Gift of Frederic B. Pratt

Bequest of W.S. Morton Mead

This ceremonial plume would have been worn straight across the back of the head, stuck into a hair net. Curator Culin's informant, George, said that it indicated his rank as captain and it had been a gift to him. The raw materials are responsible for much of the effect of wealth and prestige. The larger piliated woodpecker does not live around Chico; its feathers must be traded in from the mountains. This pin employs sixteen of its scalps- a multiple of four, the sacred number. The manzanita wood for the shaft is especially hard and difficult to carve.

This dyed black deerskin pouch is decorated with a false flap, a modified "V" shaped line that is elaborated to seem like the opening of the bag. The edge of this "flap" is bordered with braided quill work in stripes of orange and blue, edged at the top and bottom of the border with thin white lines. A thin, undulating white line has been embroidered above this border. From the bottom of the border, enhancing this illusion of a flap, metal cones filled with reddish deer hair are suspended. Similar cones with deer hair are suspended from the bottom of the bag. The bottom half of the bag is embroidered with quills in a complex of motifs. Three double-curved forms or bifurcating lines are embroidered with thin lines or orange, blue and white. These forms "sprout" from a wider double band of orange and white braided quill work, elaborated with thin outlines in blue and white. The border or groundline for these sprouting forms is surrounded by an irregular, zig-zag outline in white with some blue at bottom. At the base of each of the five resulting points of the zig-zag are five circles, each composed of concentric rings made of quill embroidered lines of white, orange and blue. The ribbon strap of the pouch is now deteriorated, appearing to be maroon with yellowish stripes.

Charles Stewart Smith Memorial Fund

Large, beaded floral pattern on white beaded background on the body and band of this bag. The band is wide with a maple leaf pattern on it. The body continues the maple leaf motif with the addition of flowers and a three leafed plant. The bottom edge of bag has 11 loom beaded squares dangling from the edge in beaded in geometric patterns with yarn tassles hanging from them.

Bequest of W.S. Morton Mead

Brooklyn Museum Collection

By exchange

Anonymous gift in memory of Dr. Harlow Brooks