Large "Klickitat" Huckleberry Basket

This is a large oval polychrome fully imbricated "Klickitat" berry basket in excellent condition.  I put "klickitat" in parentheses because that is often used as a generic term for huckleberry baskets from the Plateau Indians.  I believe this basket was made by the Yakima because the design is not consistent with the classic Klickitat design pattern of thee large "V" patterns around the basket and it was collected in the Yakima area.  This basket has two opposed triangles on the two broad sides of the basket which almost touch and two smaller but similar triangles on the two narrow sides. Another interesting thing about this basket is that it is oval rather than round as most of the fully imbricated Plateau baskets are.  In the 1970's I bought very old and used fully imbricated basket in White Salmon Washington from an older woman who was well connected with the Indian community in that area.  She told me that imbricated large oval baskets were woven that way because they sat better against a horse when being used to transport huckleberries from the mountains in earlier times.

H. 14 1/2"; L. 13 1/2"; W. 11 1/2"

c. 1920

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