Curator’s Choice: Pinedale Black-on-white Burden Basket Effigy

Photos by Jannelle Weakly

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This is a fired clay model (effigy) of an ancient, cone-shaped carrying basket with three painted pottery jars stacked inside. The loop between the two lower jars represents a strap used in loading and securing the basket’s contents. Other straps, not depicted on this object, would go around the carrier’s shoulders, like those of a modern backpack. The half-circle of clay bearing squiggled lines that juts out below the jars is meant to represent a tumpline—a strap that ran across the carrier’s forehead, helping to support and to stabilize the basket.

This rare object was made by immigrants from the Kayenta region of far northern Arizona or southern Utah who moved to the area around what is now Show Low, in east-central Arizona, more than 700 years ago. Similar items have been found dating as early as 600 C.E. in northern Arizona. The use of this particular artifact is uncertain, as there is no record of where in the site or with what other things it was found. Archaeologists believe that similar objects were used by ancient women for ritual purposes. Some have been found in burned houses alongside human figurines made of clay and elaborately decorated, full-size sandals and menstrual aprons.*

This object was excavated from the Showlow Ruin (Holbrook:12:2[GP]; AZ P:12:3[ASM]) by a member of the Whipple family, who owned the site. The artifact was then sold to a person identified in collections records only as “L. Jennings.” Gila Pueblo Archaeological Foundation then bought the object from Jennings in 1928, adding it to their collections for the purpose of research.

Prehispanic objects are no longer purchased by most museums as this practice encourages the looting of archaeological sites and contributes to the loss of irretrievable information about the past. When Gila Pueblo Archaeological Foundation dissolved, in 1950, all of its collections—including this object—were donated to the Arizona State Museum (ASM).

Examples of clay burden basket effigies have been found at Pueblo Bonito and Pueblo del Arroyo—both of which are Great Houses in Chaco Canyon, northwestern New Mexico—and Broken Flute Cave and other Basketmaker caves in northeastern Arizona. Another has been recovered from an unknown site in Chaco Canyon, and two were found in the vicinity of Houck, in northeastern Arizona. One of the effigies from Pueblo Bonito, the specimen from the unknown site in Chaco Canyon, and those from Houck each bear a single miniature pottery jar on top. Most examples of this form, however, do not have attached vessels.

Besides the example from Showlow Ruin, which dates to the late 1200's or early 1300's C.E., ASM curates very early specimens, lacking attached vessels, from the Prayer Rock District of northeastern Arizona. These early specimens most likely date to the period between 600 and 700 C.E., indicating that the traditions associated with these objects were long-lived.

This object is most interesting to me, an archaeologist who studies ancient migrations, because it is a clue marking the movement of people. Such migrations created the ethnically diverse late prehispanic communities that were directly ancestral to the Pueblo Indians who live in the region today.

* Menstrual aprons are thong-like woven garments stained with traces of menstrual blood.

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Image of a Burden Basket This is the type of basket the effigy is based on (it’s laying down, sideways).
From the National Park Service website: A Survey of the Recreational Resources of the Colorado River Basin (1949), Chapter 4: Prehistory of Man
http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/colorado/chap4.htm

More Recent Examples of Burden Baskets
From the National Museum of the American Indian website:
http://www.nmai.si.edu/exhibitions/baskets/subpage.cfm?subpage=burden

Image of a Woman Carrying a Burden Basket This Takelma woman from Oregon is carrying a different style of burden basket using a tumpline.
From the Bureau of Land Management website: Spring Seasonal Settlement Patterns of the Takelma
http://www.blm.gov/or/resources/recreation/tablerock/table-rock-settlement-spring.php