Object name: Burden basket / Collection place: Van Duzen River, Humboldt County, California / Accession number: Acc.247 - Hearst Museum Portal Search Results

Start Over Object name Burden basket Collection place Van Duzen River, Humboldt County, California Accession number Acc.247

Hearst Museum object titled Burden basket, accession number 1-10518, described as Border is tied down with buckskin. Tag: "Nongatl". Per Ralph Shanks: Open-work twined basket bowl. Crossed warp starting knot. Peeled and some unpeeled shoots, possibly hazel (Corylus cornuta californica), warps and peeled shoot wefts. The rim is reinforced with two rods lashed on with a strip of leather. There is a leather strap that forms a handle. Starting at the starting knot there is 2 1/2 inches of plain twining over two warps, followed by two weft rows of three strand twining, followed by plain twining over one warp to the rim. The warps are parallel. The rim is trimmed. The rim has two reinforcing rods on the interior lashed on with buckskin of the type more often seen at the rim of southern Humboldt Athabaskan burden baskets. The workface is on the exterior. The basket has a rightward work direction and an up to the right slant of weft twist.

Hearst Museum object titled Burden basket, accession number 1-10528, described as Old, mended. Grimy and worn, in fragile condition. Hoop broken. Newer coarse twined bottom sewn on with buckskin thong. White overlay, 2-faced. Horizontal diamond bands. 2 rows of triangles like sawteeth just below rim. All plain weave. Label "Nongatl". Per Ralph Shanks: Close-twined conical burden basket, used. No starting knot due to repair. The base is an added on separate basket, made of willow (Salix), tied on with leather lashing. The main basket is probably willow warp with conifer root (Pinophyta) wefts and beargrass (Xerophyllum tenax) weft design overlay. There is a reinforcing rod at the interior rim that is a shoot that is attached to the upper weft rows, using a leather cord, with up to the right slanted leather lashing going through the basket every inch or so. Starting after the base repair there is plain twining to the rim. Starting at the base there is about 3 1/2 inches of vertical lines of beargrass followed by five beargrass horizontal diamond bands, with one plain beargrass band separating every two diamond bands. At the rim there are two rows of beargrass triangles separated by a row of plain conifer root. The rim is trimmed. The basket undulates. The workface is on the exterior. The basket has a rightward work direction and an up to the right slant of weft twist. The overlay is two sided, with the primary design on the exterior. The basket has a flattened side, probably to go flush against the carrier's back. The lashing technique and the undulation of the body of the basket are probably Southern Humboldt Athabaskan characteristics and the conical shape with a narrower flat bottom is Southern Nongatl characteristics.