A Classic Pösaala, or Bachelor Blanket, Navajo, Woven-at-Hopi, circa 1850.

The pösaala, or bachelor blanket, measures 45 inches long by 63 inches wide, as woven. Dimensions are large for a classic Hopi pösaala. The large dimensions suggest the pösaala was woven by a Navajo woman living in a Hopi family. The irregular widths of the vertical brown and white bands support the Navajo, Woven-at-Hopi attribution.

The pösaala is fully twilled. The twilling appears in three distinct patterns: a diagonal twill, a diamond twill, and a herringbone twill. While twill patterns appear in both Hopi pösaalas and Navajo mantas, the combination of three distinct twill patterns in the same manta is more common in classic and late classic Navajo mantas than it is in classic or late classic Hopi pösaalas.

The Hopi and the Navajo are close neighbors. Intermarriage between the two cultures has been common for at least four centuries. If a Navajo woman married into a Hopi family, it would be consistent with her roles as a mother and a wife to weave a pösaala, or bachelor blanket, influenced by both the Hopi and Navajo weaving traditions.

The alternating horizontal brown and white bands in late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Hopi pösaalas were precursors to the broad, alternating brown and white bands in early nineteenth century Navajo first phase chief’s blankets. The introduction of pairs of blue bands to the brown and white pösaala formatwas the Navajo innovation that created the Ute Style first phase.

See the Schoch First Phase for an early classic first phase with brown and white yarns, but no blue bands. See the Cahn First Phase for an early classic first phase with thin blue stripes superimposed on a field of horizontal brown and white bands.

The Pösaala is ex- Jamie Compton, of New York and Santa Fe. In 2017, Joshua Baer & Company bought the pösaala from Compton. Later in 2017, the pösaala was acquired from Joshua Baer & Company by the current owner.

The brown yarns are un-dyed handspun Churro fleece, from two different brown fleeces. The white yarns are un-dyed handspun Churro fleece.