ABSTRACT
The cradleboards and patterns of cradleboard use observed at Cottonwood Springs can be considered broadly representative of the entire reservation. The cradleboard has a great many functions, only one of which is related to infant transport, and this function was probably never the main reason for its use or existence. After the child is positioned on the cradleboard the edge of the blanket on which he is lying is brought tightly around his body, passing under each armpit and bringing a layer of the blanket between his arms and his trunk. The other edge of the blanket is then passed tightly over both arms, which have been extended at the infant's sides, and tucked underneath the baby. Much of the early anthropological and developmental interest in the cradleboard was related to its possible effects on motor development.
