Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology

The Wiyot were a coastal people who once inhabited the region of Humboldt County, California, between Cape Mendocino on the south and the watershed of the Mad River on the north. Located on some of the rare flat coast land north of San Francisco, the Wiyot were early victims of White American incursion. With their population greatly reduced by the 1860's(Elsasser 1978a:161-162), there were few Wiyot baskets for sale to the travelers who made California Indian basket collections around the turn of the century. This is especially true in the case of the basket type called the fancy basket.