Storage Bag (late 1800s): Art, History and Details

Storage Bag (late 1800s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Rectangular bags made of soft hide—known among early white traders as “possible bags” because they could hold “anything possible”—were used to store personal items inside the tipi, where they doubled as pillows. When encampments moved, the bags were carried on the side of a saddle, where their decoration could be admired.

Object facts

• Title: Storage Bag
• Date: late 1800s
• Culture: Native North America, Plains, Lakota (Sioux)
• Type: Leather
• Technique: Native-tanned hide, glass beads, dyed horsehair, tin cones, sinew thread
• Dimensions: Overall: 38.8 cm (15 1/4 in.)
• Collection: T - Native North American
• Department: Textiles
• Accession number: 1937.850

A detail from the museum

Bags like this were used to store personal items inside the tipi, where they doubled as pillows.

Collection credit

Gift of Amelia Elizabeth White

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.