Fig. 724.—Votive offering. Alaska.
Fig. 724 is copied from a piece of ivory in the museum of the Alaska Commercial Company, San Francisco, California, and was interpreted by an Alaskan native in San Francisco in 1882.
First is a votive offering or “shaman stick,” erected to the memory of one departed. The “bird” carvings are considered typical of “good spirits,” and the above was erected by the remorse-stricken individual, who had killed the person shown.
The headless body represents the man who was killed. In this respect the Ojibwa manner of drawing a person “killed” is similar.
The right hand Indian represents the homicide who erected the “grave-post” or “sacred stick.” The arm is thrown earthward, resembling the Blackfeet and Dakota gesture for “kill.”
That portion of the Kauvuya tribe of Indians in Southern California known as the Playsanos, or lowlanders, formerly inscribed characters upon the gravestones of their dead, relating to the pursuits or good qualities of the deceased. Dr. W. J. Hoffman obtained several pieces or slabs of finely-grained sandstone near Los Angeles, California, during the summer of 1884, which had been used for this purpose. Upon these were the drawings, in incised lines, of the fin back whale, with figures of men pursuing them with harpoons. Around the drawings were close parallel lines with cross lines similar to those made on ivory by the southern Innuit of Alaska.
Figs. 725 to 727 were procured from a native Alaskan by Dr. Hoffman in 1882, and explained to him to be drawings made upon grave posts.
