Perishable: Cotton Cloth AZRU8-2717

Cotton Cloth, Accession AZRU-00008, Catalog #2717. Morris FS 3745. Analyzed by Laurie Webster, 2006. Small piece of cotton plain-weave cloth with intact end selvage and two areas of twined-stitch embroidery. Embroidery is adjacent to end selvage and along one side. Piece of 2S-Z yucca cordage is worked into end selvage. Measurements: L 12.0, W 10.5 CM. Image: AZRU8-2717 A: cotton plain-weave cloth with end selvage and twine-stitch embroidery. AZRU8-2717 B: detail of twine-stitch embroidery along end selvage. AZRU8-2717 C: detail of twine-stitch embroidery along side of fragment. AZRU8-2717 D: detail of yucca yarn worked into end selvage. Recovered from Earl Morris' excavation of , Aztec West Ruin. Earl Morris’ description of Room 147 at the time of excavation is as follows: “the immediate floor covering was a foot of refuse, with Burials Nos. 60 and 61 on the surface of the refuse…[long listing of artifacts]… In each end of the west wall is a ventilator opening and in the north half of the east wall is a hole made by relic hunters…The one ceiling support was a pine trunk extending from north to south. The poles were of cottonwood, spaced in threes, and spanning the entire length of the room. The support broke, first at the center, and again at the north wall. In consequence, the ceiling bagged down more than 2 feet at the central point and probably would have completely fallen during the last forty years, wreaking havoc with the contents of Room 136-2, had not the early visitors to the ruin set up a post with a cap piece beneath the break in the stringer” (Morris 1928:379).
Reference: Earl Morris, 1928, Notes on Excavations in the Aztec Ruin, Volume XXVI, Part V, Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, New York.