Alfred T. White Fund

Alfred W. Jenkins Fund

Alfred T. White Fund

A. Augustus Healy Fund

Single interlock tapestry weave with cotton warps and camelid weft, with a thread count of more than 200 threads per inch. This miniature tunic with short sleeves was probably a ceremonial textile placed in the tomb of an important personage. The sleeves are too narrow for it to have served as a child's garment. The tunic is decorated with two vertical panels on the front and two on the back that contain composite figures in the act of running. Each figure has a human body, a puma head with condor feathers, and carries a staff terminating in a condor head. The figures are tan, red, blue, yellow, white, purple, and brown on a yellow ground. The remaining parts of the shirt are simple tan panels with red stripes as well as a border at each side containing condor motifs. There is an embroidered rectangular section at the neck. The garment is moderately unstable due to age-related deterioration. Both cotton and camelid fiber in the object have thinned and dried with age. The weaving is very fine and is a visible reminder of how important the person who owned this tunic must have been in Wari society, which was centered in southern Peru. The imagery on this textile relates very closely to the carvings found on the Gateway of the Sun at Tiwanaku near Lake Titicaca in Bolivia. It is not precisely known how the imagery migrated to the Wari Empire and it is difficult to discern as no textiles were preserved at Tiwanaku where the climate is inhospitable for perishable items such as cloth.

Size: miniature. Probable wearer: female. Vertical camelid fiber warp. Camelid fiber weft. Camelid fiber crossed looping and other embellishment. Weft-faced plain weave with bands of complementary weft, float weave (reversible).

Museum Expedition 1941, Frank L. Babbott Fund

Museum Expedition 1941, Frank L. Babbott Fund

Museum Expedition 1941, Frank L. Babbott Fund

Size: adult; probable wearer: male. The plain weave dark blue field has a horizontal camelid fiber warp and weft. Camelid fiber embroidery in red, dark blue, yellow and green is used for the designs. The lack of any indication of borders suggests that this textile may have been used as a headdress. The abstract design represents a smaller cat in outline, which is nested within a larger elongated cat figure; the cat tails end in a distinctive triangular shape. Filler figures are small cats. Several pieces in the collection have the same feline figure on the borders (34.1555 and 34.1591). A variant of this back-to-back feline figure occurs on a mantle in the collection (34.1584), where it repeats in paired bands; however the tail terminates in the complete body of a small cat, rather than in a triangular shape. A looped headband (34.1596) also has a design which represents a similar feline figure.