Shoshone-Bannock Subsistence and Society

by Robert F. Murphy; Yolanda Murphy

After the Sun Dance was concluded, the participants withdrew from the valley lands and retired to the Green River country and the mountains until the autumn buffalo hunt. At this time, the larger buffalo-hunt and Sun Dance group broke into small units and scattered in several directions. Shimkin maps some of the trails followed by the summer hunting parties (p. 249). Although there was considerable deviation from the trails he indicates, they show a penetration of the Yellowstone and Jackson Hole country, the Owl Creek Mountains, and the Green River and Bear River regions.

Shimkin's chart of the yearly subsistence cycle shows June and July as a period of intertribal rendezvous while August and early September were spent in family groups (p. 279). My informants indicated that small groups of families were the essential social and economic units from June to September; the trade rendezvous held in the Green River country ended by 1840. Some Shoshone said the summer group consisted of only one tipi, while others claimed that this was a post-reservation pattern. In earlier times, it was said, the need for security from attack caused groups of from six to ten tipis (this figure is highly uncertain) to travel together. These summer groups were probably the most stable and cohesive units in Eastern Shoshone society, although there was a good deal of interchange of members.

Although each summer group often followed the same general route every year, other groups could and did hunt this territory. There was no sense of group or band ownership of the lands habitually visited, and a group could alter or change its route. In June many people went to the Sweetwater region and across South Pass to hunt antelope. Antelope were also hunted at various times of the year north of Wind River on the benches at the foot of the Owl Creek Range and in the Green River country. In the latter area, the Eastern Shoshone were frequently joined in September by Shoshone and Bannock from Idaho.

There were several routes to the Jackson Hole and Yellowstone country. The Yellowstone does not seem to have been visited as frequently before the final pacification of the area, owing, no doubt, to the proximity of Crow and Blackfoot. Some groups followed the most direct route—through the Wind River Valley and across Togwatee Pass (the present route of U. S. Highway 287). Others hunted first in the Owl Creek Mountains and then crossed west into the Wind River Valley at Dubois and thence through Togwatee Pass. Still another route led through the "Rough Trail," now called Washakie Pass, in the Wind River Range and gave access to the Pinedale area and the western slope of the range. From that point, groups hunted in this immediate region or went northwest to Jackson Hole or south to the Fort Bridger area. Any one of these routes could be used for the return to Wind River and the subsequent fall buffalo hunt, but there was a tendency to return by a different trail than that used on the outward trip.

Summer subsistence activities were varied, but none called for extensive coöperation beyond the immediate family or the small summer group. Antelope hunting west of the Continental Divide called for some joint endeavor, though not on the scale of the buffalo hunt. Moose and elk were hunted by smaller parties in the high mountain parks and forests of the Wind River, Grand Teton, and Owl Creek Mountains. The last range was especially noted for a plentiful supply of mountain sheep. Deer were killed and rabbits were taken throughout the year. Sage hens were snared in the spring, and duck were killed on Bull Lake in Wind River Valley in the fall. After 1840, there were almost no buffalo left on the west side of the Wind River Range, although before that time they were pursued there by the Shoshone. However, the Wind River Valley abounded in buffalo until relatively late, for the worst excesses of the white hide-hunters did not begin until after the Civil War. Buffalo were also killed in the Owl Creek and Wind River foothills and were taken also in Jackson Hole and Yellowstone Park. Also, a smaller variety of buffalo, called timber buffalo, which did not follow the migratory pattern of the larger Plains type, was killed in the high mountain parks.

Fish were of fundamental importance, especially, according to Shimkin (1947a, p. 268), during the spring. Mountain trout were the main fish; the Eastern Shoshone did not join their colinguists in salmon fishing on the Columbia waters, at least during this later period. Shimkin specifically states that "no private ownership of good fishing places existed, and dams and weirs were not maintained from year to year" (ibid.). This accords with our own field data.

Summer economic activities involved little estensive coöperation and, since game was scattered through the mountains rather than concentrated in large herds, the small groups of families were the most effective economic units. It is significant in this connection that, as soon as the security of the country was guaranteed by the presence of the whites, the one-or two-tipi summer camp displaced its somewhat larger predecessor. Game in the pre-treaty period was plentiful in the Wyoming mountains and a single family or small group of tipis could gain adequate subsistence; the principal reason for larger gatherings in the summer was defense. The yield probably became better after camp groups became smaller, for locales were not hunted out as rapidly.

The only economic activity other than the buffalo hunt which called for the coöperation of a large group of men was antelope hunting. Antelope were usually surrounded by the hunters and run in circles by relays of mounted men. Unlike the Nevada population, the Eastern Shoshone did not build brush corrals or employ antelope shamans.

Women's economic life could be pursued by individuals. In addition to cooking, dressing skins, and other household chores, women's efforts provided all the vegetable foods consumed by the Shoshone. This activity went on from summer into fall. Various berries were collected; gooseberries, currants, buffalo berries, and chokecherries being the most important. All these berries grew near streams and ripened about August. Gooseberries and chokecherries can be found in the mountains and foothills while buffalo berries and currants grow in the lower valleys. The berries were dried and stored for future use.

Roots, also, were a valuable adjunct to the diet. Yamp, the principal root, was found in the mountains. Bitterroot was dug on prairie hills, wild potatoes were found in the foothills, and the wild onion grew in the valley floors. Although special trips were not made to root grounds (in contrast to the congregations for camas in Idaho) the women dug them out with pointed sticks near favorable hunting camps. One informant spoke, for example, of the rich yamp grounds in the Big Horn Mountains. All the women of the camp group went out together to dig roots. This was for purposes of companionship; each woman dug and kept her own tubers.