Description
This Maine Indian birchbark wastebasket is decorated with pots of ferns.
Birchbark was an important part of the material culture of Maine's Indians, who harvested large sheets of it from the trunks of trees without cutting into the tree wood or harming the tree.
The dark bark is the inner side that was against the tree. The lighter exterior bark is on the inside of the basket.
View additional information about this item on the Maine Memory Network.