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PREHISTORIC TEXTILE ART
OF
EASTERN UNITED STATES
BY
WILLIAM HENRY HOLMES
CONTENTS
Page
Introductory 9
Scope of the work 9
Definition of the art 10
Materials and processes 10
Sources of information 11
Products of the art 13
Wattle work 13
Basketry 15
Types of basketry 15
Baskets 15
Sieves and strainers 17
Cradles 18
Shields 18
Matting 18
Pliable fabrics 21
Development of spinning and weaving 21
Cloths 22
Nets 26
Feather-work 27
Embroidery 28
Fossil fabrics 28
Modes of preservation 28
Fabrics from caves and shelters 29
Charred remains of fabrics from mounds 35
Fabrics preserved by contact with copper 36
Fabrics impressed on pottery 37
INDEX
ILLUSTRATIONS
Page
PLATE I. Products of the textile art: _a_, Openwork
fish baskets of Virginia Indians; _b_, Manner of
weaving: _c_, Basket strainer; _d_, Quiver of rushes;
_e_, Mat of rushes 18
II. Mat of split cane 28
III. Mantle or skirt of light-colored stuff 30
IV. Fringed skirt 32
V. Frayed bag and skeins of hemp fiber 34
VI. Charred cloth from mounds in Ohio 36
VII. Drawings of charred fabric from mounds 38
VIII. Copper celts with remnants of cloth 40
IX. Bits of fabric-marked pottery, with clay casts of same 44
FIG. 1. Fish weir of the Virginia Indians 14
2. Use of mats in an Indian council 19
3. Use of mat in sleeping 20
4. Section of cliff showing position of grave shelter 31
5. Portion of mantle showing manner of weaving 32
6. Analysis of the weaving of fringed skirt 32
7. Former costumes of woman and girl in Louisiana 33
8. Border of bag 34
9. Sandal or moccasin from a Kentucky cave 35
10. Fine, closely woven cloth preserved by contact with
copper beads 36
11. Small portion of rush matting preserved by contact
with copper 37
12. Split-cane matting from Petite Ause island,
Louisiana 38
13. Fabric-marked vase from a mound in North Carolina 39
14. Diagonal fabric, ancient pottery of Tennessee 39
15. Fabric from the ancient pottery of Alabama 40
16. Twined fabric from ancient pottery, Tennessee 40
17. Twined fabric from ancient pottery, Tennessee 40
18. Twined fabric from ancient salt vessel, Illinois 41
19. Twined fabric from ancient salt vessel, Illinois 41
20. Twined fabric from a piece of clay, Arkansas 42
21. Twined fabric from ancient pottery, Tennessee 42
22. Twined fabric from ancient pottery, Missouri 42
23. Twined fabric from ancient pottery, Carter county,
Tennessee 43
24. Twined fabric from ancient pottery, Tennessee 43
25. Twined fabric from ancient pottery, Tennessee 43
26. Twined fabric, with patterns, Ohio valley 44
27. Net from ancient pottery, District of Columbia 44
28. Net from ancient pottery, North Carolina 45
PREHISTORIC TEXTILE ART OF EASTERN
UNITED STATES
BY W. H. HOLMES
INTRODUCTORY.
SCOPE OF THE WORK.
About the year 1890 the writer was requested by the Director of the
Bureau of Ethnology to prepare certain papers on aboriginal art, to
accompany the final report of Dr. Cyrus Thomas on his explorations of
mounds and other ancient remains in eastern United States. These papers
were to treat of those arts represented most fully by relics recovered
in the field explored. They included studies of the art of pottery, of
the textile art and of art in shell, and a paper on native tobacco
pipes. Three of these papers were already completed when it was decided
to issue the main work of Dr. Thomas independently of the several papers
prepared by his associates. It thus happens that the present paper,
written to form a limited section of a work restricted to narrow
geographic limits, covers so small a fragment of the aboriginal textile
field.
The materials considered in this paper include little not germane to the
studies conducted by Dr. Thomas in the mound region, the collections
used having been made largely by members of the Bureau of Ethnology
acting under his supervision. Two or three papers have already been
published in the annual reports of the Bureau in which parts of the same
collections have been utilized, and a few of the illustrations prepared
for these papers are reproduced in this more comprehensive study.
Until within the last few years textile fabrics have hardly been
recognized as having a place among the materials to be utilized in the
discussion of North American archeology. Recent studies of the art of
the mound-building tribes have, however, served to demonstrate their
importance, and the evidence now furnished by this art can be placed
alongside of that of arts in clay, stone, and metal, as a factor in
determining the culture status of the prehistoric peoples and in
defining their relations to the historic Indians. This change is due to
the more careful investigations of recent times, to the utilization of
new lines of archeologic research, and to the better knowledge of the
character and scope of historic and modern native art. A comparison of
the textiles obtained from ancient mounds and graves with the work of
living tribes has demonstrated their practical identity in materials, in
processes of manufacture, and in articles produced. Thus another
important link is added to the chain that binds together the ancient and
the modern tribes.
DEFINITION OF THE ART.
The textile art dates back to the very inception of culture, and its
practice is next to universal among living peoples. In very early stages
of culture progress it embraced the stems of numerous branches of
industry afterward differentiated through the utilization of other
materials or through the employment of distinct systems of construction.
At all periods of cultural development it has been a most indispensable
art, and with some peoples it has reached a marvelous perfection, both
technically and esthetically.
Woven fabrics include all those products of art in which the elements or
parts employed in construction are more or less filamental, and are
combined by methods conditioned chiefly by their flexibility. The
processes employed are known by such terms as wattling, interlacing,
plaiting, netting, weaving, sewing, and embroidering.
MATERIALS AND PROCESSES.
Viewing the entire textile field, we find that the range of products is
extremely wide. On the one hand there is the rude interlacing of
branches, vines, roots, and canes in constructing houses, weirs, cages,
rafts, bridges, and the like, and on the other, the spinning of threads
of almost microscopic fineness and the weaving of textures of marvelous
delicacy and beauty.
The more cultured peoples of Central America and South America had
accomplished wonders in the use of the loom and the embroidery frame,
but the work of the natives of the United States was on a decidedly
lower plane. In basketry and certain classes of garment-making, the
inhabitants of the Mississippi valley were well advanced at the period
of European conquest, and there is ample evidence to show that the
mound-building peoples were not behind historic tribes in this matter.
In many sections of our country the art is still practiced, and with a
technical perfection and an artistic refinement of high order, as the
splendid collections in our museums amply show.
The degree of success in the textile art is not necessarily a reliable
index of the culture status of the peoples concerned, as progress in a
particular art depends much upon the encouragement given to it by local
features of environment. The tribe that had good clay used earthenware
and neglected basketry, and the community well supplied with skins of
animals did not need to undertake the difficult and laborious task of
spinning fibers and weaving garments and bedding. Thus it appears that
well-advanced peoples may have produced inferior textiles and that
backward tribes may have excelled in the art. Caution is necessary in
using the evidence furnished by the art to aid in determining relative
degrees of culture.
SOURCES OF INFORMATION.
The failure of the textile art to secure a prominent place in the field
of archeologic evidence is due to the susceptibility of the products to
decay. Examples of archaic work survive to us only by virtue of
exceptionally favorable circumstances; it rarely happened that mound
fabrics were so conditioned, as the soil in which they were buried is
generally porous and moist; they were in some cases preserved through
contact with objects of copper, the oxides of that metal having a
tendency to arrest decay. The custom of burial in caves and rock
shelters has led to the preservation of numerous fabrics through the
agency of certain salts with which the soil is charged. Preservation by
charring is common, and it is held by some that carbonization without
the agency of fire has in some cases taken place.
Considerable knowledge of the fabrics of the ancient North American
tribes is preserved in a way wholly distinct from the preceding. The
primitive potter employed woven textiles in the manufacture of
earthenware; during the processes of construction the fabrics were
impressed on the soft clay, and when the vessels were baked the
impressions became fixed. The study of these impressions led to meager
results until the idea was conceived of taking castings from them in
clay, wax, or paper; through this device the negative impression becomes
a positive reproduction and the fabrics are shown in relief, every
feature coming out with surprising distinctness; it is possible even to
discover the nature of the threads employed and to detect the manner of
their combination.
Evidence of the practice of textile arts by many ancient nations is
preserved to us by such implements of weaving as happened to be of
enduring materials; spindle-whorls in clay and stone are perhaps the
most common of these relics. These objects tell us definitely of the
practice of the art, but give little insight into the character of the
products. It is a notable fact that evidence of this class is almost
wholly wanting in the United States; spindle-whorls have in rare cases
been reported from southern localities, and a few writers have mentioned
their use by modern tribes.
It happens that in some cases we may learn something of the progress
made by vanished peoples in this art by a study of the forms of such of
their earthen vessels as were manifestly derived from baskets, or made
in imitation of them. The ornamental art of peoples well advanced in
culture often bears evidence of the influence of the system of
combination of parts followed originally in the textile arts, and little
art, ancient or modern, in which men have endeavored to embody beauty,
is without strongly marked traces of this influence. By the study of
archaic ornament embodied in clay, wood, and stone, therefore, the
archeologist may hope to add something to the sum of his knowledge of
ancient textiles. It should be noted that the pottery of the
mound-builders shows less evidence of the influence of textile forms
than does that of most other nations, and some groups of their ware
appear to present no recognizable traces of it whatever.
Although much information has been brought together from all of the
sources mentioned, it is not at all certain that we can form anything
like a complete or correct notion of the character and scope of the art
as practiced by the mound-builders. No doubt the finest articles of
apparel were often buried with the dead, but a very small fraction only
of the mortuary wrappings or costumes has been preserved, and from vast
areas once thickly inhabited by the most advanced tribes nothing
whatever has been collected. Of embroideries, featherwork, and the like,
so frequently mentioned by early travelers, hardly a trace is left.
The relations of our historic tribes to the ancient peoples of our
continent and to all of the nations, ancient and modern, who built
mounds and earthworks, are now generally considered so intimate that no
objection can be raised to the utilization of the accounts of early
explorers in the elucidation of such features of the art as archeology
has failed to record. The first step in this study may consist quite
properly of a review of what is recorded of the historic art.
Subsequently the purely archeologic data will be given.
PRODUCTS OF THE ART.
In undertaking to classify the textile fabrics of the mound region it
is found that, although there is an unbroken gradation from the rudest
and heaviest textile constructions to the most delicate and refined
textures, a number of well-marked divisions may be made. The
broadest of these is based on the use of spun as opposed to unspun
strands or parts, a classification corresponding somewhat closely to the
division into rigid and pliable forms. Material, method of combination
of parts, and function may each be made the basis of classification,
but for present purposes a simple presentation of the whole body of
products, beginning with the rudest or most primitive forms and ending
with the most elaborate and artistic products, is sufficient. The material
will be presented in the following order: (1) Wattle work; (2)
basketry; (3) matting; (4) pliable fabrics or cloths.
WATTLE WORK.
The term wattling is applied to such constructions as employ by
interlacing, plaiting, etc., somewhat heavy, rigid, or slightly pliable
parts, as rods, boughs, canes, and vines. Primitive shelters and
dwellings are very often constructed in this manner, and rafts, cages,
bridges, fish weirs, and inclosures of various kinds were and still are
made or partly made in this manner. As a matter of course, few of these
constructions are known to us save through historic channels; but traces
of wattle work are found in the mounds of the lower Mississippi valley,
where imprints of the interlaced canes occur in the baked clay plaster
with which the dwellings were finished. When we consider the nature of
the materials at hand, and the close correspondence in habits and
customs of our prehistoric peoples with the tribes found living by the
earliest explorers and settlers, we naturally conclude that this class
of construction was very common at all known periods of native American
history.
The constructors of native dwellings generally employed pliable branches
or saplings, which are bound together with vines, twigs, and other more
pliable woody forms. John Smith says of the Indians of Virginia[1]
that--
Their houses are built like our Arbors, of small young
springs bowed and tyed, and so close covered with Mats, or
the barkes of trees very handsomely, that notwithstanding
either winde, raine, or weather, they are as warm as stooues,
but very smoaky, yet at the toppe of the house there is a
hole made for the smoake to goe into right over the fire.
[1] Hist. Virginia, John Smith. Richmond, 1819, vol. I, p.
130.
Butel-Dumont also, in describing the dwellings of the Natchez Indians of
the lower Mississippi region, speaks of the door of an Indian cabin
"made of dried canes fastened and interlaced on two other canes placed
across."[2]
A singular use of wattle work is mentioned by Lafitau. He states that
the young men, when going through the ordeal of initiation on attaining
their majority, were placed apart in--
An inclosure very strongly built, made expressly for this
purpose, one of which I saw in 1694, which belonged to the
Indians of Paumaünkie. It was in the form of a sugar loaf and
was open on all sides like a trellis to admit the air.[3]
Of a somewhat similar nature was the construction of biers described by
Butel-Dumont. Speaking of the Mobilians, he says:
When their chief is dead they proceed as follows: At 15 or 20
feet from his cabin they erect a kind of platform raised
about 4½ feet from the ground. This is composed of four
large forked poles of oak wood planted in the earth, with
others placed across; this is covered with canes bound and
interlaced so as to resemble greatly the bed used by the
natives.[4]
According to John Lawson, similarly constructed "hurdles" were in use
among the Carolina Indians.
[Illustration: 1.--Fish weir of the Virginia Indiana (after Hariot).]
The tide-water tribes of the Atlantic coast region made very frequent
use of fish weirs, which were essentially textile in character. John
Smith mentions their use in Virginia, and Hariot gives a number of
plates in which the weirs are delineated. The cut here given (figure 1)
is from Hariot's plate XIII. It represents a very elaborate trap; much
simpler forms are shown in other plates. Slender poles set in the
shallow water are held in place by wattling or interlacing of pliable
parts.
It is probable that traps of similar character were used by the
mound-building tribes wherever the conditions were favorable. The only
apparent traces of such weirs yet found in any part of the country are a
number of stumps of stakes discovered by H. T. Cresson in Delaware river
near Wilmington, but these appear to be much heavier than would have
been used for the purpose by the natives.
Another somewhat usual use of wattling is mentioned by various authors.
Butel-Dumont speaks of a raft made of poles and canes, and Du Pratz,
writing of the Louisiana Indians, says:
The conveniencies for passing rivers would soon be suggested
to them by the floating of wood upon the water. Accordingly
one of their methods of crossing rivers is upon floats of
canes, which are called by them Cajeu, and are formed in this
manner. They cut a great number of canes, which they tie up
into faggots, part of which they fasten together sideways,
and over these they lay a few crossways, binding all close
together, and then launching it into the water.[5]
We learn from various authors that cage-like coffins were constructed of
canes and reeds something after the wattle style; and hampers, cages for
animals, chests for treasures or regalia, biers, carrying chairs, fish
baskets, beds and seats were often similarly made. These articles, being
generally light and portable, and constructed of delicate parts, can as
well be classed with basketry as with wattle work.
[1] Hist. Virginia, John Smith. Richmond, 1819, vol. I, p.
130.
[2] Memoires Historiques sur la Louisiane, George Marie
Butel-Dumont. Paris, 1753, vol. II, p. 104.
[3] Moeurs dea Sauvages Ameriquains, Père Joseph François
Lafitau. Paris, 1724, vol. I, p. 286.
[4] Op. cit., vol. I, p. 244.
[5] Hist. Louisiana, Le Page Du Pratz. English translation,
London, 1763, vol. II, pp. 228-229.
BASKETRY.
TYPES OF BASKETRY.
Perhaps no branch of the textile art was of greater importance to the
aborigines than basketry. This term may be made to cover all woven
articles of a portable kind which have sufficient rigidity to retain
definite or stable form without distention by contents or by other
extraneous form of support. It will readily be seen that in shape,
texture, use, size, etc., a very wide range of products is here to be
considered. Basketry includes a number of groups of utensils
distinguished from one another by the use to which they are devoted.
There are baskets proper, hampers, cradles, shields, quivers, sieves,
etc. There is frequent historical mention of the use of basketry, but
the descriptions of form and construction are meager. An excellent idea
of the ancient art can be gained from the art of the present time, and
there is every reason to believe that close correspondence exists
throughout.
BASKETS.
Lawson refers to basket-making and other textile arts of the Carolina
Indians in the following language:
The Indian women's work is to cook the victuals for the whole
family, and to make mats, baskets, girdles, of possum hair,
and such like. * * *
The mats the Indian women make are of rushes, and about five
feet high, and two fathom long, and sewed double, that is,
two together; whereby they become very commodious to lay
under our beds, or to sleep on in the summer season in the
day time, and for our slaves in the night.
There are other mats made of flags, which the Tuskeruro
Indians make, and sell to the inhabitants.
The baskets our neighboring Indians make are all made of a
very fine sort of bullrushes, and sometimes of silk grass,
which they work with figures of beasts, birds, fishes, &c.
A great way up in the country, both baskets and mats are made
of the split reeds, which are only the outward shining part
of the cane. Of these I have seen mats, baskets, and dressing
boxes, very artificially done.[6]
James Adair, although, a comparatively recent writer, gives such
definite and valuable information regarding the handiwork of the
Southern Indians that the following extracts may well be made. Speaking
of the Cherokees, he remarks:
They make the handsomest clothes baskets, I ever saw,
considering their materials. They divide large swamp canes,
into long, thin, narrow splinters, which they dye of several
colours, and manage the workmanship so well, that both the
inside and outside are covered with a beautiful variety of
pleasing figures; and, though for the space of two inches
below the upper edge of each basket, it is worked into one,
through the other parts they are worked asunder, as if they
were two joined a-top by some strong cement. A large nest
consists of eight or ten baskets, contained within each
other. Their dimensions are different, but they usually make
the outside basket about a foot deep, a foot and an half
broad, and almost a yard long.[7]
This statement could in most respects be made with equal truth and
propriety of the Cherokee work of the present time; and their
pre-Columbian art must have been even more pleasing, as the following
paragraph suggests:
The Indians, by reason of our supplying them so cheap with
every sort of goods, have forgotten the chief part of their
ancient mechanical skill, so as not to be well able now, at
least for some years, to live independent of us. Formerly,
those baskets which the Cheerake made, were so highly
esteemed even in South Carolina, the politest of our
colonies, for domestic usefulness, beauty, and skilful
variety, that a large nest of them cost upwards of a
moidore.[8]
That there was much uniformity in the processes and range of products
and uses throughout the country is apparent from statements made by
numerous writers. Speaking of the Louisiana Indians, Du Pratz says:
The women likewise make a kind of hampers to carry corn,
flesh, fish, or any other thing which they want to transport
from one place to another; they are round, deeper than broad,
and of all sizes. * * * They make baskets with long lids that
roll doubly over them, and in these they place their earrings
and pendants, their bracelets, garters, their ribbands for
their hair, and their vermillion for painting themselves, if
they have any, but when they have no vermillion they boil
ochre, and paint themselves with that.[9]
It happens that few baskets have been recovered from mounds and graves,
but they are occasionally reported as having been discovered in caverns
and shelters where conditions were especially favorable to their
preservation. Such specimens may as reasonably be attributed to the
mound-building as to the other Indians. The following statement is from
John Haywood:
On the south side of Cumberland river, about 22 miles above
Cairo, * * * is a cave * * *. In this room, near about the
center, were found sitting in baskets made of cane, three
human bodies; the flesh entire, but a little shrivelled, and
not much so. The bodies were those of a man, a female and a
small child. The complexion of all was very fair, and white,
without any intermixture of the copper colour. Their eyes
were blue; their hair auburn, and fine. The teeth were very
white, their stature was delicate, about the size of the
whites of the present day. The man was wrapped in 14 dressed
deer skins. The 14 deer skins were wrapped in what those
present called blankets. They were made of bark, like those
found in the cave in White county. The form of the baskets
which inclosed them, was pyramidal, being larger at the
bottom, and declining to the top. The heads of the skeletons,
from the neck, were above the summits of the blankets.[10]
SIEVES AND STRAINERS.
It is apparent that baskets of open construction were employed as sieves
in pre-Columbian as well as in post-Columbian times. Almost any basket
could be utilized on occasion for separating fine from coarse particles
of food or other pulverulent substances, but special forms were
sometimes made for the purpose, having varying degrees of refinement to
suit the material to be separated.
Bartram mentions the use of a sieve by the Georgia Indians in straining
a "cooling sort of jelly" called conti, made by pounding certain roots
in a mortar and adding water.
Butel-Dumont describes the sieves and winnowing fans of the Louisiana
Indians. The Indian women, he says, make very fine sieves--
With the skin which they take off of the canes; they also
make some with larger holes, which serve as bolters, and
still others without holes, to be used as winnowing fans. * *
* They also make baskets very neatly fashioned, cradles for
holding maize; and with the tail feathers of turkeys, which
they have much skill in arranging, they make fans not only
for their own use, but which even our French women do not
disdain to use.[11]
Le Page Du Pratz says that "for sifting the flour of their maiz, and
for other uses, the natives make sieves of various finenesses of the splits
of cane;"[12] and a similar use by the Indians of Virginia is recorded by
John Smith:
They use a small basket for their Temmes, then pound againe
the great, and so separating by dashing their hand in the
basket, receive the flowr in a platter of wood scraped to
that forme with burning and shels.[13]
From Hakluyt we have the following:
Their old wheat they firste steepe a night in hot water, and
in the morning pounding yt in a morter, they use a small
baskett for the boulter or searser, and when they have syfted
fourth the finest, they pound againe the great, and so
separating yt by dashing their hand in the baskett, receave
the flower in a platter of wood, which, blending with water,
etc.[14]
CRADLES.
That cradles of textile construction were used by the mound-builders may
be taken for granted. The following is from Du Pratz, who is speaking of
the work of the inhabitants of the lower Mississippi:
This cradle is about two feet and a half long, nine inches
broad. It is skillfully made of straight canes of the length
desired for the cradle, and at the end they are cut in half
and doubled under to form the foot. The whole is only half a
foot high. This cradle is very light, weighing only two
pounds. * * * The infant being rocked lengthwise, its head is
not shaken as are those who are rocked from side to side, as
in France. * * * The cradle is rocked by means of two ends of
canes, which make two rollers.[15]
SHIELDS.
Woven targets or shields would seem to be rather novel objects, but such
are mentioned by John Smith, who used those belonging to friendly
Indians in an encounter on the Chesapeake:
Here the Massawomek Targets stood vs in good stead, for vpon
Mosco's words we had set them about the forepart of our Boat
like a forecastle, from whence we securely beat the Salvages
from off the plaine without any hurt. * * * Arming ourselues
with these light Targets (which are made of little small
sticks woven betwixt strings of their hempe and silke grasse,
as is our cloth, but so firmly that no arrow can possibly
pierce them).[16]
[6] Hist. of Carolina, etc., John Lawson. London, 1714, pp.
307, 308.
[7] History of the American Indians. London, 1775, p. 424.
[8] Ibid., p. 424.
[9] Hist. Louisiana. English translation, London, 1763, vol.
II, pp. 227-228.
[10] Nat. and Abor. Hist. of Tenn., John Haywood. Nashville,
1823, pp. 191-192.
[11] Op. cit., vol. I, p. 154.
[12] Op. cit., vol. II, p. 226.
[13] Hist. Virginia, John Smith. Richmond, 1819, p. 127.
[14] Hist. of Travaile into Virginia: Win. Strachey, Hakluyt
Society, Lond., 1844, vol. VI, p. 73.
[15] Hist. Louisiana, vol. II, pp. 310, 311.
[16] Op. cit., p. 185.
MATTING.
No class of articles of textile nature were more universally employed by
the aborigines than mats of split cane, rushes, and reeds, and our
information, derived from literature and from such remnants of the
articles themselves as have been recovered from graves and caves, is
quite full and satisfactory. Mats are not so varied in form and
character as are baskets, but their uses were greatly diversified; they
served for carpeting, seats, hangings, coverings, and wrappings, and
they were extensively employed in permanent house construction, and for
temporary or movable shelters. A few brief extracts will serve to
indicate their use in various classes of construction by the tribes
first encountered by the whites.
Hariot says that the houses of the Virginia Indians--
Are made of small poles made fast at the tops in rounde forme
after the maner as is vsed in many arbories in our gardens of
England, in most townes couered with barkes, and in some with
artificiall mattes made of long rushes; from the tops of the
houses downe to the ground.[17]
[Illustration: PL. I. PRODUCTS OF THE TEXTILE ART.
_a_, Openwork fish baskets of Virginia Indians; _b_, manner of weaving;
_c_, basket strainer; _d_, quiver of rushes; _e_, mat of rushes.]
It would appear from a study of the numerous illustrations of houses
given by this author that the mats so often referred to were identical
in construction with those still in use among the tribes of the upper
Mississippi and the far west. The rushes are laid close together side by
side and bound together at long intervals by cords intertwined across.
In _e_, plate I, is reproduced a small portion of a mat from Hariot's
engraving of the dead-house of the Virginia Indians, which shows this
method of construction.
The modern use of mats of this class in house construction is known by
an example which I have seen represented in a small photograph, taken
about the year 1868, and representing a Chippewa village, situated
somewhere in the upper Missouri valley, probably not far from Sioux
City, Iowa.
[Illustration: FIG. 2.--Use of mats in an Indian council (after
Lafitau).]
Mats were used not only in and about the dwellings of the aborigines,
but it was a common practice to carry them from place to place to sleep
on, or for use as seats or carpeting in meetings or councils of
ceremonious nature. The latter use is illustrated in a number of the
early accounts of the natives. Figure 2, copied from Lafitau, serves to
indicate the common practice.
The omnipresent sweat-house of the aborigines is thus described by
Smith:
Sometimes they are troubled with dropsies, swellings, aches,
and such like diseases; for cure whereof they build a Stone
in the forme of a Doue-house with mats, so close that a few
coales therein covered with a pot, will make the patient
sweat extreamely.[18]
Bartram, speaking of the Seminoles, states that the wide steps leading
up to the canopied platform of the council house are "covered with
carpets or mats, curiously woven of split canes dyed of various
colours."[19]
The use of mats in the mound country in very early times is described by
Joutel as follows:
Their moveables are some bullocks' hides and goat skins well
cured, some mats close wove, wherewith they adorn their huts,
and some earthen vessels which they are very skilful at
making, and wherein they boil their flesh or roots, or
sagamisé, which, as has been said, is their pottage. They
have also some small baskets made of canes, serving to put in
their fruit and other provisions. Their beds are made of
canes, raised 2 or 3 feet above the ground, handsomely fitted
with mats and bullocks' hides, or goat skins well cured,
which serve them for feather beds, or quilts and blankets;
and those beds are parted one from another by mats hung
up.[20]
The mats so much used for beds and carpets and for the covering of
shelters, houses, etc., were probably made of pliable materials such as
rushes. De la Potherie illustrates their use as beds,[21] one end of the
mat being rolled up for a pillow as shown in figure 3.
[Illustration: FIG. 3.--Use of mat in sleeping (after De la Potherie).]
The sizes of mats were greatly varied; the smallest were sufficient for
seating only a single person, but the largest were many yards in length,
the width being restricted to a few feet by the conditions of
construction.
Mats were woven in two or more styles. Where the strands or parts were
uniform in size and rigidity they were simply interlaced, but when one
strong or rigid series was to be kept in place by a pliable series, the
latter were twisted about the former at the intersections as in ordinary
twined weaving. The heavy series of strands or parts were held together
side by side by the intertwined strands placed far apart, a common
practice yet among native mat-makers. Much variety of character and
appearance was given to the fabric by varying the order of the strands
in intersection. It was a common practice to interweave strands of
different size, shape, or color, thus producing borders and patterns of
no little beauty. Du Pratz thus mentions the use of dyes by the
Louisiana Indians: "The women sometimes add to this furniture of the bed
mats woven of cane, dyed of 3 colours, which colours in the weaving are
formed into various figures."[22] This is well illustrated in the mat
from a rock shelter in Tennessee, later to be described, and the Indians
of the east and north practiced the same art.
Speaking of the ceremony of smoking the calumet among the Iroquois, De
la Potherie says:
The ceremony is held in a large cabin in winter and in summer
in an open field. The place being chosen, it is surrounded
with branches to shade the company. In the center is spread a
large mat of canes dyed in various colors, which serves as a
carpet.[23]
Frequent mention is made of the use of mats in burial. Two brief
extracts will serve to illustrate this use. Butel-Dumont makes the
following statement regarding tribes of the lower Mississippi:
The Paskagoulas and Billoxis do not inter their chief when he
dies, but they dry the corpse with fire and smoke in such a
way that it becomes a mere skeleton. After it is reduced to
this state they carry it to the temple (for they have one as
well as the Natchez) and put it in the place of its
predecessor, which they take from the spot it occupied and
place it with the bodies of the other chiefs at the bottom of
the temple, where they are arranged one after the other,
standing upright like statues. As for the newly deceased, he
is exposed at the entrance of the temple on a sort of altar
or table made of cane and covered with a fine mat very neatly
worked in red and yellow squares with the skin of the
canes.[24]
Brackenridge[25] says that a few years ago, in the state of Tennessee,
"Two human bodies were found in a copperas cave in a surprising state of
preservation. They were first wrapped up in a kind of blanket, supposed
to have been manufactured of the lint of nettles, afterwards with
dressed skins, and then a mat of nearly 60 yards in length."
[17] A Brief and True account of the New Found Land of
Virginia, Thomas Hariot, p. 24.
[18] A Brief and True account of the New Found Land of
Virginia, Thomas Hariot, p. 137.
[19] William Bartram's Travels, etc. London, 1792, p. 302.
[20] Joutel, in B. F. French's Historical Collections of
Louisiana. New York, 1846, p. 149.
[21] Hist. de l'Amér. Sept., Bacqueville de la Potherie. Paris,
1722, vol. III. Plate opposite p. 24.
[22] Hist. Louisiana, Du Pratz. English translation. London,
1763, vol. II, p. 227.
[23] Hist. de l'Amér. Sept., vol. II, p. 17.
[24] Mem. sur la Louisiane, vol. I, pp. 240-241.
[25] Views of Louisiana, H. M. Brackenridge, 1817, p. 178.
PLIABLE FABRICS.
DEVELOPMENT OF SPINNING AND WEAVING.
The use of simple strands or parts in textile art precedes the use of
spun threads, but the one use leads very naturally up to the other. In
employing rushes, stems, grasses, etc., the smaller strands were doubled
to secure uniformity of size, and when a number of parts were used
they were combined into one by twisting or plaiting. In time the
advantage in strength and pliability of twisted strands came to be
recognized, and this led to the general utilization of fibrous substances,
and finally to the manufacture of suitable fibers by manipulating the
bark of trees and plants. Spinning was probably not devised until
the weaver's art had made considerable advance, but its invention
opened a new and broad field and led to the development of a magnificent
industry. Semi-rigid fabrics served for a wide range of uses,
as already described, but soft and pliable cloths for personal use and
ornament were made possible only by the introduction of spinning.
On the arrival of the whites the native art was well advanced;
thread, cordage, and even ropes of considerable weight were made with
a degree of uniformity and refinement that surprises us. The finest
threads with which I am acquainted are perhaps not as fine as our no.
10 ordinary spool cotton thread, but we are not justified in assuming
that more refined work was not done. What we have is only that which
happened to be preserved through burial with the dead or by impression
on the plastic surface of clay used in the arts.
The materials employed for spinning by the aborigines were greatly
diversified. Through historical as well as through purely archeologic
sources we learn that both vegetal and animal filaments and fibers were
freely used. The inner bark of the mulberry was a favorite material,
but other fibrous barks were utilized. Wild hemp, nettles, grasses,
and other like growths furnished much of the finer fibers. The hackling
was accomplished by means of the simplest devices, such as pounding
with hammers or sticks. The hair and sinews of animals were frequently
spun into threads and woven into cloth.
A few citations from early authors will indicate sufficiently for
present purposes the methods of spinning and weaving employed by tribes
which, if not in all cases mound-builders, were at least the neighbors
and relatives of the mound-building Indians.
CLOTHS.
The character of the woven articles is to a great extent indicated in
the extracts which follow. It evidently was not customary to weave
"piece" goods, but rather to make separate units of costumes,
furnishing, etc., for use without cutting, fitting, and sewing. Each
piece was practically complete when it came from the frame or loom. For
clothing and personal use there were mantles, shawls, and cloaks to be
worn over one or both shoulders or about the body as described by
Hariot, Smith, the Knight of Elvas, Du Pratz, and others; there were
skirts fastened about the waist and drawn with an inserted cord or
looped over a belt; there were belts, sashes, garters, shot pouches, and
bags. For household use there were hangings, covers for various
articles, and bedclothing; there were nets for fishing and cords for
angling. Some of these extracts describe the whole group of activities
included in the practice of the art as well as the use of the products.
I have considered it preferable to quote as a unit all that is said on
the subject by each author, giving cross reference, when necessary, in
discussing particular topics under other headings.
Weaving among the Indians of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, and the
northeast is described by Kalm, De la Potherie, and others. The
following extracts are from Kalm, and will serve to indicate the status
of the art over a wide area:
_Apocynum cannabinum_ was by the Swedes called Hemp of the
Indians; and grew plentifully in old corn grounds, in woods on
hills, and in high glades. The Swedes had given it the name of
Indian hemp, because the Indians formerly, and even now, apply
it to the same purposes as the Europeans do hemp; for the
stalk may be divided into filaments, and is easily prepared.
When the Indians were yet settled among the Swedes, in
Pensylvania and New Jersey, they made ropes of this apocynum,
which the Swedes bought, and employed them as bridles, and for
nets. These ropes were stronger, and kept longer in water,
than such as were made of common hemp. The Swedes commonly got
fourteen yards of these ropes for one piece of bread. Many of
the Europeans still buy such ropes, because they last so well.
The Indians likewise make several other stuffs of their hemp.
On my journey through the country of the Iroquese, I saw the
women employed in manufacturing this hemp. They made use
neither of spinning wheels nor distaffs, but rolled the
filaments upon their bare thighs, and made thread and strings
of them, which they dyed red, yellow, black, etc., and
afterwards worked them into stuffs, with a great deal of
ingenuity. The plant is perennial, which renders the annual
planting of it altogether unnecessary. Out of the root and
stalk of this plant, when it is fresh, comes a white milky
juice, which is somewhat poisonous. Sometimes the fishing
tackle of the Indians consists entirely of this hemp. The
Europeans make no use of it, that I know of.[26]
In another place this author describes the weaving of bark fibers:
The _Direa palustris_, or Mouse-wood, is a little shrub which
grows on hills, towards swamps and marshes, and was now in
full blossom. The English in Albany call it Leather-wood,
because its bark is as tough as leather. The French in Canada
call it Bois de Plomb, or Leaden-wood because the wood itself
is as soft and as tough as lead. The bark of this shrub was
made use of for ropes, baskets, etc., by the Indians, whilst
they lived among the Swedes. And it is really very fit for
that purpose, on account of its remarkable strength, and
toughness, which is equal to that of the Lime-tree bark. The
English and the Dutch in many parts of North America, and the
French in Canada, employ this bark in all cases where we make
use of Lime-tree bark in Europe. The tree itself is very
tough, and you cannot easily separate its branches without
the help of a knife: some people employ the twigs for
rods.[27]
De la Potherie, who wrote at an earlier date than Kalm, says--
The women spin on their knees, twisting the thread with the
palm of the hand; they make this thread, which should rather
be called twine (fisselle), into little balls.[28]
Hariot, John Smith, and Adair bear witness to the primitive practice of
the art in Virginia and the Carolinas. Smith uses the following words:
Betwixt their hands and thighes, their women vse to spin,
the barkes of trees, Deere sinewes, or a kinde of grasse
they call Pemmenaw, of these they make a thread very even
and readily. This thread serveth for many vses. As about
their housing apparell, as also they make nets for fishing,
for the quantitie as formally as ours. They make also with
it lines for angles.[29]
The Cherokees and other Indians with whom Adair came in contact
preserved in their purity many of the ancient practices. The following
extracts are, therefore, of much importance to the historian of the
textile art in America:
Formerly, the Indians made very handsome carpets. They have a
wild hemp that grows about six feet high, in open, rich,
level lands, and which usually ripens in July: it is plenty
on our frontier settlements. When it is fit for use, they
pull, steep, peel, and beat it; and the old women spin it off
the distaffs, with wooden machines, having some clay on the
middle of them, to hasten the motion. When the coarse thread
is prepared, they put it into a frame about six feet square,
and instead of a shuttle, they thrust through the thread with
a long cane, having a large string through the web, which
they shift at every second course of the thread. When they
have thus finished their arduous labour, they paint each side
of the carpet with such figures, of various colours, as their
fruitful imaginations devise; particularly the images of
those birds and beasts they are acquainted with; and likewise
of themselves, acting in their social, and martial stations.
There is that due proportion and so much wild variety in the
design, that would really strike a curious eye with pleasure
and admiration. J. W--t, Esq., a most skilful linguist in the
Muskohge dialect, assures me, that time out of mind they
passed the woof with a shuttle; and they have a couple of
threddles, which they move with the hand so as to enable them
to make good dispatch, something after our manner of weaving.
This is sufficiently confirmed by their method of working
broad garters, sashes, shot pouches, broad belts, and the
like, which are decorated all over with beautiful stripes and
chequers.
The women are the chief, if not the only, manufacturers; the
men judge that if they performed that office, it would
exceedingly depreciate them. * * * In the winter season, the
women gather buffalo's hair, a sort of coarse, brown, curled
wool; and having spun it as fine as they can, and properly
doubled it, they put small beads of different colours upon
the yarn, as they work it, the figures they work in those
small webs, are generally uniform, but sometimes they
diversify them on both sides. The Choktah weave shot-pouches
which have raised work inside and outside. They likewise make
turkey feather blankets with the long feathers of the neck
and breast of that large fowl--they twist the inner end of
the feathers very fast into a strong double thread of hemp,
or the inner bark of the mulberry tree, of the size and
strength of coarse twine, as the fibres are sufficiently
fine, and they work it in manner of fine netting. As the
feathers are long and glittering, this sort of blankets is
not only very warm, but pleasing to the eye.[30]
The extent and importance of the art among the Gulf tribes are indicated
by a number of early observers. The Knight of Elvas speaks of
the use of blankets by the Indians, 83 degrees west longitude, and 32
degrees north latitude, or near the central portion of Georgia:
These are like shawls, some of them are made from the inner
barks of trees, and others from a grass resembling nettle,
which, by threading out, becomes like flax. The women use
them for covering, wearing one about the body from the waist
downward, and another over the shoulder, with the right arm
left free, after the manner of the gypsies: the men wear but
one, which they carry over their shoulders in the same way,
the loins being covered with a bragueiro of deer-skin, after
the fashion of the woolen breech-cloth that was once the
custom of Spain. The skins are well dressed, the color being
given to them that is wished, and in such perfection, that,
when of vermilion, they look like very fine red broadcloth,
and when black, the sort in use for shoes, they are of the
purest. The same hues are given to blankets.[31]
At Cutifachiqui similar fabrics were observed:
In the barbacoas were large quantities of clothing, shawls of
thread, made from the barks of trees and others of feathers,
white gray, vermilion and yellow, rich and proper for
winter.[32]
The frequent mention of fabrics used by the Indians for shawls, mantles,
etc., makes it plain that such were in very general use when the town of
Pacaha was captured, and the Spaniards clothed themselves with mantles,
cassocks, and gowns made from these native garments. Everywhere woven
shawls were a principal feature of the propitiatory gifts of the natives
to the Spaniards.
The extent of this manufacture of hempen garments by the Indians of the
lower Mississippi is well indicated in the account of the adventures of
the expedition on the western side of the Mississippi at Aminoga. The
Spaniards undertook the construction of brigantines by means of which
they hoped to descend the Mississippi and to pass along the gulf coast
to Mexico. A demand was made upon the natives for shawls to be used in
the manufacture of sails, and great numbers were brought. Native hemp
and the ravelings of shawls were used for calking the boats.[33] What a
novel sight must have been this first European fleet on the great river,
consisting of five brigantines impelled by sails of native manufacture!