Clothing

CLOTHING

The Indian being constantly exposed to the elements needed very little clothing. It consisted, in the case of the man, of a breech-cloth made of skins which was worn about the loins. For the woman it took the form of a skirt which reached from the waist to the knee. These skirts were usually made of dressed doe-skin, finished at the bottom with a slit fringe, and sometimes decorated with bead or shell ornaments.

When on the hunt the brave sometimes wore a headgear of loosely woven thongs of deerskin into which he would stick any feathers found on the trails. These feathers were carried back to camp to be used in fashioning the elegant head-dresses worn by the chiefs and headmen

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of the tribes. Beads of teeth, or shell, were worn about the necks of the women, as were beads made of adobe or clay. Both men and women sometimes wore moccasins made of deerskin. Children of both sexes usually went about entirely naked, or wore clothing fashioned after that of their parents.