Cradleboard

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Relatives made this cradleboard in yellow ocher for a baby girl; they would have used white clay paint for a boy. Its wooden backboard is covered in leather and ornamented with geometric and curvilinear designs in pigment and beadwork. A hood of thin wooden rods provided protection if the cradleboard tipped forward and also kept the sun from the baby’s eyes. A small beaded case used to hold a stitching awl for sewing heavy hides hangs from the side.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art