Blackfoot Parfleche: Rawhide Pegged Out, Fleshed, Painted While Staked, Scraped Even, Cut and Folded Like an Envelope (Wissler, 1910)

"Its simplicity of construction is inspiring and its usefulness scarcely to be over-estimated."

Stretch the fresh hide on the ground hair side down and peg it with wooden stakes. Rake and hack off the flesh and fat with a fleshing tool; if the hide stiffens, wet it with warm water.

Leave it to cure and bleach in the sun for some days, now and then pouring warm water over it.

While it is still staked, mark out as many parfleche as the hide will take (his Fig. 45: a 160 cm steer hide with two parfleche, two bags and three toy parfleche) and paint the designs. Ours: earth paints with a little water, laid on with a brush.

Pull the stakes and lay the stiff hide in shade. Stand on it, lean over and plane the flesh side down to an even thickness with an adze-like scraper, sideways strokes taking off chips and shavings; turn it and scrape the hair off the same way.

Mark the outlines with a knife point and cut them out (Fig. 46: a long rectangle with a big flap; sides irregular). Trim, and make pairs of lace holes (ours: a punch). Fill it by putting the contents in the middle, fold the big flap over and lace it, turn in the ends and lace them, then tie it shut with the looped thongs. Blackfoot ones average 60 x 38 cm.

From Clark Wissler, *Material Culture of the Blackfoot Indians*, **Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History** vol. V (1910), pp. 63-64, 79-81 and Figs. 45-47 (checked on the archive.org scan materialcultureo00wiss). By 1910 parfleche were kept as mementos of buffalo days and given as gifts, often ending up cut into moccasin soles. Wissler does not say what paints were used here; the paints, brush and punch are ours.