uses of baskets as receptacles, in preparing and serving food, for gleaning and milling, in mortuary customs, in religion and social life, in trapping, carrying water, and in many other areas of Indian life. An interesting and informative chapter on collectors and collections and the preservation of baskets, followed by a helpful biography, rounds out the book. In addition, the author, once Curator of Ethnology at the U.S. National Museum (part of the Smithsonian Institution), enhanced this encyclopedic study with over 450 excellent photographs and illustrations. For collectors, preservationists, anthropologists, students of crafts and culture, modern basketmakers, this is an indispensable reference — a massively rich source of information about baskets, the peoples who made them, how they were made, and their role in native American life and culture.

Over 750 color photographs illustrate this long-awaited guide for collectors of vintage Native American basketry. Decades of basketry research inform the text, guiding basket lovers to a better understanding of these woven treasures. Clear images and concise descriptions, presented in an extended gallery showcasing hundreds of baskets, delineate specific tribal styles within Native North America's nine basketry regions: Southwest, Great Basin, California, Plateau, Northwest Coast, Arctic and Subarctic, Plains, Southeast, and Northeast. Unique to this book is an in-depth comparison of imported baskets being passed off as American Indian work. The cultural and historical background as well as the influence of the "Indian basket craze" are also examined. Valuable guidance on buying, selling, and caring for baskets includes a frank discussion of legal issues impacting basket collectors. Rounding out this essential reference are comprehensive regional bibliographies, Internet resource listings, and a directory of American museums exhibiting Native American baskets.

This unique book provides a complete study of the exquisite Native American basketry from the San Francisco Bay Area and the Monterey Bay region north to Sonoma, Napa, and Mendocino and eastward across the Sacramento Valley to the crest of the Sierras. Baskets of the Pomo, Ohlone (Costanoan), Coast Miwok, Esselen, Huchnom, Lake Miwok, Maidu, Wappo, and Yuki people are lavishly illustrated and knowledgably and sensitively described. Color photographs and drawings illustrate the rare, fine California Indian baskets from museum and private collections in the United States and Europe. The vast majority of these baskets are illustrated for the first time. Ralph Shanks is vice president of the Miwok Archaeological Preserve of Marin. Lisa Woo Shanks is editor of the Basketry of California and Oregon Series. They are the authors of The North American Indian Travel Guide.

Explore the stunning diversity of North American Indian and Eskimo baskets, from little-known native basketry to the more common forms. This colorful book combines manufacturing techniques, raw materials, forms, and decorations with information on native lifestyles. More than 175 regional and tribal styles are documented in an easy-to-use and beautifully illustrated format, with a newly updated value guide. Readers will be able to identify their own Indian baskets using this guide's standardized terminology, identification keys, glossary, maps, and bibliographies. Hundreds of baskets were photographed for this volume, many from the famous and unparalleled collection of the Peabody Museum of Harvard University where the authors began their basketry research in the 1970s.

Having received acclaim for their Indian Baskets, the Turnbaughs, anthropologists at the University of Rhode Island here collect over 250 traditional Native American narratives centering around the theme of baskets. They include many monochrome photographs of baskets, basketmakers, and other topics

The methods of Indian basket weaving explained in this excellent manual are the very ones employed by native practitioners of the craft. members of the Navajo School of Basketry have set down their secrets in clear and simple language, enabling even the beginner to create work that can rival theirs in grace, design, and usefulness. Beginning with basic techniques, choice of materials, preparation of the reed, splicing, the introduction of color, principles and methods of design, shaping the basket and weaves from many cultures, such as Lazy Squaw, Mariposa, Taos, Samoan, Klikitat, and Shilo, each accompanied by specific instructions. There are suggestions for the weaving of shells, beads, feathers, fan palms, date palms, and even pine needles, and recipes for the preparation of dyes. Examples of each type of basket are illustrated by photographs, often taken from more than one angle so that the bottom can be seen as well as the top and sides. Close-up photography of the various types of stitching, especially at the crucial stage of beginning the basket, is an invaluable aid to the weaver. In addition, the authors have provided line drawings which are exceptionally clear magnifications of the various weave patterns. Anyone who follows the lessons contained in this book will have a knowledge of basketry unattainable in any other way. They are so lucid and complete that the amateur as well as the experienced weaver will be able to manufacture baskets distinguishable from authentic native articles only in that they were not woven by Indians. For those who merely seek a broader knowledge of American Indian arts, the book provides a comprehensive introduction to the subject of basketry.

In recent years, Native American basketry has aroused the interest and admiration of individuals, from the scholar to the collector. It is a complex subject and offers an opportunity to study through time the various changes which transpired in its function, form and manufacture. Native American Basketry: A Living Legacy, by Frank W. Porter III, is the first major study of the subject since 1904, and presents a collection of essays written by those intimately familiar with the basket makers and basketry of North America. Illustrated with approximately 80 black-and-white photographs--many of which are historical records of basket makers and their baskets--Native American Basketry uses archaeological, ethnographic, historical and contemporary information in discussing the changes in native basketry from prehistoric times to the present. In spite of the wide range of habitats, as well as the social and cultural diversity of the basket-making tribes, it is surprising to discover the similar ways the basket makers adapted basketry after prolonged contact with nonIndian peoples. The book is especially well-suited not only for the scholar of American Indian art history, but cultural history as well.

Everything there is to know about traditional Native American basket weaving. Native American basket weaving is an intricate and powerful art, representative of the legends and ceremonies of the Indian nations and their cultures. George Wharton James’s Indian Basketry is an invaluable aid for the artist, designer, craftsman, or beginner who wants to recreate authentic and often extinct basket forms and decorative motifs of the Native American peoples. Filled with 355 illustrations and photographs of Native American basket weavers taken at the turn of the twentieth century, this pioneering study—first published in 1901—provides in-depth information about specific aspects of Indian basketry, including: • Its role in legend and ceremony • The origins of forms and designs • Materials and colors used • Weaves and stitches • The symbolism and poetry woven into each basket • Preservation • Tips for the collector • And much more! From Yolo ceremonial baskets to Oraibi sacred trays, Indian Basketry traces the origin, development, and fundamental principles of the basket designs of the major Indian tribes of the southwestern United States and Pacific Coast, along with comments on the basket weaving of a number of other North American tribes.