Basketry

• Basket weaving dates back nearly 8,000 years and was originally a craft undertaken by tribes across the entire country. Indians from the Northeast produced baskets from pounded ash splints or braided sweetgrass. Southeast Indians, such as the Cherokee tribe, made baskets from bundled pine needles or river cane wicker. Southwest Indians crafted baskets from coiled sumac or willow wood, and Northwest coast Indians fashioned their baskets from cedar bark, swamp grass or spruce root. Inuits even created baskets from whale baleen. Native-Americans created basketry in the same way until the arrival of the Europeans and the introduction of new materials, such as glass bead, commercial beads and exotic bird feathers. They also made different shapes, like goblets, hammers and fishing creels. The Hopi and Jicarilla Apache became famous for their bright-colored baskets, after the introduction of dyes.
  
  

Textiles

• The most well-known textile arts is Navajo blankets and rugs originally made in the late 18th century and still made today in the traditional style. The weaver kneels by a vertical wooden loom and weaves colored threads into geometric patterns using a shuttle. Originally, the Native Americans used hand-spun cotton but later moved on to sheep wool. Another style, used to create blankets, tapestries, clothing and the chilkat blankets of the Tlingit tribe, is finger-weaving. Tribes from the plains used to make robes and blankets with painted, quilled and beaded buffalo hide since around 1540. After the extermination of the buffalo, some artists continue to make these robes and blankets from the hides of animals raised in captivity.
  
  

Sculptures, Carvings and Figurines

• In the Southwest, Native-American sculptors created stone figurines in the form of animals, humans and supernatural beings, known as storytellers or fetishes, from as early as 650 A.D. Zuni tribe fetishes were totems with inlaid eyes and heart lines, while Navajo storytellers were put into necklaces, and used for telling stories. The Pueblo Indians crafted figurines from clay, and the Hopi made kachina dolls out of cottonwood roots. In the Northwest, tribesmen carved totem poles and bentwood boxes, while Iroquois and Cherokee Indians created wooden masks. Other carvings include the clay ceremonial pipes of the Ojibway Indians, and tree root staffs and bowls of the Algonquin.
  
  

Jewelry

• The difference in jewelry styles between tribes was less pronounced than that of other crafts due to the lack of variety in materials. Before European colonization, craftspeople used beads, shells, copper, silver, ivory, amber, turquoise and other precious stones. Later, they began using glass and more developed metalworking methods. Originally, metalwork involved hammering and etching copper pendants and earrings, or creating beads. Navajo, Hopi and Pueblo tribesmen acquired knowledge of silversmithing from the Spanish in the 1800s, and then developed the squash blossom necklace, silver overlay bracelets and turquoise inlay rings.