Charring, contact with copper, impressions on pottery, arid environments, these are the ways that fabric was preserved over the ages just waiting for William H. Holmes to study and describe it.  One of our favorite authors takes a look at wattle work, fabrics, feather work, basketry, matting , nets, etc. 

This is one of the series of publications written to accompany the report on the mound explorations of the bureau of ethnology by Cyrus Thomas.

"About the year 1890 the writer was requested by the Director of the Bureau of Ethnology to prepare certain papers on aboriginal art, to accompany the final report of Dr. Cyrus Thomas on his explorations of mounds and other ancient remains in eastern United States. These papers were to treat of those arts represented most fully by relics recovered in the field explored. They included studies of the art of pottery, of the textile art and of art in shell, and a paper on native tobacco pipes. Three of these papers were already completed when it was decided to issue the main work of Dr. Thomas independently of the several papers prepared by his associates. It thus happens that the present paper, written to form a limited section of a work restricted to narrow geographic limits, covers so small a fragment of the aboriginal textile field."

Holmes' Definition of the Art: "The textile art dates back to the very inception of culture, and its practice is next to universal among living peoples. In very early stages of culture progress it embraced the stems of numerous branches of industry afterward differentiated through the utilization of other materials or through the employment of distinct systems of construction. At all periods of cultural development it has been a most indispensable art, and with some peoples it has reached a marvelous perfection, both technically and esthetically.
     Woven fabrics include all those products of art in which the elements or parts employed in construction are more or less fllamental, and are combined by methods conditioned chiefly by their flexibility. The processes employed are known by such terms as wattling, interlacing, plaiting, netting, weaving, sewing, and embroidering."

This 8-1/4" x 10-1/2",  64 page, soft cover, facsimile reprint contains 9 full page plates and 28 illustrations.  $7.95