Irregularly shaped kapa fragment from Hawaii. Fragment has a crisp texture. The brown ground is heavily embossed with criss-crossed lines. May have been part of a kapa moe, or layered sleeping cover. Kapa (the Hawaiian word for tapa) is a cloth made from the inner bark of trees and is widely used in the Pacific for clothing and bedding, as well as secular, sacred, and ceremonial uses.
tapa (bark cloth)
tapa (bark cloth)
Original To Stephen Phillips House (Salem, Mass.),
E16866
Unknown
Pacific Island Group
6 1/4 x 12 1/2 (HxW) (inches)
Gift of the Stephen Phillips Memorial Charitable Trust for Historic Preservation
2006.44.3650
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