The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, November 30, 1902, Page 5

THE SUNPAY CALL. THE HOPI F all the numerous crazes that have come and gone the Indian basket has been the most lasting of all. It means something to own a good collection. First and fore- most it is quite the thing to have a cor- e ively to the workings of the red people and there is hardly a house in this city that falls to boast of one or two trinkets at least. Again they expensive and most difficuit , not to mention that the buyer of a valued basket must be well up In re before he knows or appre- e desi the colors and the es which appear most simple to the lated of the most interesting as well as ial books on basketry is that com- ge Wharton James, who for ty-five years has spent the time living with and The pictures, which r page, were all taken ever he saw anything that ood or typical extracts from his should interest all collectors: est vesseis used by mankind shelis, broken gourds receptacles that pre- ortunely to the s his intelligence n place to place a receptable for water wher he hot and desert regions be- on. But accl- appen to the frag- the suggestion of means of fiber nets L step toward basket- It is easy to see how ge a gourd thus surrounded sustaining or carrying net led use of the net after e broken pieces, and timately would be made for without reference to le. Weaving once begun, w rough or crude, improve- follow, and hence the et.” savages on earth so crude e no form of basketry. Ths beasts are basket-makers, and act for themselves lit- re they may hide. Long kers, the potter, or even thers of the Fates, g them out and f Coarse basketry or i charred in very anclent were before the fi the cook, cz rs. h few exceptions women, the wide world over, are the basket-makers, net- ters and we ers.”—Otis T. Mason. “What Victor Hugo strikingly expressed about the ca drals of Europe when he exclatmed, ‘The book has killed the buiiding be truthfully applied to the Indian in the expression, ‘clviliza- tion has killed the basket.” For, as the Indian woman finds that she can pur- chase for & few cents the pans, pots and kettles used by her civilized sister, she loses the desire to spend weary days, and even months, in making baskets, which, in the past, served alone as her domestic utensils. Consequently basket-making as & fine art among the aborigines is rapidly éying out. True, there are still many baskets made, and on a2 recent trip to the high Sierras of California I found a number of first-class basket-makers at work, and, more pleasing still, some of the young girls were learning the art. But in almost every case the basket- maker of to-day is dominated by a rude commercialism rather than by a desire to make a basket which shall be her best prized household treasure as the highest expression of which she is capable of the art instinct within her. Hence the rage for old baskets. A true eollector does not h & basket made to sell, and, as the baskets are comparatively limited in the opportunity to secure them passing away, if it is not al- appeared. Indian ceremonies baskets play a most important part. In one of the great healing ceremonies and dances of he Navajos the baskets have a distinct place. One of two baskets must be used. he whole series of dances, prayers, songs, etc., are called ‘Hasjeiti Dalljis.’ ey are conducted by one of the lead’'ng ns of the tribe and only the most can afford them, for the cost is , even as high as hundreds and often or three thousands of dollars. For two nine days these ceremonies last, the lirst day being devoted to the building and ded- n of a medicine hogan and a sweat und this sweat house wands of tur- thers were placed, which were hither in oneof these sacred bas- and when the sweating process was T the wands were collected, placed in basket and removed to the medicine the fourth day two of these baskets ured prominently in the ceremonies. A medicine basket containing amole root and Wwater was placed in front of a circle made of sand and covered with pine boughs. A second basket contained water and a quantity of pine needies sufficlently thick to form a dry surface, and on the top of PASKET DANCE AT ORAIBI , ARIZONA SEORGE YWHARTON SVAH these needles & number of valuable neck- laces of coral, turquoise and silver were placed. A square was formed on the edge of the basket with four of the turkey wands before mentioned. The song priest with rattles led several prrests in singing. The invalid sat to the northeast of the cir- cle, a breechcloth his only.apparel. Dur- ing the chanting an attendant made suds by macerating the amole and beating it up and down in the water. The basket re- mained in position; the man stooped over it, facing north; his position allowed the sunbeams which came through the fire openings to fall upon the suds. When the basket was a mass of white froth the at- tendant washed the suds from his hands by pouring water from a Paluti basket water-bottle over them, after which the song priest came forward and with corn polien drew a cross over the suds, which stood firm like the beaten whites of eggs, the arms of the cross pointing to the car- dinal points. A circle of the pollen was then made around the edge of the suds. This crossing and circling of the basket of suds with the pollen is supposed to give them additional power in restoring the in- valid to health. The invalid now knelt upon the pinon boughs in the center of the same circle. A handful of the suds was placed on his head. The basket was now placed mear him, and he bathed head thoroughly; the maker of the suds afterward assisted him in bathing the en- tire body with the suds, and pleces of yucca were rubbed upon the body. The chant continued through the ceremony and closed just as the rematnder of the suds was emptied by the attendant over the invalid’s head. The song priest col- lected the four wands from the second basket, and an attendant gathered the necklaces; a second attendant pjaced the basket before the Invalld, who was now sitting In the center of the circie, and the AW DESIGN OF FTLYING BATS ON CAHUILLA DASKET . A , A > WEDDING: BASKE. T, first attendant assisted him in bathing tne entire body with his mixture; the body was quite covered with the pine needles, which had become very soft from soaking. The invalid then returned to his former posi- tion at the left of the song priest, and the pine needles of the yucca, or amole, to- gether with the sands, were carried out and deposited at the foot of a pinon tree. The body of the invalid was dried by rub- bing with meal. “Later in the day at another most elaborate ceremony, baskets filled with food are placed in a circle around a fire in the medicine lodge. One of the priests takes a pinch of the food from each basket and places it in another basket. Then it is prayed over, smoked over and thus made a powerful medicine by the song priest. After the priest has gone through several performances with it, the invalid dips his three first fingers into the mixture, puts them in his mouth, and loudly sucks in the air. This is repeated four times. Then all the attendants do likewise, with a prayer for rain, good crops, health and riches. This food i afterward dried by the chief medicine man, made into a powder and is one of his most potent medicines. “On the sixth day a great sand paint- ing is made in the medicine lodge, and the invalid, as he enters, is required to take the sacred medicine basket, which is now filled with the sacred meal, and sprinkle the painting with it. The chief figures of the painting were the goddesses of the rainbow, whose favor it was desired he should gain. Again and again in the ceremonies these sacred baskets are used and on the ninth day in the concluding dance the invalid takes it full of sacred meel and sprinkles all the dancers. “If the margin is worn through or torn, the basket is unfit for sacred use. The basket is one of the perquisites of the shaman when the rites are done; A SABDBS EASYET but he, In turn, must give 1t away and must be careful never to eat out of it. Notwithstanding its sacred uses, food may be served In it by other person than the shaman who has used it ceremo- nially. “The recent researches of Fewkes and others have done much to further our knowledge of the symbolism of aborig- inal art. Little by little we are begin- ning to reap the harvest of fascinating lore and myth and legend connected with the designs on pottery, basketry, shields, masks, etc., “Perhaps the most common design' in California baskets is that of the diamond- backed rattlesnake. Another common California and North Pacific region design is that of the quail. The distinguishing feature of this design is the plume, which appears something like a rude sketch of a golf club and is invariably shown in verti- cal square-tipped appendices to parallelo- grams or triangles, which represent the bodies of the birds. Birds of different kinds besides the quail are often repre- sented. One basket has fiying geese and flying bats. In an Apache basket are sev- eral butterfiles, and also butterfly wings. *“In the Hopl basket is a highly conven- tionalized design which I have been told represents both the dragon fly and the bee. The splder-web design, so important to the Hopl, is shown and is also repre- sented In the Apache basket and in the Agua Callente baskets in the hands of the weavers. “The greatest source of pleasure in bas- ketry, to my mind, is to be found in the as yet almost untouched well of sym- bolism; the poetry, the religion, the super- stitlon woven by the humble Amerind into her basket " “I once found a basket at Saboba with stitches and cross stitches upon it, mak- ing a criss-cross design that seemed as if it could not be imitative, conventionalized, ! & i e Nl VEAVER o symbolic or ldeograpnic. Yet as I talked with Juana Apopas, its maker, a bright, witty, elderly woman, I was convinced that it had its meaning. For a long time she parried all my questions with the In- dlan’s dread of being laughed at or de- rided, but at length convinced that I hould rot ridicule her, she said that over and over again when she was weary and tired, and angered at the subjection of her people to the rude. and domineering whites, as she lay down at night, her eyes ‘wandered to the ‘long path of gray light in the sky—the milky way—and she felt she would like to pass away, to die. Then her spirit would walk on this path of light with “those above,” and from thence she could look down upon the white people in the sorrow she hoped wourd come upon them for thelr wicked treatment of her people.’ “The mingled pathos, indignation anf} anger with which she sald these things showerd the deep current of feeling which possessed her, though she was living among - surroundings of poverty and qualor, and had a physiognomy that to the general visitor of her village con- tained nothing but the low, groveling, an- imal and sensual “This criss-cross pattern was her meth- od of representing the milky-way. “Dr. Hudson says: ‘There are ten grad- ed rules governing a ‘basket crank’ in es- timating the value of a Poma basket. Given in the order of their importance they are: Weave, symmetry of outline, of stitch, of thread, delicacy of thread, material, pattern, ornamentation, general effect and size. Bize is properly placed last in the list, because a shibu's dlameter is seldom greater than fifteen inchea. However, there is a rare specimen in a Chicago private collection which measures nine feet in circumference, and for which ‘was pald $800." cARUILLA INDI AN COPNER. IN LIBSBRAEY OF GEORGE. WHARTON JAMES, PASADENA. “GATHERING INFORMATION—Those who are (nterested in the preservation of accurate knowledge of Indian baskets and their weavers can do good service in thelr respective localities by recording such particulars as the following blank calls for, verifying tue answers givem by one weaver by comparison with those given by others.” Only 'by persistent endeavor can reliable information be obtained. The blank is one prepared and sent out by Professor Mason ot the Smithsonian Thati- lllfluhl to whom lovers of basketry ows 80 much: Basket Work of American Indians. «Location of Tribe. Legend .. Specimen