A Further Contribution to the Study of the Mortuary Customs of the North American Indians

Part 1

This e-text comes in three forms: Unicode (UTF-8), Latin-1 and ASCII. Use the one that works best on your text reader.

--In the UTF-8 (best) version, a small group of words will appear with a macron (“long” mark) on a or u: Tsinūk (six times), tamahno-ūs (three times), mé-mel-ūs-illa-hee, Kaw-a-wāh, Tāh-zee (twice each) There is also a single Greek word. The letter “œ” displays as a single character, and apostrophes and quotation marks are “curly” or angled. If any part of this paragraph displays as garbage, try changing your text reader’s “character set” or “file encoding”. If that doesn’t work, proceed to:

--In the Latin-1 version, the words listed above will have a circumflex (â or û) instead of a macron, the Greek word will be transliterated and shown between #marks#, and the form “œ” is two letters. The three long French passages still have the appropriate accents, but apostrophes and quotation marks will be straight (“typewriter” form). Again, if you see any garbage in this paragraph and can’t get it to display properly, use:

--The ASCII-7 or rock-bottom version. In this version, all diacritics (accents) are gone, including accents on all French words.

Much of this article is quoted from other published sources. The resulting inconsistencies in spelling and punctuation are unchanged. Typographical errors are listed at the end of the e-text.

The Table of Contents and Index were supplied from the beginning and end of the Annual Report volume. The List of Illustrations was printed with the article.

Most footnotes are purely bibliographic. Asterisks after a few footnote numbers [44*] were added by the transcriber to identify those notes that give further information.]

SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION--BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY

J. W. Powell, Director

A FURTHER CONTRIBUTION

to the

STUDY OF THE MORTUARY CUSTOMS

of the

NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS.

Dr. H. C. YARROW,

Act. Asst. Surg., U.S.A.

CONTENTS

List of illustrations 89 Introductory 91 Classification of burial 92 Inhumation 93 Pit burial 93 Grave burial 101 Stone graves or cists 113 Burial in mounds 115 Burial beneath or in cabins, wigwams, or houses 122 Cave burial 126 Embalmment or mummification 130 Urn burial 137 Surface burial 138 Cairn burial 142 Cremation 143 Partial cremation 150 Aerial sepulture 152 Lodge burial 152 Box burial 155 Tree and scaffold burial 158 Partial scaffold burial and ossuaries 168 Superterrene and aerial burial in canoes 171 Aquatic burial 180 Living sepulchers 182 Mourning, sacrifice, feasts, etc. 183 Mourning 183 Sacrifice 187 Feasts 190 Superstition regarding burial feasts 191 Food 192 Dances 192 Songs 194 Games 195 Posts 197 Fires 198 Superstitions 199

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

1.--Quiogozon or dead house 94 2.--Pima burial 98 3.--Towers of silence 105 4.--Towers of silence 106 5.--Alaskan mummies 135 6.--Burial urns 138 7.--Indian cemetery 139 8.--Grave pen 141 9.--Grave pen 141 10.--Tolkotin cremation 145 11.--Eskimo lodge burial 154 12.--Burial houses 154 13.--Innuit grave 156 14.--Ingalik grave 157 15.--Dakota scaffold burial 158 16.--Offering food to the dead 159 17.--Depositing the corpse 160 18.--Tree-burial 161 19.--Chippewa scaffold burial 162 20.--Scarification at burial 164 21.--Australian scaffold burial 166 22.--Preparing the dead 167 23.--Canoe-burial 171 24.--Twana canoe-burial 172 25.--Posts for burial canoes 173 26.--Tent on scaffold 174 27.--House burial 175 28.--House burial 175 29.--Canoe-burial 178 30.--Mourning-cradle 181 31.--Launching the burial cradle 182 32.--Chippewa widow 185 33.--Ghost gamble 195 34.--Figured plum stones 196 35.--Winning throw, No. 1 196 36.--Winning throw, No. 2 196 37.--Winning throw, No. 3 196 38.--Winning throw, No. 4 196 39.--Winning throw, No. 5 196 40.--Winning throw, No. 6 196 41.--Auxiliary throw, No. 1 196 42.--Auxiliary throw, No. 2 196 43.--Auxiliary throw, No. 3 196 44.--Auxiliary throw, No. 4 196 45.--Auxiliary throw, No. 5 196 46.--Burial posts 197 47.--Grave fire 198

A FURTHER CONTRIBUTION

to the

STUDY OF THE MORTUARY CUSTOMS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS

By H. C. Yarrow.

INTRODUCTORY.

In view of the fact that the present paper will doubtless reach many readers who may not, in consequence of the limited edition, have seen the preliminary volume on mortuary customs, it seems expedient to reproduce in great part the prefatory remarks which served as an introduction to that work; for the reasons then urged, for the immediate study of this subject, still exist, and as time flies on become more and more important.

The primitive manners and customs of the North American Indians are rapidly passing away under influences of civilization and other disturbing elements. In view of this fact, it becomes the duty of all interested in preserving a record of these customs to labor assiduously, while there is still time, to collect such data as may be obtainable. This seems the more important now, as within the last ten years an almost universal interest has been awakened in ethnologic research, and the desire for more knowledge in this regard is constantly increasing. A wise and liberal government, recognizing the need, has ably seconded the efforts of those engaged in such studies by liberal grants, from the public funds; nor is encouragement wanted from the hundreds of scientific societies throughout the civilized globe. The public press, too--the mouth-piece of the people--is ever on the alert to scatter broadcast such items of ethnologic information as its corps of well-trained reporters can secure. To induce further laudable inquiry, and assist all those who may be willing to engage in the good work, is the object of this further paper on the mortuary customs of North American Indians, and it is hoped that many more laborers may through it be added to the extensive and honorable list of those who have already contributed.

It would appear that the subject chosen should awaken great interest, since the peculiar methods followed by different nations and the great importance attached to burial ceremonies have formed an almost invariable part of all works relating to the different peoples of our globe; in fact, no particular portion of ethnologic research has claimed more attention. In view of these facts, it might seem almost a work of supererogation to continue a further examination of the subject, for nearly every author in writing of our Indian tribes makes some mention of burial observances; but these notices are scattered far and wide on the sea of this special literature, and many of the accounts, unless supported by corroborative evidence, may be considered as entirely unreliable. To bring together and harmonize conflicting statements, and arrange collectively what is known of the subject, has been the writer’s task, and an enormous mass of information has been acquired, the method of securing which has been already described in the preceding volume and need not be repeated at this time. It has seemed undesirable at present to enter into any discussion regarding the causes which may have led to the adoption of any particular form of burial or coincident ceremonies, the object of this paper being simply to furnish illustrative examples, and request further contributions from observers; for, notwithstanding the large amount of material already at hand, much still remains to be done, and careful study is needed before any attempt at a thorough analysis of mortuary customs can be made. It is owing to these facts and from the nature of the material gathered that the paper must be considered more as a compilation than an original effort, the writer having done little else than supply the thread to bind together the accounts furnished.

Part 2

It is proper to add that all the material obtained will eventually be embodied in a quarto volume, forming one of the series of Contributions to North American Ethnology prepared under the direction of Maj. J. W. Powell, Director of the Bureau of Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution, from whom, since the inception of the work, most constant encouragement and advice has been received, and to whom all American ethnologists owe a debt of gratitude which can never be repaid.

Having thus called attention to the work, the classification of the subject may be given, and examples furnished of the burial ceremonies among different tribes, calling especial attention to similar or almost analogous customs among the peoples of the Old World.

For our present purpose the following provisional arrangement of burials may be adopted, although further study may lead to some modifications.

CLASSIFICATION OF BURIAL.

1st. By INHUMATION in pits, graves, or holes in the ground, stone graves or cists, in mounds, beneath or in cabins, wigwams, houses or lodges, or in caves.

2d. By EMBALMMENT or a process of mummifying, the remains being afterwards placed in the earth, caves, mounds, boxes on scaffolds, or in charnel-houses.

3d. By DEPOSITION of remains in urns.

4th. By SURFACE BURIAL, the remains being placed in hollow trees or logs, pens, or simply covered with earth, or bark, or rocks forming cairns.

5th. By CREMATION, or partial burning, generally on the surface of the earth, occasionally beneath, the resulting bones or ashes being placed in pits in the ground, in boxes placed on scaffolds or trees, in urns, sometimes scattered.

6th. By AERIAL SEPULTURE, the bodies being left in lodges, houses, cabins, tents, deposited on scaffolds or trees, in boxes or canoes, the two latter receptacles supported on scaffolds or posts, or placed on the ground. Occasionally baskets have been used to contain the remains of children, these being hung to trees.

Continue reading A Further Contribution to the Study of the Mortuary Customs of the North American Indians free in the Wunder reader →