Fig. 16. Flaking-tool—lower branch utilized to form a crotch in which blow was struck. Upper opposite branch used to secure a heavy stone to give weight and increase the pressure.
(From George Sellars’s article in the
Smithsonian Report, 1885, pt. 1, reprinted
in Chapter IV.)
Fig. 17. A plan view of the outer or high side of an ordinary flake.
“Wood-craft.—Here belongs the felling of trees with stone axes and fire. The softest woods, such as pine, cedar, poplar, and cypress, were chosen for canoes, house-frames, totem-poles, and other large objects. The stems of smaller trees were used also for many purposes. Driftwood was wrought into bows by the Eskimo. As there were no saws, trunks were split and hewn into single planks on the North Pacific Coast. Immense communal dwellings of cedar were there erected, the timbers being moved by rude mechanical appliances and set in place with ropes and skids. The carving on house-posts, totem-poles, and household furniture was often admirable. In the Southwest underground stems were carved into objects of use and ceremony.
“Root-craft.—Practiced for food, basketry, textiles, dyes, fish-poisoning, medicine, etc. Serving the purposes of wood, the roots of plants developed a number of special arts and industries.
“Fibre-craft.—Far more important than for textile purposes, the stems, leaves, and inner and outer bark of plants and the tissues of animals having each its special qualities, engendered a whole series of arts. Some of these materials were used for siding and roofing houses; others yielded shredded fibre, yarn, string, and rope; and some were employed in furniture, clothing, food receptacles and utensils. Cotton was extensively cultivated in the Southwest.
“Seed-craft.—The harvesting of berries, acorns, and other nuts, and grain and other seeds, developed primitive methods of gathering, carrying, milling, storing, cooking, and serving, with innumerable observances of days and seasons, and multifarious ceremony and lore.
“Not content with merely taking from the hand of nature, the Indians were primitive agriculturalists. In gathering roots they first unconsciously stirred the soil and stimulated better growth. They planted gourds in favored places, and returned in autumn to harvest the crops. Maize was regularly planted on ground cleared with the help of fire, and was cultivated with sharpened sticks and hoes of bone, shell, and stone. Tobacco was cultivated by many tribes, some of which planted nothing else.
“Animal industries.—Arts and industries depending on the animal kingdom include primarily hunting, fishing, trapping, and domestication. The secondary arts involve cooking and otherwise preparing food; the butchering and skinning of animals, skin-dressing in all its forms; cutting garments, tents, boats, and hundreds of smaller articles, and sewing them with sinew and other thread; working claws, horn, bone, teeth, and shell into things of use, ornaments, and money; and work in feathers, quills, and hair....
