University of Virginia Library

IMPLEMENTS OF WOOD

Bodkins and billets of wood, combs and scrapers, wedges, and weaving
implements were used almost daily in Pueblo homes a thousand
years ago. They and their fragments, the chips and scrapings left
from their manufacture, and numerous puzzling little gadgets wrapped
with sinew or yucca string comprise an appreciable part of every
collection from caves and cliff dwellings. But all these are lacking at
Pueblo Bonito, and that the ruin stands exposed to the elements does
not seem the full explanation. The objects next to be presented are,
therefore, neither so numerous nor so diversified as I believe they
should be. The Late Bonitians were skilled woodworkers, and a much
more representative series of their wooden tools and utensils should,
it seems, have survived.

Fire-making apparatus.—Three hearth fragments prove the Bonitians,
true to the American tradition, made fire by friction of two
pieces of wood. The hearth remained stationary while the drill, standing

in one of the hearth's sockets, was rapidly twirled between the
operator's palms. Wood dust, produced by the rotating drill, fell hot
from the notched socket to ignite shredded cedar bark or grass tinder.

Two of our hearth fragments, figure 40, are of cottonwood. They
had been placed for safekeeping between the paired roofing poles
resting, respectively, on pilasters 1 and 6 in Kiva L. Split vertically,
the smaller fragment had seen further brief service when its middle
half-socket was used as a drill seating. Our third specimen (U.S.N.M.
No. 335264) is a piece of willow, half an inch in diameter by 3¼ inches
long, in which four sockets remain.

We recovered no fire drill or identifiable portion thereof. Drills
presumably were straight willow stalks, peeled, smoothed by abrasion,
and rounded at the bottom as a result of being rotated in the hearth
sockets.

Fig. 40.—Fragments of fire-drill hearths.

Spatula.—The specimen represented by figure 41 may be the reworked
blade of a digging stick. Its wood, unidentified, is much
lighter than usual for such tools but this condition could be a consequence
of decay. The irregularities at the neck are entirely owing to
rot. For the upper half, both edges have been reduced slightly to
emphasize the end knob.

Pottery scrapers (?).—Two wedge-shaped bits, one cottonwood
and the other juniper, more or less resemble pottery scrapers (pl. 38,
figs. g, h). Had they actually been used as such, however, their cut
ends would have been abraded less abruptly. On the other hand, both
are smoothed toward the tip as if from repeated use. Both are from
the rubbish fill of Room 323.

Spindle whorls.—Figure 42, a, shows half a wooden disk, presumably
a spindle whorl. Its edge is direct, except for a small segment
thinned from both sides. The fragment is one-eighth inch thick; the
drilled hole at center, three-sixteenths inch in diameter. Another
fragment, three-sixteenths inch thick by 2[fraction 15 by 16] inches in diameter, is

from Room 327 (pl. 38, fig. k). Like the first example, it is of juniper;
its periphery is thinned from both sides.

That illustrated by b, b′, figure 42, is the half of a third juniper
spindle whorl, painted on both sides. Its interior has partially disintegrated
leaving the exterior somewhat warped and shrunken. Three

Fig. 41.—The
reworked blade
of a digging
stick.

insect borings are indicated on the upper edge. I
judge the shaft hole to have been one-fourth inch
in diameter. The yellow-bordered toothed rings at
center and periphery are, respectively, light green
and blue; the field between is red. On the opposite
side two light-green circles alternate with three yellow-bordered
blue rings. Except for the red of the
background, which was spread evenly, all the pigments
were so thick as to pile up at time of application.

Our only complete spindle whorl is of gourd rind
(fig. 43). Its shaft boring is just a trifle under onefourth
inch; its diameter, in contrast to the three
of wood, is 1[fraction 7 by 16] inches.

Loom bars.—Lying side by side on the bench in
the southwest quarter of Kiva D were seven
knobbed oak bars we tentatively identified as the
supporting elements of a waist loom. The number
is still puzzling, for such a loom normally has but
two, at most three, bars. Perhaps we have here the
interchangeable parts of several looms, returned to
a commonly accepted niche after they were last
used. In any case, our identification has since won
the support of Charles Amsden (1934, p. 23). Unfortunately,
decay had progressed so far we were
able to restore only two of the seven (pl. 72, figs.
h, i). The worked stick that reminded Pepper (1920,
pp. 155f., 157) of a ladder rung, from Room 32, is
unquestionably another knob-ended loom bar.

From Room 320 we recovered two other sets,
each consisting of four bars (pl. 38, figs. n, o). The
rods vary in length from 13¼ to 19 inches; in diameter,
from 1 to 1⅛ inches at the butt. The one at the
left is fairly dense and heavy and may be mountain
mahogany. The others are light in weight, probably
cottonwood. A 2-inch section on the left side of the
next to last specimen is slightly concave in consequence

both of attrition and compression. This scar I take to be
evidence that the piece rested upon a ceiling pole or similar timber

Fig. 42.—Spindle-whorl fragments of wood.

when in use. But neither this nor any of the others shows wear caused
by ropes or cords.

Loom anchors (?).—The two pine boards illustrated on plate 39,
figures b, c, may have been pierced for rope loops anchoring the end

bars of a loom. Formerly dressed on both sides, they are now more
or less weathered and rotted. We found them among fallen masonry
above the 12-inch layer of woodpile chips with which storeroom 296
was floored. Transversely across the face of specimen c are water
stains spaced as if the board once rested upon the cut ends of ceiling
poles. If this surmise be correct, then the superincumbent position of
the board was secondary, perhaps part of a hatchway frame, since a
pole covered the two borings at right.

Fig. 43.—Spindle whorl of
gourd rind.

All the holes on specimen c are paired.
They were cut to meet below the surface
and take a quarter-inch cord. In the cluster
at the left a comparable connection is
noted between the middle hole and that
immediately to its right, while a lesser
drilling connects with the hole at the left.
Lesser drillings likewise join each of the
three upper holes with the one next below.
An accident at the time boring was in
progress punched the middle hole clear
through the board and thus necessitated a
plug from the opposite side. Specimen b is pierced by one half-inch
hole, while a second was gouged out at an angle to emerge on the
lower edge. Neither within nor without do any of these holes exhibit
wear such as a taut cord would have produced.

We observed at Pueblo Bonito nothing comparable to the built-in
floor anchors for looms in Hopi kivas (Mindeleff, 1891, p. 126, fig. 27)
or those in northern Arizona cliff dwellings (Kidder and Guernsey,
1919, pp. 50, 60, 70; Judd, 1930, pp. 29, 61-62, figs. 3, 18). Like the
paired holes in the sandstone cliff above the rooftops of Betatakin, our
board c could have held yucca loops from which a waist loom might
have been suspended.

Board ends.—The third plank, plate 39, a, with its middle growth
rings marking the heart of a pine over 8 inches in diameter, belongs
to a different category. Whether it was once longer we do not know.
Neither can we guess the purpose for which it was originally made.
As last used it formed part of the ceiling in the southeast quarter
of subterranean Room 255. One end has succumbed to worms and
weather; from the opposite, squared and smoothed by abrasion, a
quarter-inch wedge had been gnawed with a stone ax, the better to fit
it in place. Two sizable knots were leveled as if by machine. Even
if some of the log had been split away with hammer and wedge it was

Plate 34.—Bone needle, pins, and specialized tools. (Photographs by Robert F. Sisson.)

Plate 35

Upper: Ring basket as found, on the floor of Room 290. (Photograph by O. C. Havens,
1923.)

Lower: Two decayed ring baskets among the burial offerings in Room 320. (Photograph
by O. C. Havens, 1924.)

Plate 36.—Scrapers made from deer humeri, inlaid with shell, jet, and turquoise. (Photograph by Willard R. Culver.)

Plate 37.—Four humeri scrapers from Room 326.

Miscellaneous objects of wood.

Plate 38

Two sets of loom bars from Room 320.

Plate 39.—Part of a plank (a), two problematical loom anchors (b, c), and miscellaneous
board fragments (d-i) showing cut ends.

Plate 40.—Fragments of ring baskets woven of split yucca (a, b) and rush leaves (c, d).

A, Part of a ring basket woven of rush-leaf strips.

Plate 41

B, Vegetable matter in a finely woven basket formed a pillow for Burial 5, Room 326.

a prodigious labor to plane the remainder to a thickness of 1½ inches
with no tools other than sandstone abraders. Planks were occasionally
utilized as sills or lintels; less frequently, as flooring.

The smaller pieces (pl. 39, figs. d-i) not only illustrate Bonitian
skill in dressing out a board, but also show how ends were severed
with flint knife or stone ax. Figure h, although found in an Old
Bonitian storeroom, is unquestionably part of a cedar shake from a
Late Bonitian ceiling. It was sawed halfway through with a flint blade
and the end then broken off. Others have both ends cut and from both
sides. Pieces such as figures e, f, and i may have been detached for
use alone. The exhibited face of e, covered by shrinkage cracks, is
slightly concave through use as a work board. Its darker color is due
to the application of paraffin.

Miscellaneous.—Besides the usual odds and ends, including splints
with which the kitchen fire was roused, our collection contains several
unusual artifacts of wood. The comblike contrivance represented by
figure 44 remains nameless. Its two longest "teeth" are rounded at
the tip while the others are broken; all four were broken off an inch
above the crosspieces. These latter are split willow, bound with sinew;
sinew also binds a fiber thread to one of the vertical members.

The angular object, figure 45, likewise remains unexplained. Knots
have been removed and the crotch widened somewhat; one end is
sinew-wrapped to check splitting. This specimen is reminiscent of the
curved and angular knob-ended sticks that Pepper found in Rooms
32 and 33 and that he suggested might have been tossed in play
(Pepper, 1920, figs. 61, 62).

Figure i, plate 38, carved from a cottonwood root, is as likely to
have been a doll as anything else; the next piece, j, apparently is part
of a juniper tablet accidentally split while being reduced in size. The
lower end was sawed from both sides, but insufficiently, for only a
corner came free when breaking pressure was applied. Where intact,
the edges are smooth from abrasion, rounded, and somewhat thinned.
Both faces of the tablet had been carefully dressed but longitudinal
scorings appear on that presented in our illustration.

The next figure, l, is a section of peeled willow, both ends of which
were severed in the customary way, by cutting and breaking. Neither
end was abraded; the shaft bears no trace of former wrappings, no
indication of use except a small, restricted area where marks of a flint
flake evidence utilization of the stick as a cutting block. Perhaps no
more than a discard, the section in any case is not to be confused with
the peeled and abraded willows employed by the hundred in ceilings
of second-type construction.

Fig. 44.—A comblike object.

Fig. 45.—A sinew-wrapped stick.

Gourd bottles or canteens are evidenced by two fragments, one
of which (U.S.N.M. No. 335367) preserves the crooked neck. Its
peduncle attachment was cut out to form an orifice, and a small hole,
presumably for a cord, was drilled through one wall three-fourths of
an inch from the lip. Earthenware canteens in the form of gourds
were fairly common in Basket Maker and Early Pueblo times.