This page was last updated on: November 30, 2009
You are visitor #
Throughout history, baskets have been crafted in almost every size, shape, color, and texture. The addition of the wheel has perhaps created the ultimate basket.
Web site created by Alan J. Ageloff
Copyright 2009 Alan Ageloff. All rights reserved.
Basket History Links:
The phrase "To Hell in a Handbasket" may have originated during the 18th century, as a result of the invention of the guillotine, when the severed heads of criminals were placed
in baskets.
In each case, the basket is associated with peril.
Or, it may have originated simply because a basket is a common, efficient, and easy means of storage and transportation. In any case, its alliteration is genius.
Baskets date back about 15,000 years to neolithic times and have been used by every culture.
Baskets can be constructed from almost any material. Most are made from wood, roots, leaves, grass, pine needles, wicker, reed, cane, bamboo, raffia, medulla, or ash. Wicker baskets (made from willow bark) and reed & cane baskets (made from vines) are among the most popular and easiest to produce. Sweetgrass baskets, originally produced by African slaves in and around Charleston, South Carolina, are considered to be one of the few the ramaining forms of African-American folk art.
Welcome!
When something goes wrong, it's "going to Hell in a handbasket".
How the phrase became an anthem remains a mystery.
Ironiclly, the phrase "Is it bigger than a bread basket?" became popular with the invention of the refrigerator.
However, basketball hoops are THE most popular type of basket in the United States
Factoid:
Shaker Baskets are usually bleached white.
Factoid:
Nantucket Lightship Baskets were used as floating light houses off the coast of Nantucket island during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Factoid:
Constructing baskets underwater is most efficient because the materials become more pliable.
Factoid:
The University of Arizona's Recreation Center offers Underwater Basketweaving as a course.
Please browse the books, videos, & basketry items located towards the bottom of this page
VIDEO, AND CD ROMs FOR SALE:
BASKET MAKING & CRAFTING BOOKS FOR SALE:
BASKET HISTORY, ART, AND COLLECTING BOOKS FOR SALE:
MISCELLANEOUS BASKETRY BOOKS FOR SALE:
UTILITARIAN BASKETS FOR SALE:
Hmm...
It seems that nowadays you can't say the word HANDBASKET without also mentioning the word HELL in the same sentence!
DECORATIVE BASKETS FOR SALE:
Factoid:
Snake charmers are found mostly in Hindu counties and have been around almost as long as baskets. Snakes have no ears, however, and
are not being"charmed"
at all. They are simply responding to the movements of the charmer's hands.
Don't' see any basketry items that you want to buy?
Please browse the rest of Amazon.com.
Just enter the word basket into the keyword field.
Or, select a product category and then enter basket as your keyword.
It probably originated from folklore and ancient history.
Who can forget the
infant Moses floating down
the Nile River in a basket?
Or Dorothy's dog Toto (in The Wizard of Oz) and Elliot's friend ET (in E.T. The Extra Terrestrial) being whisked away in bicycle baskets.
According to Webster's Dictionary, a basket case is someone who has had all four limbs amputated or someone who has become completely incapacitated, inoperative, or worn out from nervous tension. The 1982 cult classic film Basket Case is Siamese twins. Green Day's 1994 song Basket Case is one of the 1990's biggest hits.
In the United States, baskets serve mainly as decorations or for cheap utilitarian purposes.
Decorative Basketry Links:
T H E A R T O F W A Y N E T H I E L
W A Y N E T H I E L . C O M
 | ||||
Handbaskets: To Hell and Back
A Silly Little Website About Baskets
Throughout the world, baskets serve vital daily purposes.
Throughout history, baskets have served various religious purposes.
The phrase
"A tisket a tasket... a green and yellow basket" became popular when Ella Fitzgerald recorded her famous hit song of the same title.
In the United States, the most widely used baskets include gift baskets, shopping baskets, picnic baskets, fruit baskets, waste paper baskets, bread baskets, laundry baskets, pet baskets, sewing baskets, fishing baskets, and Easter baskets.
