Pitt Rivers Museum Anthropology and World Archaology

 

Americas

 

Velvet Baby Bag

Canada

 

Collected by Beatrice Blackwood

Given to the Museum in 1935

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Velvet Baby Bag, Canada

Amongst North American Indians, historically much of a baby's first two years were spent in cradleboards. Typically, a baby was wrapped in soft sphagnum moss. Baby and moss were then placed in a ‘moss bag’, such as this one, which was then laced on to a cradleboard. The representation of a spider’s web hanging from the bag is a 'dreamcatcher' – it is designed to catch the bad dreams in the air, allowing only the good dreams through to the sleeping baby. Dreamcatchers come from the Ojibwa and Cree peoples of north America. This one is from the community of Norway House in northern Manitoba.

View database record 1935.32.14