- Collection type
- Object
- Description
- Cradle.
- Long description
- Cradle with rawhide back and tanned skin sides, and hood covered with lane stitch beadwork; geometrical designs in colours on white ground; beaded flap with bead pendants and trade brass bells at back of head.
- Geographical reference
- Cultural groups
- Lakota
- Date / Period
- Date made: Before 1952
- Date collected
- By 1952
- Acquisition information
- Donated: 1952
- Materials and processes
- Material Brass Metal, Material Bead, Material Animal Rawhide Skin, Material Animal Sinew, Material Animal Skin, Process Machine-made, Process Beadwork, Process Stitched
- Dimensions
- Length: max 740 mm
- Object numbers
- Accession number: 1952.2.1
- Associated publications
- This object was selected for a Museum Top 10 application (mobile app) available on the Android and iOS store from 2013 to 2016. An image of the object was accompanied by the following text: Cradleboard, USA. Lakota (Sioux) people, Dakota USA. Inv: 1952.2.1. Cradleboards are a type of protective baby carrier, historically used by the indigenous peoples of North and Central America. They enabled a mother to carry her child on her back, strap it to the side of a horse, or lean it against a tree or building when busy. The stiff wooden baseboard protected the baby’s spine in its first few months of life, whilst the hood provided shade from the sun or shelter from wind and rain. Many elders believed cradleboards ‘socialized’ infants when worn because it brought the child to the eye level of the adults. This example was made by a member of the Lakota (or Teton) Sioux, one of a confederation of seven related Sioux tribes of the Great Plains region. It is made of both rawhide and tanned animal skin, stitched with sinew, and covered in lazy-stich beadwork of colourful geometrical designs on a white background. ‘Lazy-stich’ is the term used to describe one of the simplest beadwork techniques, used to cover large areas quickly with tight, ridged beading. The Pitt Rivers Museum has numerous and varied examples of baby carriers on display, from the Ojibwe tribe in the northeast woodlands, to the Cree Nation of Canada, to the Yurok tribe of California. They are varied in form and style: some have wooden frames, others are fabric bags lined with soft moss. They often feature naturalistic designs or cultural motifs, rendered in beadwork or paint, and might be decorated with shells, quills, ribbons, coins or beads. Some have dangling items, designed either to amuse the baby or to act as charms against diseases like smallpox. Most were collected in the late 19th and early 20th centuries when the cultural traditions of many of these groups were under threat. Fortunately however, some of these traditions survive and cradleboards and baby-carriers are still used by some indigenous peoples today. Related content - Find out more about lazy stich: http://www.matoska.com/siouxlazystitch.htm. [HA 07/01/2016] Originally entered on database as Sioux Teton Lakota. [CW 27 5 99]
Search terms: Music, Children and Childcare, Furniture Dwelling, Trade, Transport and Travel, Musical Instrument, Cradle