Of course Kuchyeampsi has all her material ready, the strips buried in
moist sand, the grass moistened, and she may be starting a plaque. The
slender coil at the center is too small to be formed with grass stems,
so she builds it up of waste bits from the leaf-stripping, wrapping it
with yucca strips, and taking only a few stitches with the encircling
coil, since the bone awl is too clumsy for continuous stitching at the
outset. After the third round the bone awl is plied, continuously
piercing through under the coil and taking in the stitches beneath
strips. As a hole is made the yucca strip is threaded through and
drawn tight on the grass coil, and so the patient work goes on till
the basket is complete. The patterns which appear on the baskets are
stored up in the maker's brain and unfold as the coil progresses with
the same accuracy as is evinced by the pottery decorator. The finish
of the end of the coil gives an interesting commentary on Hopi
beliefs. It is said that the woman who leaves the coil end unfinished
does not complete it because that would close her life and no more
children would bless her.
At Oraibi one may see the women making wicker tray-baskets. Three or
four slender sumach twigs are wickered together side by side at the
middle and another similar bundle laid across the first at right
angles. Then dyed branches of a desert plant known as "rabbit brush"
are woven in and out between the twigs, and as the basket progresses
she adds other radial rods until the basket is large enough. She
finishes the edge by bending over the sumach ribs, forming a core,
around which she wraps strips of yucca.
One must admire the accuracy with which the designs are kept in mind
and woven into the structure of the basket with splints of various
colors or strips of tough yucca. The translation of a design into the
radiating sewing of the coiled basket or the horizontal filling of
the wicker basket shows the necessity of the different treatments,
contrasting with the freedom which it is the potter's privilege to
display on the smooth surface of her ware. So far as known the Hopi
women never fail in applying their designs, however intricate.
Frequently these designs represent mythical birds, butterflies,
clouds, etc.
Among the Hopi certain of the villages are noted for their local
manufactures. Thus Walpi and Hano are practically the only towns where
pottery is made, the Middle Mesa towns are headquarters for coiled
baskets, and Oraibi furnishes wicker baskets. Perhaps the meaning of
this is that these arts belong to clans, who have preserved them and
know the secrets, and with the dying out of the workers or migration
of the clans the arts have disappeared or have been transformed.
Another cause which will suggest itself is the local abundance and
quality of the materials required to be found in the surrounding
plains and mountains.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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