plant fibre cordage, basswood or false nettle; porcupine quills, natural (white) and dyed yellow, purple, magenta and red; silk ribbon, teal blue and reddish brown

Quills are wrapped over vegetable fibre cording. The cord has been looped like a garden hose to form a four and then five strands, tied in intervals with seven pieces of silk ribbon, four blue and three reddish brown. Most of the cord has been wrapped with white and purple quills. However, one end, which appears as one strand because the entire piece is wrapped in a circle, is embellished with additional colours.

The seeming deliberate placement of ties and use of purple and white dyed porcupine quills led the GRASAC research team wonder if this item could be a wampum-style necklace to show hereditary chieftainship. CW thought it was a neck ornament with political or ceremonial significance. They doubted it would have been used as a prisoner tie. The team wondered why was it deliberately gathered and tied? SL notes that a Haudenosaunee necklace at the McCord Museum (M12533) is similarly tied in a deliberate way.

RP wondered if it could be an ornament associated with traditional spiritual celebrations.

The presence of aniline-dyed quills means that the date of manufacture must be after 1857.

This item was found by the Pitt Rivers Museum, unentered in their catalogue. It was catalogued as donated by Prof. Henry Balfour in 1939, although this is a guess based on the fact that Balfour had acquired many items for the museum. The Pitt Rivers accession book entry states it was made by Mrs. Sinibah of Parry Island.

This record was created as part of a Great Lakes Research Alliance for the Study of Aboriginal Arts and Cultures (GRASAC) research trip to the Pitt Rivers Museum and British Museum, December 8-22 2007, funded by a grant from the International Opportunities fund of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).

researchers present: Heidi Bohaker (HB), Al Corbiere (AC), Stacey Loyer (SL), Janis Monture (JM), Laura Peers (LP), Ruth Phillips (RP), Anne De Stecher (AS), Cory Willmott (CW).