Light basket, or "saranip," woven from the bast of elm ("ohyo") and cotton thread. The basket has a rounded base and tapers from 14" at the rim to 3" at the base. It is woven using a technique known as twining, with thin cotton thread "wefts" roughly 1.5" apart passing through stationary vertical "warps" of untwisted/unbraided elm bast. Warps are gathered at rim and twice braided together - once, into vertical single plaits, and then these plaits are braided horizontally to form a sturdy rim. Carrying cord of elm bast connected at opposite points along rim via elm bast loops.
Donor:
Dai Williams, Estate of Karin Nelson, and Karin Nelson
The style, materials, and twined and woven techniques characteristic of this basket are associated with the Ainu, the indigenous peoples of Hokkaidō, Japan during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These types of baskets are commonly found in museum collections of Ainu material; they are very light for easy transport and, for the Ainu, easily replaceable.