American Indian life

by Unknown

The great supernatural beings of Nootka belief, such as the Sky Chief, the Thunder-bird, and the Wolves, loomed very large in Tom’s life, whether in prayer or in ritual. Certain Nootka are more deeply religious than others. They are more fervent in their prayers and they work themselves up to a greater ecstasy in the performance of rituals that are sacred to divine powers. In contrast to men of this type, Tom has always been rather sober, not a skeptic by any means, but not an emotional enthusiast. His knowledge of religious ceremonials is vast, but the spirit that animates this knowledge is rather one of order, of legal particularity, not of spiritual ecstasy. The practical economical world, the pursuit of gain, has always been more congenial to Tom’s temperament. This does not mean that Tom is a rationalist in matters relating to the unseen world. Only the educated or half-educated half-breeds are rationalists, and more than one of them has angered Tom by his ill-advised attempts to disturb him with skeptical arguments. However, there has been no change in Tom. He knows, as firmly as he knows his own name, that when the rumble of thunder is heard from the mountain, it is because the Thunder-bird is leaving his house on the peak, flapping his wings heavily, as he makes off for the sea to prey upon the whales. He knows also that when those that are not blind like himself tell him that there has been a flash of lightning, it is because the Thunder-bird has dropped the belt wound about his middle. This belt is the lightning serpent, zig-zagging down to the earth or coiling in a flash around a cedar tree.

Aside from the elementary problem of making his living, a Nootka’s main concern is to earn the esteem of his fellow tribesmen by a lavish display of wealth. It is not enough for him to accumulate it and to live in private ease. He must, from time to time, invite the other families of his tribe, and the neighboring tribes, to public ceremonies known as potlatches, in which one or more of the important privileges to which he is entitled are shown and glorified by the distribution of property to the guests. The exhibiting of privileges may take several forms. The most important of them refer to ancestral crests, which may be shown in a dramatic performance, as a picture on a board, or latterly, on canvas, or symbolized in a dance. Ceremonial games are another frequent type of exhibitions of privileges at certain potlatches. Nearly all privileges have their proper songs, which are themselves jealously guarded privileges, and which are sung on these occasions.

There are two considerations that make the public performance of the more important privileges a matter of the greatest moment. In the first place, a man must clearly indicate his right to its performance by recounting the origin myth that it dramatizes, and by tracing his personal connection with the originator of the privilege. In the second place, he must be careful to distribute at least as much property as has already been distributed in his family, in connection with the public presentation of the privilege. If it is at all possible, he will try to exceed the record, so as to add to the public prestige not only of himself and his immediate family, but of the privilege itself. Should he fail in either of these essential respects, he is shamed. Hence, an important potlatch is not to be lightly undertaken. It requires much careful thought and preparation, and it necessitates the gathering of enough wealth to pay for all the services rendered by singers and other assistants, to present substantial gifts to the guests, and to feed the crowd of men, women and children that are present at the ceremony.

A potlatch is not often given as a mere display of wealth. Nearly always it is combined with some definite social or religious function, such as the giving of a name, the coming to marriageable age of a daughter, marriage, a mourning ceremony, the Wolf ritual, or a doctoring ceremony. Potlatching in its fundamental sense, in other words the giving away of property to the guests, is an essential of practically all ceremonies, big or little, religious or profane. Every potlatch involves at least three parties, the giver, the guest or guests, and the person in whose honor the potlatch is given. The last of these is generally some young member of the family whose prestige is thus furthered early in life, but it may be a stranger who has done the giver a service. There are different kinds of gifts. Certain of them are ceremonial grants to which the highest in rank of the tribe are entitled, but which they are expected to return with one hundred per cent interest at a subsequent potlatch. Another class of gifts, which feature the most important and picturesque part of the potlatch, is made to the highest in rank among the guests. There is no rigid rule as to the return of these gifts, but in practice they are nearly always liquidated at a return potlatch, with gifts of an equal, and in many cases greater, value. Finally, towards the end of the potlatch, there is a general distribution of smaller amounts to the crowd. Less careful account is taken of the return of such gifts than of the first two types. In part, the giving of a potlatch amounts to an investment of value, though it is doubtful whether, among the Nootka, the greater part of the expenditure incurred at a potlatch ever returned to its owner.

A potlatch serves not only a definite social and economic purpose for its giver, but affords, as well, an opportunity for minor distributions of property, such as public payments for services, on the part of other individuals present. Indeed any announcements of importance, such as the handing over of a privilege or a change in name, would be most appropriately made at a potlatch. The assembled tribesmen and guests were, to all intents and purposes, witnesses to such announcements.

Tom began to give potlatches on his own account when still quite a young man. The first one of any importance that he was responsible for, was a potlatch in honor of his niece’s husband. This was a man of low birth, whom Tom had vowed to have nothing to do with. When his niece, however, gave birth to a child, Tom relented and, in order to wash away the stain on his family’s honor, he called together thirty of his relatives, and distributed four guns and a blanket to each. He also sang two of his privileged songs, which he then and there transferred to the child as its due privilege. This potlatch not only marked a reconcilement with his low-born nephew, but gave the little youngster a fair start in life in the race for status. The next of Tom’s potlatches was a Wolf ritual, in which he himself performed two of the ceremonial dances, those of the Thunder-bird and the Wolf circling about on all fours.

Some time after this, Tom resolved to marry a Ts’isha’ath girl named Witsah. In spite of the fact that she was a member of his own tribe, Tom wooed the girl not as a Ts’isha’ath, but as a member of a Nitinat tribe, among whom he had kinsmen on his father’s side. As his own father was dead, he had ten of his Nitinat uncles woo the girl on his behalf. The wooing is always an important part of the marriage preliminaries, and consists chiefly in the placing of objects, symbolizing one or more of the privileges of the suitor, outside the house of the girl’s family. The suitor himself is not present. Sometimes the objects are refused, when the suit may be continued until an acceptance is gained, though this does not necessarily follow. The suitor privileges deposited by Tom’s representatives consisted of ten fires and a carving, representing the lightning serpent. These were accepted and returned to Tom’s uncle as an indication of willingness on the part of the bride’s parents to proceed with the marriage ceremony. Not long after the return of the privileges, the marriage ceremony was celebrated among the Ts’isha’ath people. The money distributed at that time by Tom and his Nitinat relatives constituted a bridal purchase, but when Tom’s first child was born, the property then distributed was returned to Tom and the Nitinats with interest.

The greater part of the marriage ceremony consists of the performance of ceremonial games, each of which is accompanied by special songs, and followed by distributions of property. These games symbolize the difficulty of obtaining the hand of the bride, referring as they do to legendary tests that suitors were compelled to undergo in the past, before they could be admitted by the bride’s father. One of the tests, for instance, might be the lifting of an especially heavy stone, or standing for some time without flinching between two fires. According to legendary theory such tests should be endured by the bridegroom himself, but in actual ceremonial practice any one of the bridegroom’s party may be the winner in the contest, and receive the prize from the bride’s father or whoever of her people is the proud possessor of that particular marriage-game privilege.

Some time after his marriage Tom gave two potlatches in a single month. The first of these was a puberty potlatch in behalf of a younger sister of his. The second was a birth feast or, as the Nootka term it a “navel feast” for his first child, a boy. About a year later Tom invited the Ucluelet people, one of the Nootka tribes, to a feast at which many dance privileges were performed and much property distributed. By this time Tom was getting to be pretty well known among the tribes of the west coast of Vancouver Island, for his rapidly growing wealth and for his potlatches. It was, therefore, no surprise to him, though it proved very gratifying, to have the chief of the Ahousat, one of the most powerful of the northern Nootka tribes, especially invite him to a potlatch at which he was given four of the chief’s ceremonial songs. In return, Tom gave a potlatch to the Ahousat and the Comox, a tribe of alien speech from the east coast of the Island. He distributed four hundred blankets to the former, three hundred to the latter.

A year or two after this potlatch, occurred the decisive event in Tom’s social career. This was the birth of his first daughter. The most magnificent Nootka potlatches are generally given in connection with a daughter’s puberty ceremony. Ever since his marriage, Tom had been hoping to be able, in the fullness of time, to make a record in potlatching among his people, and to show his most valued privileges at the puberty potlatch of a daughter. Now that he was actually blessed by the arrival of a little girl, Tom’s plans took immediate shape. He set about the accumulation of property with more zest than ever, driving many a sharp bargain with the Indians and whites, and he revolved frequently in his mind what tribes he was to invite, and what dramatic displays, dances and songs he was to use at the great ceremony. His first concern was to build a large house of native construction that the guests were to enter when invited to the Ts’isha’ath people. Appropriate timbers for posts and beams are not easy to find, especially since the white man’s sawmill has made its appearance in the country. Hence, Tom was indefatigable in making inquiries of various persons and keeping his eye out for sufficiently large and conveniently located cedars. As he found such trees, he had them felled, hauled up to the Ts’isha’ath village along the Somass river, and put in place as opportunity presented itself. The actual construction of the house was thus spread over a period of some ten or fifteen years.