Courtesy Queensland Museum
Accession Number: QE1477
Museum: Queensland Museum
Date Acquired: 1916
Collector: Joseph Campbell (1856-1933)
Date Collected: 1916
Where from: Wrights Creek
Description: L 450 x W 480 x D 300mm
Basket, large and plain bicornual basket made from woven lawyer cane. Basket had remnants of cotton seeds and pods found inside.
In 1910 a cotton plantation called Gossypium Park, was established south of Cairns at Wrights Creek, (Kamma), which employed local Aboriginal labour. Five years later the plantation went into receivership and one of the cotton gins were sent to Yarrabah. In 1916, Joseph Campbell, former Director of Cotton Culture for Gossypium Park Estates Ltd., and supervisor of Aborigines on the plantation in 1914, sold a collection of artefacts including shields and baskets to the Queensland Museum for 30 pounds. These bicornual baskets are unique to the Rainforest peoples that inhabited the lands between Port Douglas and Cardwell. They are made from twined lawyer cane (Calamus moti.) and varied in size according to their purpose, and were often used as an important trading item. Smaller baskets were used to carry seeds and fruit, and place into the running water to leach toxins from seeds. The larger ones were use to carry babies and possessions. The ochred baskets were sacred and used to carry human remains.
See: ‘Joseph Campbell’ authored by Trish Barnard