Description and History of the Pueblo Indian Tribes

The word pueblo in Spanish means simply “town;” but in American ethnography, it has obtained a special signification from the aboriginal structures so-called, whose remains are found in profusion in Arizona and the neighboring localities over an area about 350 miles from east to west and 300 miles from
 north to south. These are buildings several stories in height, either of stone or of adobes, communal in character, that is, intended to accommodate a whole gens or clan, and usually with certain peculiarities of finish and plan. The adobes are generally large, some four feet long by two feet wide, and were often made upon the wall itself, the clay or gravel being carried in a moist state in baskets of this size and deposited upon the wall till the mass dried. When stones are employed, they are held together by a mud mortar. The most celebrated of these adobe edifices are perhaps the Casas Grandes in the valley of the San Miguel river, in northern Chihuahua. They have frequently been described and do not differ except in size from hundreds of other ruins in the Gila basin.

In connection with the pueblos stand the “cliff-houses,” structures of stones usually carefully squared and laid in mortar, found in great numbers and over an area of wide extent in the deep gorges or cañons of the Colorado, the Gila and the upper Rio Grande, and their numberless affluents. They are perched upon the ledges of the precipices, which often descend almost perpendicularly for thousands of feet, and access to many of them could have been only by ladders or ropes. Prominent points are frequently surmounted by round or square stone towers, evidently for purposes of observation. The disposition
 of the cliff houses renders it certain that their plans and positions were selected with a view to make them safe retreats from marauding enemies.

As descriptions of these interesting ruins have often been introduced to support vague and extraordinary theories concerning ancient America, I would emphatically say there is nothing in any of the remains of the pueblos, or the cliff houses, or any other antiquities in that portion of our continent, which compels us to seek other constructors for them than the ancestors of the various tribes which were found on the spot by the Spaniards in the sixteenth century, and by the armies of the United States in the middle of the nineteenth. This opinion is in accordance with history, with the traditions of the tribes themselves, and with the condition of culture in which they were found. When, in 1735, Pedro de Ainza made an expedition from Santa Fé against the Navajos, he discovered tribes dwelling in stone houses “built within the rocks,” and guarded by watchtowers of stone. The Apaches still remember driving these cliff-dwellers from their homes, and one of the Apache gentes is yet named from them “stone-house people.” As for the pueblos, seven or eight of them are occupied to-day by the same people who built them, and whose homes they have been for many centuries.

It is a significant fact that these people do not all belong to the same stock. On the contrary, the “Pueblo Indians” are members of a number of wholly disconnected stems. This proves that the Pueblo civilization is not due to any one unusually gifted lineage, but was a local product, developed in independent tribes by the natural facilities offered by the locality. It is a spontaneous production of the soil, climate, and conditions, which were unusually favorable to agricultural and sedentary occupations, and prompted various tribes to adopt them.

Of these different peoples, those of the Moqui Pueblo belonged to the Shoshonee branch of the Uto-Aztecan stock, and is the only existing Pueblo which is peopled by that widespread stem. We have good reason to believe, however, that the Pimas of the Sonoran Group of the same stock once occupied a number of adobe Pueblos, and quite likely were the constructors of the Casas Grandes.

The natives of the remaining Pueblos belong to three independent stocks, known as the Kera, the Tehua, and the Zuñi families. No relationship has been discovered between either of these and any tribe outside the territory I have referred to.

The culture of the Pueblos, both ancient and modern, bears every mark of local and independent growth. A knowledge of metals, other than to a
 limited extent for ornament, is nowhere evident. Tillage of the fields in a rude manner was the main source of the food supply. Pottery of fine temper and in symmetrical forms was manufactured by the women. That they had any other domestic animal than a fowl, and sometimes a dog, has not been shown. Mats and clothing were woven of the fibres of bark and grass, and the culture of cotton was at one time common, especially among the Moquis and Pimas. The arts of weaving feathers and working shells into decorative objects are not yet lost. Apart from the development of the art of architecture, there was little in the culture of the Pueblo tribes to lift them above the level of the Algonkins. The acequias, or irrigation trenches, about which much has been written, were a necessity of their climate, and were in use among their southern neighbors in Sonora, and the Navajos.

LINGUISTIC STOCKS OF THE PUEBLOS.

KERA STOCK.	Pueblos of Kera or Queres, Cochiti, Laguna, Acoma, Silla, etc., on the upper Rio Grande, Jemez and San Juan rivers.
TEHUA STOCK.	Jemez, on the Jemez river.
	Piros, on Rio Grande and in Chihuahua.
	Tanos, near Albuquerque, New Mexico.
	Taos, at Taos Pueblo.
	Tehuas, at Tesuque and neighboring Pueblos.
ZUÑI STOCK.	At Zuñi Pueblo.

 

Description of the Yuma Indians

The valley of the Colorado River in Arizona, the peninsula of California and portions of the eastern shore of the Gulf of California, formed the home of the Yuma stock. They were found in these regions by Coronado as early as 1540, and own no traditions of having lived anywhere else. The considerable differences in their dialects within this comparatively small area indicates that a long period has elapsed since the stock settled in this locality and split up into hostile fractions.

It has also been called the Katchan or Cuchan stock, and the Apache, that being the Yuma word for “fighting men”; but we should confine the term Apaches to the Tinneh (Athapascan) tribe so
 called, and to avoid confusion I shall dismiss the terms Apache-Yumas, Apache-Tontos and Apache-Mohaves, employed by some writers. The Yumas, from whom the stock derives its name, lived near the mouth of the Colorado River. Above them, on both banks of the river, were the Mohaves, and further up, principally on Virgin River, were the Yavapai.

Most of the Yumas are of good stature, the adult males averaging five feet nine inches high, well built and vigorous. The color varies from a dark to a light mahogany; the hair is straight and coarse, the eyes horizontal, the mouth large, and the lips heavy. The skull is generally brachycephalic, but there are a number of cases of extreme dolichocephaly.

Animal totems with descent in the male line prevailed among the Yumas, though they seem for a long time not to have regarded these matters closely. In culture they vary considerably. The Seris or Ceris, who formerly lived in the hills near Horcasitas, but in 1779 were removed to the island of Tiburon, are described as thieves and vagrants, lazy and wretched. They were exceedingly troublesome to the Mexican government, having revolted over forty times. The boats they use are of a peculiar construction, consisting of rushes tied together. As weapons up to recent years they preferred the bow and arrow, and upon the arrow laid some kind of poison which prevented the wounds from healing.
 Their dialect, which is harsh, is related especially to the western branch of the Yuma stem. They are described as light in color and some of them good-looking, but filthy in habits.

The Yumas and Maricopas were agricultural, cultivating large fields of corn and beans, and irrigating their plantations by trenches. It is highly probable that formerly some of them dwelt in adobe houses of the pueblo character, and were the authors of some of the numerous ruined structures seen in southern Arizona. The pottery and basket work turned out by their women are superior in style and finish. A few years ago the Mohaves of the west bank lived in holes in the earth covered with brush, or in small wattled conical huts. For clothing they wore strips of cottonwood bark, or knotted grass. Tattooing and painting the person in divers colors were common. The favorite ornament was shells, arranged on strings, or engraved and suspended to the neck. The chiefs wore elaborate feather head-dresses.

The Tontos, so-called from their reputation for stupidity, are largely mixed with Tinné blood, their women having been captured from the Apaches. Though savage, they are by no means dull, and are considered uncommonly adept thieves.

Quite to the south, in the mountains of Oaxaca and Guerrero, the Tequistlatecas, usually known by the
 meaningless term Chontales, belong to this stem, judging from the imperfect vocabularies which have been published.

The peninsula of California was inhabited by several Yuma tribes differing in dialect but much alike in culture, all being on its lowest stage. Wholly unacquainted with metals, without agriculture of any kind, naked, and constructing no sort of permanent shelters, they depended on fishing, hunting and natural products for subsistence. Their weapons were the bow and the lance, which they pointed with sharpened stones. Canoes were unknown, and what little they did in navigation was upon rafts of reeds and brush.

Marriages among them were by individual preference, and are said not to have respected the limits of consanguinity; but this is doubtful, as we are also told that the mother-in-law was treated with peculiar ceremony. Their rites for the dead indicate a belief in the survival of the individual. The body was buried and after a certain time the bones were cleaned, painted red, and preserved in ossuaries.

The population was sparse, probably not more than ten thousand on the whole peninsula. At the extreme south were the Pericus, who extended to N. Lat. 24°; beyond these lived the Guaicurus to about Lat. 26°; and in the northern portion of the peninsula to latitude 33° the Cochimis. The early writers state that in appearance these bands did not differ from the Mexicans on the other side of the Gulf.
 Their skulls, however, which have been collected principally from the district of the Pericus, present a peculiar degree of elongation and height (dolichocephalic and hypsistenocephalic).

YUMA LINGUISTIC STOCK.

• Ceris, on Tiburon Island and the adjacent coast.
• Cochimis, northern portion of Californian peninsula.
• Cocopas, at mouth of Colorado river.
• Coco-Maricopas, on middle Gila river.
• Comeyas, between lower Colorado and the Pacific.
• Coninos, on Cataract creek, branch of the Colorado.
• Cuchanes, see Yumas.
• Diegueños, near San Diego on the Pacific.
• Gohunes, on Rio Salado and Rio Verde.
• Guaicurus, middle portion of Californian peninsula.
• Hualapais, from lower Colorado to Black Mountains.
• Maricopas, see Coco-Maricopas.
• Mohaves, on both banks of lower Colorado.
• Pericus, southern extremity of Californian peninsula.
• Tontos, in Tonto basin and in the Pinal mountains.
• Tequistlatecas, of Oaxaca and Guerrero.
• Yavipais, west of Prescott, Arizona.
• Yumas, near mouth of Colorado river.[128]

 

The Dakota Sioux History and Description

The western water-shed of the Mississippi river was largely in the possession of the Dakota or Sioux stock. Its various tribes extended in an unbroken line from the Arkansas river on the south to the Saskatchewan on the north, populating the whole of the Missouri valley as far up as the Yellowstone. Their principal tribes in the south were the Quapaws, Kansas and Osages; in the central region the Poncas, Omahas and Mandans; to the north were the Sioux, Assiniboine and Crows; while about Green Bay on Lake Michigan lived the Winnebagoes.

The opinion was formerly entertained that this great family moved to the locations where they were first met from some western home; but the researches of modern students have refuted this. Mr. Dorsey has shown by an analysis of their most ancient traditions that they unanimously point to an eastern origin, and that the central and southern bands did not probably cross the Mississippi much before the fourteenth century. This is singularly supported by the discovery of Mr. Horatio Hale that the Tuteloes of Virginia were a branch of the Dakotas; and further, the investigations of Catlin among the Mandans resulted in showing that this nation reached the Missouri Valley by traveling down the Ohio. They therefore formed a part of the great easterly migration of the North Atlantic tribes which seem to have been going on for many centuries before the discovery
. In the extreme south, almost on the gulf coast of Louisiana, lived some small bands of Dakotas, known as Biloxis, Opelousas, Pascagoulas, etc. They were long supposed to speak an independent tongue, and only of late years has their proper position been defined.

Their frames are powerful, and the warriors of the Sioux have long enjoyed a celebrity for their hardihood and daring. The massacre of General Custer’s command, which they executed in 1876, was the severest blow the army of the United States ever experienced at the hands of the red man. With reference to cranial form they are dolichocephalic, sixteen out of twenty-three skulls in the collection of the Academy offering a cephalic index under 80.

The northern Dakotas do not seem to have had the same system of gentes which prevailed in most of the eastern tribes. Mr. Morgan was of the opinion that it had existed, but had been lost; this, however, requires further proof. There are many societies among them, but not of the nature of clans. Their chiefs hold their position by hereditary descent in the male line, though among the Winnebagoes the early traveller, Carver found the anomaly of a woman presiding over the tribe. The central bands, the Mandans and Minnetarees, recognized gentes with descent in the female line; while among the Poncas and Omahas there were also gentes, but with descent in the male line. The condition in this respect, of the members of this family, as also of that of the Athabascan, seems to prove that the gentile
 system is by no means a fixed stadium of even American ancient society, but is variable, and present or absent as circumstances may dictate.

A few members of this family, notably the Mandans, attained a respectable degree of culture, becoming partly agricultural, and dwelling most of the year in permanent abodes; but the majority of them preferred depending on the bounties of nature, pursuing the herds of buffaloes over the boundless pastures of the plains, or snaring the abundant fish in the myriad streams which traversed their country.

The mythology of the Dakotas is concerned with the doings of giants in whom we recognize personifications of the winds and storms. One of these is Haokah, to whom the warrior sends up an invocation when about to undertake some perilous exploit. The thunder is caused by huge birds who flap their wings angrily and thus produce the portentous reverberations. The waters are the home of Unktahe, a mighty spirit who lurks in their depths. Indeed, to the Dakotas, and not to them alone, but to man in their stage of thought, “All nature is alive with gods. Every mountain, every tree is worshipped, and the commonest animals are the objects of adoration.”

DAKOTA LINGUISTIC STOCK.

• Arkansas, on lower Arkansas river.
• Assiniboins, on Saskatchewan and Assiniboin rivers.
• Biloxis, in Rapides Parish, Louisiana.
• 
  Crows, on Yellowstone river.
• Iowas, on the Iowa river.
• Kansas, on the Kansas river.
• Mandans, on the middle Missouri river.
• Minetarees, on the Yellowstone river.
• Ogallalas, sub-tribe of Sioux.
• Omahas, on the Elkhorn river.
• Osages, on Arkansas and Osage rivers.
• Ottoes, on the Platte river.
• Poncas, on the middle Missouri river.
• Quapaws, on lower Arkansas river.
• Sioux, on upper Mississippi and affluents.
• Tetons, sub-tribe of Sioux.
• Tuteloes, on upper Roanoke river, Va.
• Winnebagoes, western shore of Lake Michigan.
• Yanktons, on upper Iowa river.

 

Description of the Athabascan Indians 

Few linguistic families on the continent can compare in geographical distribution with that known as the Athabascan, Chepewyan or Tinné. Of these synonyms, I retain the first, as that adopted by Buschmann, who proved, by his laborious researches, the kinship of its various branches. These extend interruptedly from the Arctic Sea to the borders of Durango, in Mexico, and from Hudson Bay to the Pacific.

In British America this stock lies immediately north of the Algonkins, the dividing line running approximately from the mouth of the Churchill river on Hudson Bay to the mouth of the Fraser, on the Pacific. To the north they are in contact with the Eskimos and to the west with the tribes of the Pacific coast. In this wide but cold and barren area they are divided into a number of bands, without coherence, and speaking dialects often quite unlike. The Loucheux have reached the mouth of the Mackenzie river, 

Nowhere do we find among them any form of government. Their chiefs are chosen without formality, either on account of their daring in war or for their generosity in distributing presents. The office is not hereditary, there is rarely even any war chief, their campaigns being merely hurried raids. A singular difference exists as to their gentile systems, and their laws of consanguinity. Usually it is counted in the female line only. Thus among the Takullies of the north a son does not consider his father any relation, but only his mother and her people. When a man dies, all his property passes to his wife’s family. The totems are named from animals, and as usual a wife must be selected from another totem. This does not stand in the way of a son being united to his father’s[71] sister, and such a marriage is often effected for property reasons. Among the Sarcees the respect for a mother-in-law is so great that her son-in-law dares not sit at a meal with her, or even touch her, without paying a fine. Among the Navajo and Apache tribes the son also follows the gens of the mother, while in the Umpqua and Tutu branches in Oregon he belongs to that of his father. In all the southern tribes the gens is named from a place, not an animal. Marriage is polygamous at will, wives are obtained by purchase, and among the Slave Indians the tie is so lax that friends will occasionally exchange wives as a sign of amity. Usually the position of the woman is abject, and marital affection is practically unknown; although it is said that the Nahaunies, a tribe of eastern Alaska, at one time obeyed a female chief.

The arts were in a primitive condition. Utensils were of wood, horn or stone, though the Takully women manufactured a coarse pottery, and also spun and wove yarn from the hair of the mountain goat. Agriculture was not practised either in the north or south, the only exception being the Navajos and with them the inspiration came from other stocks. The Kuchin of the Yukon make excellent bark canoes, and both they and their neighbors live in skin tents of
 neatly dressed hides. Many of the tribes of the far north are improvident in both clothing and food, and cannibalism was not at all uncommon among them.

The most cultured of their bands were the Navajos, whose name is said to signify “large cornfields,” from their extensive agriculture. When the Spaniards first met them in 1541 they were tillers of the soil, erected large granaries for their crops, irrigated their fields by artificial water courses or acequias, and lived in substantial dwellings, partly underground; but they had not then learned the art of weaving the celebrated “Navajo blankets,” that being a later acquisition of their artisans.

In their religions there was the belief in deified natural forces and in magic that we find usually at their stage of culture. The priests or shamans were regarded with fear, and often controlled the counsels of the tribe. One of their prevalent myths was that of the great thunder-bird often identified with the raven. On the Churchill river it was called Idi, and the myth related that from its brooding on the primeval waters the land was brought forth. The myth is found too widespread to be other than genuine. The Sarcees seem to have had some form of solar worship, as they called the sun Our Father and the earth Our Mother.

The Navajos, who have no reminiscence of their ancestral home in the north, locate the scene of their creation in the San Juan mountains, and its date about seven centuries ago. Their story is that the
 first human pair were formed of the meal of maize brought by the gods from the cliff houses in the cañons.

The Athabascan dialects are usually harsh and difficult of enunciation. In reducing them to writing, sixty-three characters have to be called on to render the correct sounds. There is an oral literature of songs and chants, many of which have been preserved by the missionaries. The Hupas of California had extended their language and forced its adoption among the half-dozen neighboring tribes whom they had reduced to the condition of tributaries.

ATHABASCAN LINGUISTIC STOCK.

• Apaches, in Arizona, Chihuahua, Durango, etc.
• Ariquipas, in southern Arizona.
• Atnahs, on Copper river, Alaska.
• Beaver Indians, see Sarcees.
• Chepewyans, north of the Chipeways.
• Chiricahuas, in southern Arizona.
• Coyoteros, in southern Arizona.
• Hupas, in California, on Trinity river.
• Janos, in Chihuahua, near Rio Grande.
• Jicarillas, in northern New Mexico.
• Kenais, on and near Kenai peninsula, Alaska.
• Kuchins, on Yukon and Copper rivers, Alaska.
• Lipans, near mouth of Rio Grande (properly, Ipa-ndé).
• Loucheux, on lower Mackenzie river; most northern tribe.
• 
  Mescaleros, in New Mexico, W. of Rio Grande.
• Montagnais, north of Chipeways.
• Nahaunies, on Stickine and Talton rivers, Alaska.
• Navajos, northern New Mexico and Arizona.
• Sarcees, on upper Saskatchewan and at Alberta.
• Sicaunies, on upper Peach river.
• Slaves, on upper Mackenzie river.
• Tacullies, head waters of the Fraser river, Brit. Col.
• Tinné, synonym of Athabascan.
• Tututenas, on Rogue river, Oregon.
• Umpquas, Pacific coast near Salem, Oregon

 

Description of The Beothuk Indians Culture

Adjacent to the Labrador Eskimos and the northern Algonkins, upon the Island of Newfoundland, dwelt the Beothuks, or “Red Indians,” now extinct, who has custom and language differed much from their neighbors of the mainland. Although called “red,” they are also said to have been unusually light in complexion, and the term was applied to them from their habit of smearing their bodies with a mixture of grease and red ochre. They are further described as of medium stature, with regular features and aquiline noses, the hair black and the beard scanty or absent.

In several elements of culture, they had marked differences from the tribes of the adjacent mainland. Their canoes were of bark or of skins stretched on frames, and were in the shape of a crescent so that they required ballast to prevent them from upsetting. The winter houses they constructed were large conical lodges thirty or forty feet in diameter, having a frame of light poles upon which was laid bark or skins, generally the latter. Hunting and fishing provided them with food, and they have left the reputation of irreclaimable savages. They had no dogs, and the art of pottery was unknown; yet they were not unskilled as artisans, carving images of wood, dressing stone for implements, and tanning deerskins for clothing. An examination of their language discloses some words borrowed from the Algonkin, and slight coincidences with the Eskimo dialects, but the main body of the
 idiom stands alone, without affinities. Derivation was principal if not exclusively by suffixes, and the general morphology seems somewhat more akin to Eskimo than Algonkin examples

The Dakota Sioux History and Description

The western watershed of the Mississippi River was largely in the possession of the Dakota or Sioux stock. Its various tribes extended in an unbroken line from the Arkansas River on the south to the Saskatchewan on the north, populating the whole of the Missouri valley as far up as the Yellowstone. Their principal tribes in the south were the Quapaws, Kansas and Osages; in the central region the Poncas, Omahas and Mandans; to the north were the Sioux, Assiniboine and Crows; while about Green Bay on Lake Michigan lived the Winnebagoes.

The opinion was formerly entertained that this great family moved to the locations where they were first met from some western home; but the researches of modern students have refuted this. Mr. Dorsey has shown by an analysis of their most ancient traditions that they unanimously point to an eastern origin, and that the central and southern bands did not probably cross the Mississippi much before the fourteenth century. This is singularly supported by the discovery of Mr. Horatio Hale that the Tuteloes of Virginia were a branch of the Dakotas; and further, the investigations of Catlin among the Mandans resulted in showing that this nation reached the Missouri Valley by traveling down the Ohio. They therefore formed a part of the great easterly migration of the North Atlantic tribes which seem to have been going on for many centuries before the discovery
. In the extreme south, almost on the gulf coast of Louisiana, lived some small bands of Dakotas, known as Biloxis, Opelousas, Pascagoulas, etc. They were long supposed to speak an independent tongue, and only of late years has their proper position been defined.

Their frames are powerful, and the warriors of the Sioux have long enjoyed a celebrity for their hardihood and daring. The massacre of General Custer’s command, which they executed in 1876, was the severest blow the army of the United States ever experienced at the hands of the red man. With reference to cranial form they are dolichocephalic, sixteen out of twenty-three skulls in the collection of the Academy offering a cephalic index under 80.

The northern Dakotas do not seem to have had the same system of gentes which prevailed in most of the eastern tribes. Mr. Morgan was of the opinion that it had existed, but had been lost; this, however, requires further proof. There are many societies among them, but not of the nature of clans. Their chiefs hold their position by hereditary descent in the male line, though among the Winnebagoes the early traveller, Carver found the anomaly of a woman presiding over the tribe. The central bands, the Mandans and Minnetarees, recognized gentes with descent in the female line; while among the Poncas and Omahas there were also gentes, but with descent in the male line. The condition in this respect, of the members of this family, as also of that of the Athabascan, seems to prove that the gentile
 system is by no means a fixed stadium of even American ancient society, but is variable, and present or absent as circumstances may dictate.

A few members of this family, notably the Mandans, attained a respectable degree of culture, becoming partly agricultural, and dwelling most of the year in permanent abodes; but the majority of them preferred depending on the bounties of nature, pursuing the herds of buffaloes over the boundless pastures of the plains, or snaring the abundant fish in the myriad streams which traversed their country.

The mythology of the Dakotas is concerned with the doings of giants in whom we recognize personifications of the winds and storms. One of these is Haokah, to whom the warrior sends up an invocation when about to undertake some perilous exploit. The thunder is caused by huge birds who flap their wings angrily and thus produce the portentous reverberations. The waters are the home of Unktahe, a mighty spirit who lurks in their depths. Indeed, to the Dakotas, and not to them alone, but to man in their stage of thought, “All nature is alive with gods. Every mountain, every tree is worshipped, and the commonest animals are the objects of adoration.”

DAKOTA LINGUISTIC STOCK.

• Arkansas, on lower Arkansas river.
• Assiniboins, on Saskatchewan and Assiniboin rivers.
• Biloxis, in Rapides Parish, Louisiana.
• 
  Crows, on Yellowstone river.
• Iowas, on the Iowa river.
• Kansas, on the Kansas river.
• Mandans, on the middle Missouri river.
• Minetarees, on the Yellowstone river.
• Ogallalas, sub-tribe of Sioux.
• Omahas, on the Elkhorn river.
• Osages, on Arkansas and Osage rivers.
• Ottoes, on the Platte river.
• Poncas, on the middle Missouri river.
• Quapaws, on lower Arkansas river.
• Sioux, on upper Mississippi and affluents.
• Tetons, sub-tribe of Sioux.
• Tuteloes, on upper Roanoke river, Va.
• Winnebagoes, western shore of Lake Michigan.
• Yanktons, on upper Iowa river.

 

 

Description of the Athabascan Indians 

Few linguistic families on the continent can compare in geographical distribution with that known as the Athabascan, Chepewyan or Tinné. Of these synonyms, I retain the first, as that adopted by Buschmann, who proved, by his laborious researches, the kinship of its various branches. These extend interruptedly from the Arctic Sea to the borders of Durango, in Mexico, and from Hudson Bay to the Pacific.

In British America this stock lies immediately north of the Algonkins, the dividing line running approximately from the mouth of the Churchill river on Hudson Bay to the mouth of the Fraser, on the Pacific. To the north they are in contact with the Eskimos and to the west with the tribes of the Pacific coast. In this wide but cold and barren area they are divided into a number of bands, without coherence, and speaking dialects often quite unlike. The Loucheux have reached the mouth of the Mackenzie river, the Kuchin are along the Yukon, the Kenai on the
 ocean about the peninsula that bears their name, while the Nahaunies, Secaunies and Takullies are among the mountains to the south. The Sarcees lived about the southern head-waters of the Saskatchewan, while other bands had crossed the mountains and wandered quite to the Pacific coast, where they appear as Umpquas near Salem, Oregon; as Tututenas on Rogue river; and in California as Hupas, on and about Trinity river. These are but a small fraction of the great southern migration of this stock. The Navajos belong to it, and the redoubted Apaches, who extended their war parties far into Mexico, and who were the main agents in destroying the civilization which ages ago began to reveal fair promise in the valleys of the Gila and its affluents, and who up to very recent years defied alike the armies of both Mexico and the United States. Their southern migrations beyond the valley of the Gila probably do not date far back, that is, much beyond the conquest. Although the Mexican census of 1880 puts the Mexican Apaches at ten thousand, no such number can be located. Orozco y Berra mentions one of their tribes in Chihuahua, which he calls Tobosos; but Spanish authors refer to these as living in New Mexico in 1583. The only Apache band now known to be in Mexico are the Janos or Janeros in Chihuahua, made up of Lipans and Mescaleros. (Henshaw.)

Wherever found, the members of this group present a certain family resemblance. In appearance they are tall and strong, the forehead low with prominent superciliary ridges, the eyes slightly oblique, the nose prominent but wide toward the base, the
 mouth large, the hands and feet small. Their strength and endurance are often phenomenal, but in the North at least their longevity is slight, few living beyond fifty. Intellectually they rank below most of their neighbors, and nowhere do they appear as fosterers of the germs of civilization. Where, as among the Navajos, we find them having some repute for the mechanical arts, it turns out that this is owing to having captured and adopted the members of more gifted tribes. Their temperament is inclined to be gloomy and morose; yet in spite of their apparent stolidity they are liable to panic terrors, to epidemic neuroses, temporary hallucinations and manias—a condition not at all rare among peoples of inferior culture.

Nowhere do we find among them any form of government. Their chiefs are chosen without formality, either on account of their daring in war or for their generosity in distributing presents. The office is not hereditary, there is rarely even any war chief, their campaigns being merely hurried raids. A singular difference exists as to their gentile systems, and their laws of consanguinity. Usually it is counted in the female line only. Thus among the Takullies of the north a son does not consider his father any relation, but only his mother and her people. When a man dies, all his property passes to his wife’s family. The totems are named from animals, and as usual a wife must be selected from another totem. This does not stand in the way of a son being united to his father’s[71] sister, and such a marriage is often effected for property reasons. Among the Sarcees the respect for a mother-in-law is so great that her son-in-law dares not sit at a meal with her, or even touch her, without paying a fine. Among the Navajo and Apache tribes the son also follows the gens of the mother, while in the Umpqua and Tutu branches in Oregon he belongs to that of his father. In all the southern tribes the gens is named from a place, not an animal. Marriage is polygamous at will, wives are obtained by purchase, and among the Slave Indians the tie is so lax that friends will occasionally exchange wives as a sign of amity. Usually the position of the woman is abject, and marital affection is practically unknown; although it is said that the Nahaunies, a tribe of eastern Alaska, at one time obeyed a female chief.

The arts were in a primitive condition. Utensils were of wood, horn or stone, though the Takully women manufactured a coarse pottery, and also spun and wove yarn from the hair of the mountain goat. Agriculture was not practised either in the north or south, the only exception being the Navajos and with them the inspiration came from other stocks. The Kuchin of the Yukon make excellent bark canoes, and both they and their neighbors live in skin tents of
 neatly dressed hides. Many of the tribes of the far north are improvident in both clothing and food, and cannibalism was not at all uncommon among them.

The most cultured of their bands were the Navajos, whose name is said to signify “large cornfields,” from their extensive agriculture. When the Spaniards first met them in 1541 they were tillers of the soil, erected large granaries for their crops, irrigated their fields by artificial water courses or acequias, and lived in substantial dwellings, partly underground; but they had not then learned the art of weaving the celebrated “Navajo blankets,” that being a later acquisition of their artisans.

In their religions there was the belief in deified natural forces and in magic that we find usually at their stage of culture. The priests or shamans were regarded with fear, and often controlled the counsels of the tribe. One of their prevalent myths was that of the great thunder-bird often identified with the raven. On the Churchill river it was called Idi, and the myth related that from its brooding on the primeval waters the land was brought forth. The myth is found too widespread to be other than genuine. The Sarcees seem to have had some form of solar worship, as they called the sun Our Father and the earth Our Mother.

The Navajos, who have no reminiscence of their ancestral home in the north, locate the scene of their creation in the San Juan mountains, and its date about seven centuries ago. Their story is that the
 first human pair were formed of the meal of maize brought by the gods from the cliff houses in the cañons.

The Athabascan dialects are usually harsh and difficult of enunciation. In reducing them to writing, sixty-three characters have to be called on to render the correct sounds. There is an oral literature of songs and chants, many of which have been preserved by the missionaries. The Hupas of California had extended their language and forced its adoption among the half-dozen neighboring tribes whom they had reduced to the condition of tributaries.

ATHABASCAN LINGUISTIC STOCK.

• Apaches, in Arizona, Chihuahua, Durango, etc.
• Ariquipas, in southern Arizona.
• Atnahs, on Copper river, Alaska.
• Beaver Indians, see Sarcees.
• Chepewyans, north of the Chipeways.
• Chiricahuas, in southern Arizona.
• Coyoteros, in southern Arizona.
• Hupas, in California, on Trinity river.
• Janos, in Chihuahua, near Rio Grande.
• Jicarillas, in northern New Mexico.
• Kenais, on and near Kenai peninsula, Alaska.
• Kuchins, on Yukon and Copper rivers, Alaska.
• Lipans, near mouth of Rio Grande (properly, Ipa-ndé).
• Loucheux, on lower Mackenzie river; most northern tribe.
• 
  Mescaleros, in New Mexico, W. of Rio Grande.
• Montagnais, north of Chipeways.
• Nahaunies, on Stickine and Talton rivers, Alaska.
• Navajos, northern New Mexico and Arizona.
• Sarcees, on upper Saskatchewan and at Alberta.
• Sicaunies, on upper Peach river.
• Slaves, on upper Mackenzie river.
• Tacullies, head waters of the Fraser river, Brit. Col.
• Tinné, synonym of Athabascan.
• Tututenas, on Rogue river, Oregon.
• Umpquas, Pacific coast near Salem, Oregon.

Description of the Pawnee Indians

The Pani stock was scattered irregularly from the Middle Missouri River to the Gulf of Mexico. The Pawnees proper occupied the territory from the Niobrara River south to Arkansas. The Arikari branch had separated and migrated to the north at a comparatively recent period, while the Wichitas, Caddoes and Huecos roamed over Eastern Louisiana and Western Texas. The earliest traditions of all these peoples assign their priscan home toward the south and the Pawnees remembered having driven the Dakota tribes from the hunting grounds of the Platte Basin.

The stock as a rule had an excellent physique, being tall and robust, with well-proportioned features, the lips thin and the eyes small. Longevity however was rare, and few of either sex reached the age of sixty. The division of the tribes was into bands and these into totems, but the gentile system did not prevail with much strength among them. The chieftainship of the bands was hereditary in the male line, and the power of the chief was almost absolute. He was surrounded by a body of retainers whom he supported, and who carried out his orders. When he wished a council these messengers carried the summons. Property as well as power passed to the family of the male, and widows were often deprived
of everything and left in destitution. Marriage was a strictly commercial transaction, the woman being bought from her parents. The purchase effected, the bridegroom had a right to espouse all the younger sisters of his wife as they grew to maturity, if he felt so inclined. The laxity of the marriage rules of the stock was carried to its limit by the Arikaris, among whom it is said fathers united with their daughters and brothers with their sisters, without offending the moral sense of the community. This may have arisen after corruption by the whites.

Agriculture among them was more in favor than generally on the plains. Maize, pumpkins and squashes were cultivated, each family having its own field two or three acres in extent. For about four months of the year they were sedentary, dwelling in houses built of poles and bark covered with sods, while the remainder of the time they wandered over their hunting grounds, carrying with them tents of skins which were stretched on poles. The women manufactured a rude pottery and the men implements and weapons of wood and stone. The Arikaris were skilled in the construction of boats of skin stretched over wooden frames, an art they may have learned from the Mandans.

The information about their religion is vague, but it seems in some respects to have resembled that of the Mexican nations. One of their chief divinities was the morning star, Opirikut, which was supposed to represent the deity of fertility and agriculture. At the time of corn-planting a young girl, usually a captive, was sacrificed to this divinity. The victim was
bound to a stake and partly burned alive; but before life had ceased, her breast was cut open, her heart torn out and flung in the flames. Her flesh was then cut into small pieces and buried in the cornfield. This was believed to secure an abundant crop. The similarity of the rite to that in vogue among the Mexicans, who also worshipped the morning star as the goddess of fertility, is interesting.

The dead were buried with their possessions, and the customs of mourning continued sometimes for years.

PANI LINGUISTIC STOCK.

• Anaddakkas, on left bank of Sabine river.
• Arikaris, on the middle Missouri.
• Assinais, in central Texas.
• Caddoes, near Clear Lake, La.
• Cenis, see Assinais.
• Huecos, on the upper Brazos river.
• Innies, see Texas.
• Nachitoches, on upper Red river.
• Natacos, see Anaddakkas.
• Pawnees, between Niobrara and Arkansas rivers.
• Tawakonies, on upper Leon river.
• Texas, on upper Sabine river and branches.
• Towachies, see Pawnees.
• Wichitas, on north bank of Red river.
• Yatasses, on Stony creek, an affluent of Red river.

Mandan Indian Village is Described

Mandan Indian Village is Described

   The Mandan village contained at the time of Catlin's visit (1832), as elsewhere stated, about fifty houses and about fifteen hundred people. "These cabins are so spacious," Catlin remarks, "that they hold from twenty to forty persons—a family and all their connections…. From the great numbers of the inmates in these lodges they are necessarily very spacious, and the number of beds considerable. It is no uncommon thing to see these lodges fifty feet in diameter inside (which is an immense room), with a row of these curtained beds extending quite around their sides, being some ten or twelve of them, placed four or five feet apart, and the space between them occupied by a large post, fixed quite firmly in the ground, and six or seven feet high, with large wooden pegs or bolts in it, on which are hung or grouped, with a wild and startling taste, the arms and armor of the respective proprietors." [Footnote: North American Indians, Philadelphia ed., 1857, i, 139.]

    The household, according to the custom of the Indians, was a large one. The number of inhabitants divided among the number of houses would give an average of thirty persons to each house. It is evident from several statements of Catlin before given that the household practiced communism in living, and that it was formed of related families, on the principle of gentile kin, as among the Iroquois. Elsewhere he intimates that the Mandans kept a public store or granary as a refuge for the whole community in a time of scarcity. 

    In like manner Carver, speaking generally of the usages and customs of the Dakota tribes and of the tribes of Wisconsin, remarks that "they will readily share with any of their own tribe the last part of their provisions, and even with those of a different nation, if they chance to come in when they are eating. Though they do not keep one common store, yet that community of goods which is so prevalent among them, and their generous disposition, render it nearly of the same effect." [Footnote: Travels, etc, p. 171.]

What this author seems to state is that community of goods existed in the household, and that it was lengthened out to the tribe by the law of hospitality. Elsewhere, speaking of the large village of the Sauks, he says: "This is the largest Indian town I ever saw. It contains about ninety houses, each large enough for several families." [Footnote: Travels, etc., Phila. ed. 1796, p. 29.]