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Lot 135B
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Apache Wicker & Pinon Pitch Water Baskets (Tus) - Pair, Southwest US
Apache Wicker & Pinon Pitch Water Baskets (Tus) - Pair, Southwest US
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Native American, Southwestern United States, Arizona, Western Apache, ca. 1880–1930 CE. A pair of coiled and twined wicker vessels sealed inside and out with pinon pitch, the watertight jars known to the Apache as tus. The larger swells from a rounded base to a constricted neck and flaring rim, its surface a warm russet glazed by resin that pools and darkens across the basketry weave. Its smaller companion, nearly black with heavier pitch, echoes the same bottle silhouette in miniature. Such vessels carried and stored water across the arid uplands of Arizona, the pitch coating transforming a porous woven shell into a durable canteen lashed with horsehair or fiber loops for transport. Utilitarian rather than ornamental, they record the resourcefulness of a desert people who turned willow, sumac, and tree sap into the means of survival. Size of larger: 10.2" D x 9.8" H (25.9 cm D x 24.9 cm H).

The Apache water jar, or tus, was among the most essential possessions of a mobile desert household. Women wove the foundation from twined willow or sumac, then waterproofed it by melting pinon (pinyon) pine pitch and rubbing it into both surfaces with a heated stone or stick, a labor-intensive process that yielded a vessel light enough to carry yet capable of holding water through long journeys. The resin's color deepened with age and use, which accounts for the marked contrast between the russet larger jar and the near-black smaller one. Often suspended in pairs from a burden basket or saddle, these canteens were practical infrastructure of life in the Southwest, and surviving intact examples are increasingly scarce as the tradition waned in the early twentieth century.

Provenance: private Colorado, USA collection

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Item # 203328

  • Condition: Very Good. Some areas of chipping and loss to pitch as well as slight warping of forms. Otherwise, both are intact and very nice with rich earthen deposits.

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by Artemis Fine Arts
June 25, 2026 9:00 AM MDT
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Suite 108
Louisville, CO, US 80027

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Bid Increments
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$300 $999 $50
$1,000 $1,999 $100
$2,000 $4,999 $250
$5,000 $9,999 $500
$10,000 $19,999 $1,000
$20,000 $49,999 $2,500
$50,000 $99,999 $5,000
$100,000 $199,999 $10,000
$200,000 + $20,000