Photo by Trish Barnard

Accession Number: QE275.2

Museum: Queensland Museum

Date Acquired:

Collector: Mr John William Bleakley

Date Collected: 1914

Where from: North Queensland

Description: L420 x W180mm

Basket – bicornual. Made from lawyer cane, front coloured in red, white and yellow natural ochre pigments. Cane handle attached at back.

Bicornual baskets are woven from lawyer cane (Calamus caryotoides), a prickly large climbing palm found abundantly throughout the rainforest. They have a short handle for carrying and another much longer one that is positioned to the forehead, to enable the basket to be carried on the back, leaving the arms free. Fibre for the bicornual baskets was never dyed in preparation, but coloured decoration was painted on after the basket was completed. This basket has natural pigments of ochre applied to surface as they were once used for ceremonial or sacred purposes. Elders from the Girramay people around Cardwell have relaxed the protocols for sacred baskets and gave permission for them to be publicly displayed