Description

Oblong flexible open basket of cedar bark, twined technique with chequer base and four rows with dark brown weft near brim. [CAK 05/08/2009]

Related Collections

Manuscript and photographic collections in Archives

Longer Description

Oblong flexible open basket of cedar bark, twined technique with chequer base and four rows with dark brown weft near brim. The basket widens in all directions from the base to the brim. [CAK 05/08/2009]

Research Notes

The following information comes from Haida delegates who worked with the museum's collection in September 2009 as part of the project “Haida Material Culture in British Museums: Generating New Forms of Knowledge”:
This basket was viewed alongside other basketry items on Monday Sept 14, 2009. Delegates were uncertain that this basket was made by a Haida weaver. They noted that it is made using a backwards S-twist, and that the jog goes the wrong way, which made them question the Haida provenance. Nika Collison clarified that Haida baskets have a Z-twist, rather than an S-twist. She thought if it was made by a Haida weaver, the weaver could have been living on the mainland, or perhaps it was a Haida weaver working in a Tsimshian style. The material was identified as red cedar bark, twined. Candace Weir proposed that it might have been used for storing medicine (i.e. dried plants). [CAK 19/05/2010]

Primary Documentation

Accession Book Entry - Collection made by MISS BEATRICE BLACKWOOD, in 1936-37 in NEW GUINEA & NEW BRITAIN. & in the United States and in Mexico, 1939.... 1943... - N. AMERICA, NORTHWEST COAST, HAIDA. Oblong flexible open basket of cedar bark, twined technique with chequer base. Type common to many NW coast tribes. Length c. 19.7 cm., breadth c. 15.5 cm., depth 13.1 cm. Coll. by donor in 1925

There is no further information on the catalogue card. [CW 8 6 98]

Pitt Rivers Museum label - N. AMERICA NW COAST HAIDA INDIANS coll. in 1925 d.d. B. Blackwood ii. 1869 [MJD 05/05/2009]

Related Documents File - The Haida Project Related Documents File contains video of research sessions and interviews with Haida delegates from September 2009 as part of the project ‘Haida Material Culture in British Museums: Generating New Forms of Knowledge'. It also includes post-visit communications that discuss object provenance. For extensive photographic, video, and textual records documenting the Haida research visit as a whole, including but not limited to preparations of objects for handling, travel logistics, British Museum participation, transcribed notes from research sessions and associated public events held at PRM, see the Haida Project Digital Archive, stored with the Accessions Registers. Original hand-written notes taken during research sessions have been accessioned into the Manuscripts collection, in addition to select other materials.[CAK 02/06/2010]