A. H. Keane

American Origins—Fossil Man in America—The Lagoa-Santa Race—Physical Type in North America—Cranial Deformation—The Toltecs—Type of N.W. Coast Indians—Date of Migrations—Evidence from Linguistics—Stock Languages—Culture—Classification—By Linguistics—Ethnic Movements—Archaeological Classification—Cultural Classification—Eskimo Area—Material Culture—Origin and Affinities—Physical Type—Social Life—Mackenzie Area—The DÉnÉ—Material Culture—Physical Type—Social Life—North Pacific Coast Area—Material Culture—Physical Type—Social Life—Plateau Area—Material Culture—Interior Salish—Social Organisation—Californian Area—Material Culture—Social Life—Plains Area—Material Culture—Dakota—Religion—The Sun Dance—Pawnee—Blackfeet—Arapaho—Cheyenne—Eastern Woodland Area—Material Culture—Central Group—Eastern Group—Iroquoian Tribes: Ojibway—Religion—Iroquois—South-eastern Area—Material Culture—Creeks—Yuchi—Mound-Builders—South-western Area—Material Culture—Transitional or Intermediate Tribes—Pueblos—Cliff Dwellings—Religion—Physical Type—Social Life.

Conspectus.

Present Range. N. W. Pacific Coastlands; the shores of the Arctic Ocean, Labrador, and Greenland; the unsettled parts of Alaska and the Dominion; Reservations and Agencies in the Dominion and the United States; parts of Florida, Arizona, and New Mexico; most of Central and South America with Fuegia either wild and full-blood, or semi-civilised half-breeds.

Hair, black, lank, coarse, often very long, nearly round in transverse section; very scanty on face and practically absent on body; Colour, differs, according to localities, front dusky yellowish white to that of solid chocolate, but the prevailing colour is brown; Skull, generally mesaticephalous (79), but with wide range from 65 (some Eskimo) to 89 or 90 (some British Columbians, Peruvians); the os Incae more frequently present than amongst other races, but the os linguae (hyoid bone) often imperfectly developed; Jaws, massive, but moderately projecting; Cheek-bone, as a rule rather prominent laterally, and also high; Nose, generally large, straight or even aquiline, and mesorrhine; Eyes, nearly always dark brown, with a yellowish conjunctiva, and the eye-slits show a prevailing tendency to a slight upward slant; Stature, usually above the medium 1.728 m. (5 ft. 8 or 10 in.), but variable—under 1.677 m. (5 ft. 6 in.) on the western plateaux (Peruvians, etc.), also in Fuegia and Alaska; 1.829 m. (6 ft.) and upwards in Patagonia (Tehuelches), Central Brazil (Bororos) and Prairie (Algonquians, Iroquoians); the relative proportions of the two elements of the arms and of the legs (radio-humeral and tibio-femoral indices) are intermediate between those of whites and negroes.

Temperament, moody, reserved, and wary; outwardly impassive and capable of enduring extreme physical pain; considerate towards each other, kind and gentle towards their women and children, but not in a demonstrative manner; keen sense of justice, hence easily offended, but also easily pacified. The outward show of dignity and a lofty air assumed by many seems due more to vanity or ostentation than to a feeling of true pride. Mental capacity considerable, much higher than the Negro, but on the whole inferior to the Mongol.

Speech, exclusively polysynthetic, a type unknown elsewhere; is not a primitive condition, but a highly specialised form of agglutination, in which all the terms of the sentence tend to coalesce in a single polysyllabic word; stock languages very numerous, perhaps more so than all the stock languages of all the other orders of speech in the rest of the world.

Religion, various grades of spirit and nature worship, corresponding to the various cultural grades; a crude form of shamanism prevalent amongst most of the North American aborigines, polytheism with sacrifice and priestcraft amongst the cultured peoples (Aztecs, Mayas, etc.); the monotheistic concept nowhere clearly evolved; belief in a natural after-life very prevalent, if not universal.

Culture, highly diversified, ranging from the lowest stages of savagery through various degrees of barbarism to the advanced social state of the more or less civilised Mayas, Aztecs, Chibchas, Yungas, Quichuas, and Aymaras; amongst these pottery, weaving, metal-work, agriculture, and especially architecture fairly well developed; letters less so, although the Maya script seems to have reached the true phonetic state; navigation and science rudimentary or absent; savagery generally far more prevalent and intense in South than in North America, but the tribal state almost everywhere persistent.

North America: Eskimauan (Innuit, Aleut, Karalit); Athapascan (DÉnÉ, Pacific division, Apache, Navaho); Koluschan; Algonquian (Delaware, Abnaki, Ojibway, Shawnee, Arapaho, Sauk and Fox, Blackfeet); Iroquoian (Huron, Mohawk, Tuscarora, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga); Siouan (Dakota, Omaha, Crow, Iowa, Osage, Assiniboin); Shoshonian (Comanche, Ute); Salishan; Shahaptian; Caddoan; Muskhogean (Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole); Pueblo (ZuÑian, Keresan, Tanoan).

Central America: Nahuatlan (Aztec, Pipil, Niquiran); Huaxtecan (Maya, QuichÉ); Totonac; Miztecan; Zapotecan; Chorotegan; Tarascan; Otomitlan; Talamancan; Choco.

South America: Muyscan (Chibcha); Quichuan (Inca, Aymara); Yungan (Chimu); Antisan; Jivaran; Zaparan; Betoyan; Maku; Pana (Cashibo, Karipuna, Setebo); Ticunan; Chiquitan; Arawakan (Arua, Maypure, Vapisiana, Ipurina, Mahinaku, Layana, Kustenau, Moxo); Cariban (BakaÏri, Nahuqua, Galibi, Kalina, Arecuna, Macusi, Ackawoi); Tupi-Guaranian (Omagua, Mundurucu, Kamayura, Emerillon); Gesan (Botocudo, Kayapo, Cherentes); Charruan; Bororo; Karayan; Guaycuruan (Abipones, Mataco, Toba); Araucanian or Moluchean; Patagonian or Tehuelchean (Pilma, Yacana, Ona); Enneman (Lengua, Sanapana, Angaites); Fuegian (Yahgan, Alakaluf).

It is impossible to dissociate the ethnological history of the New World from that of the Old. The absence from America at any period of the world's history not only of anthropoid apes but also of the Cercopithecidae, in other words of the Catarrhini, entirely precludes the possibility of the independent origin of man in the western hemisphere. Therefore the population of the Americas must have come from the Old World. In prehistoric times there were only two possible routes for such immigration to have taken place. For the mid-Atlantic land connection was severed long ages before the appearance of man, and the connection of South America with Antarctica had also long disappeared[737]. We are therefore compelled to look to a farther extension of land between North America and northern Europe on the one hand, and between north-west America and north-east Asia on the other. We know that in late Tertiary times there was a land-bridge connecting north-west Europe with Greenland, and Scharff[738] believes that the Barren-ground reindeer took this route to Norway and western Europe during early glacial times, but that "towards the latter part of the Glacial period the land-connection ... broke down." Other authorities are of opinion that the continuous land between the two continents in higher latitudes remained until post-glacial times. Brinton[739] considered that it was impossible for man to have reached America from Asia, because Siberia was covered with glaciers and not peopled until late Neolithic times, whereas man was living in both North and South America at the close of the Glacial Age. He acknowledged frequent communication in later times between Asia and America, but maintained that the movement was rather from America to Asia than otherwise. He was therefore a strong advocate of the European origin of the American race. There is no doubt that North America was connected with Asia in Tertiary times, though some geologists assert that "the far North-west did not rise from the waves of the Pacific Ocean (which once flowed with a boundless expanse to the North Pole) until after the glacial period." In that case "the first inhabitants of America certainly did not get there in this way, for by that time the bones of many generations were already bleaching on the soil of the New World[740]." The "Miocene Bridge," as the land connecting Asia and America in late geological times has been called, was probably very wide, one side would stretch from Kamchatka to British Columbia, and the other across Behring Strait. If, as seems probable, this connection persisted till, or was reconstituted during, the human period, tribes migrating to America by the more northerly route would enter the land east of the great barrier of the Rocky Mountains. The route from the Old World to the New by the Pacific margin probably remained nearly always open. Thus, while not denying the possibility of a very early migration from North Europe to North America through Greenland, it appears more probable that America received its population from North Asia.

We have next to determine what were the characteristics of the earliest inhabitants of America, and the approximate date of their arrival. There have been many sensational accounts of the discoveries of fossil man in America, which have not been able to stand the criticism of scientific investigation. It must always be remembered that the evidence is primarily one of stratigraphy. Assuming, of course, that the human skeletal remains found in a given deposit are contemporaneous with the formation of that deposit and not subsequently interred in it, it is for the geologist to determine the age. The amount of petrifaction and the state of preservation of the bones are quite fallacious nor can much reliance be placed upon the anatomical character of the remains. Primordial human remains may be expected to show ancestral characters to a marked degree, but as we have insufficient data to enable us to determine the rate of evolution, anatomical considerations must fit into the timescale granted by the geologist.

Apart from pure stratigraphy associated animal remains may serve to support or refute the claims to antiquity, while the presence of artifacts, objects made or used by man, may afford evidence for determining the relative date if the cultural stratigraphy of the area has been sufficiently established.

Fortunately the fossil human remains of America have been carefully studied by a competent authority who says, "Irrespective of other considerations, in every instance where enough of the bones is preserved for comparison the somatological evidence bears witness against the geological antiquity of the remains and for their close affinity to, or identity with those of the modern Indian. Under these circumstances but one conclusion is justified, which is that thus far on this continent, no human bones of undisputed geological antiquity are known[741]." Hrdlicka subsequently studied the remains of South America and says, "A conscientious, unbiased study of all the available facts has shown that the whole structure erected in support of the theory of geologically ancient man on that continent rests on very imperfectly and incorrectly interpreted data and in many instances on false premises, and as a consequence of these weaknesses must completely collapse when subjected to searching criticism.—As to the antiquity of the various archaeological remains from Argentina attributed to early man, all those to which particular importance has been attached have been found without tenable claim to great age, while others, mostly single objects, without exception fall into the category of the doubtful[742]."

The conclusions of W. H. Holmes, Bailey Willis, F. E. Wright and C. N. Fenner, who collaborated with Hrdlicka, with regard to the evidence thus far furnished, are that, "it fails to establish the claim that in South America there have been brought forth thus far tangible traces of either geologically ancient man himself or of any precursors of the human race[743]." Hrdlicka is careful to add, however, "This should not be taken as a categorical denial of the existence of early man in South America, however improbable such a presence may now appear."

According to J. W. Gidley[744] the evidence of vertebrate paleontology indicates (1) That man did not exist in North America at the beginning of the Pleistocene although there was a land connection between Asia and North America at that time permitting a free passage for large mammals. (2) That a similar land connection was again in existence at the close of the last glacial epoch, and probably continued up to comparatively recent times, as indicated by the close resemblance of related living mammalian species on either side of the present Behring Strait. (3) That the first authentic records of prehistoric man in America have been found in deposits that are not older than the last glacial epoch, and probably of even later date, the inference being that man first found his way into North America at some time near the close of the existence of this last land bridge. (4) That this land bridge was broad and vegetative, and the climate presumably mild, at least along its southern coast border, making it habitable for man.

Rivet[745] points out that from Brazil to Terra del Fuegia on the Atlantic slope, in Bolivia and Peru, on the high plateaux of the Andes, on the Pacific coast and perhaps in the south of California, traces of a distinct race are met with, sometimes in single individuals, sometimes in whole groups. This race of Lagoa Santa is an important primordial element in the population of South America, and has been termed by Deniker the Palaeo-American sub-race[746].

The men were of low stature but considerable strength, the skull was long, narrow and high, of moderate size, prognathous, with strong brow ridges, but not a retreating forehead. There is no reliable evidence as to the age of these remains. Hrdlicka, after reviewing all the evidence says, "Besides agreeing closely with the dolichocephalic American type, which had an extensive representation throughout Brazil, including the Province of Minas Geraes, and in many other parts of South America, it is the same type which is met with farther north among the Aztec, Tarasco, Otomi, Tarahumare, Pima, Californians, ancient Utah cliff dwellers, ancient north-eastern Pueblos, Shoshoni, many of the Plains Tribes, Iroquois, Eastern Siouan, and Algonquian. But it is apart from the Eskimo, who form a distinct subtype of the yellow-brown strain of humanity[747]."

Rivet[748] adds that an examination of the present distribution of the descendants of the Lagoa-Santa type shows that they are all border peoples, in East Brazil, and the south of Patagonia and Terra del Fuegia, where the climate is rigorous, in desert islands of west and southern Chili, on the coast of Ecuador, and perhaps in California. This suggests that they have been driven out in a great eccentric movement from their old habitat, into new environment producing fresh crossings.

There is an absence of this high narrow-headed type throughout the northern part of South America, and a prevalence of medium or sub-brachycephalic heads which are always low in the crown. These are now represented by the Caribs and Arawaks, but there was more than one migration of brachycephalic peoples from the north.

To return to North America. As we have just seen Hrdlicka recognises a dolichocephalic element in North America, and various ethnic groups range to pronounced brachycephaly. Nevertheless he believes in the original unity of the Indian race in America, basing his conclusions on the colour of the skin, which ranges from yellowish white to dark brown, the straight black hair, scanty beard, hairless body, brown and often more or less slanting eye, mesorrhine nose, medium prognathism, skeletal proportions and other essential features. In all these characters the American Indians resemble the yellowish brown peoples of eastern Asia and a large part of Polynesia[749]. He also believes that there were many successive migrations from Asia.

The differences of opinion between Hrdlicka and other students is probably more a question of nomenclature than of fact. The eastern Asiatics and Polynesians are mixed peoples, and if there were numerous migrations from Asia, spread over a very long period of time, people of different stocks would have found their way into America. "It is indeed probable," Hrdlicka adds, "that the western coast of America, within the last two thousand years, was on more than one occasion reached by small parties of Polynesians, and that the eastern coast was similarly reached by small groups of whites; but these accretions have not modified greatly, if at all, the mass of the native population[750]."

The inhabitants of the plains east of the Rocky Mountains and the eastern wooded area are characterised by a head which varies about the lower limit of brachycephaly, and by tall stature. This stock probably arrived by the North Pacific Bridge before the end of the last Glacial period, and extended over the continent east of the great divide. Finally bands from the north, east and south migrated into the prairie area. The markedly brachycephalic immigrants from Asia appear to have proceeded mainly down the Pacific slope and to have populated Central and South America, with an overflow into the south of North America. It is probable that there were several migrations of allied but not similar broad-headed peoples from Asia in early days, and we know that recently there have been racial and cultural drifts between the neighbouring portions of America and Asia[751]. Indeed Bogoras[752] suggests that ethnographically the line separating Asia and America should lie from the lower Kolyma River to Gishiga Bay.

Owing to these various immigrations and subsequent minglings the cranial forms show much variation, and are not sufficiently significant to serve as a basis of classification. In parts of North America the round-headed mound-builders and others were encroached upon by populations of increasingly dolichocephalic type—Plains Indians and Cherokees, Chichimecs, Tepanecs, Acolhuas. Even still dolichocephaly is characteristic of Iroquois, Coahuilas, Sonorans, while the intermediate indices met with on the prairies and plateaux undoubtedly indicate the mixture between the long-headed invaders and the round-heads whom they swept aside as they advanced southwards. Thus the Minnetaris are highly dolicho; the Poncas and Osages sub-brachy; the Algonquians variable, while the Siouans oscillate widely round a mesaticephalous mean.

The Athapascans alone are homogeneous, and their sub-brachycephaly recurs amongst the Apaches and their other southern kindred, who have given it an exaggerated form by the widespread practice of artificial deformation, which dates from remote times. The most typical cases both of brachy and dolicho deformation are from the Cerro de las Palmas graves in south-west Mexico. Deformation prevails also in Peru and Bolivia, as well as in Ceara and the Rio Negro on the Atlantic side. The flat-head form, so common from the Columbia estuary to Peru, occurs amongst the broad-faced Huaxtecs, their near relations the Maya-QuichÉs, and the Nahuatlans. It is also found amongst the extinct Cebunys of Cuba, Hayti and Jamaica, and the so-called "Toltecs," that is, the people of Tollan (Tula), who first founded a civilised state on the Mexican table-land (sixth and seventh centuries A.D.), and whose name afterwards became associated with every ancient monument throughout Central America. On this "Toltec question" the most contradictory theories are current; some hold that the Toltecs were a great and powerful nation, who after the overthrow of their empire migrated southwards, spreading their culture throughout Central America; others regard them as "fabulous," or at all events "nothing more than a sept of the Nahuas themselves, the ancestors of those Mexicans who built Tenochtitlan," i.e. the present city of Mexico. A third view, that of Valentini, that the Toltecs were not Nahuas but Mayas, is now supported both by E. P. Dieseldorff[753] and by FÖrstemann[754]. T. A. Joyce[755] suggests that the vanguard of the Nahuas on reaching the Mexican valley adopted and improved the culture of an agricultural people of Tarascan affinities whose culture was in part due to Mayan inspiration, whom they found settled there. Later migrations of Nahua were greatly impressed with the "Toltec" culture which had thus arisen through the impact of a virile hunting people on more passive agriculturalists.

On the North-west Pacific Coast similar ethnical interminglings recur, and Franz Boas[756] here distinguishes as many as four types, the Northern (Tsimshian and others), the Kwakiutl, the Lillooet of the Harrison Lake region and the inland Salishan (Flat-heads, Shuswaps, etc.). All are brachycephalic, but while the Tsimshians are of medium height 1.675 m. (5 ft. 6 in.) with low, concave nose, very large head, and enormously broad face, exceeding the average for North America by 6 mm., the Kwakiutls are shorter 1.645 m. (5 ft. 4¾ in.) with very high and relatively narrow hooked nose, and quite exceptionally high face; the Harrison Lake very short 1.600 m. (5 ft 3 in.) with exceedingly short and broad head (C. I. nearly 89), "surpassing in this respect all other forms known to exist in North America"; lastly, the inland Salish of medium height 1.679 m. (5 ft. 6 in.) with high and wide nose of the characteristic Indian form and a short head.

It would be difficult to find anywhere a greater contrast than that which is presented by some of these British Columbian natives, those, for instance, of Harrison Lake with almost circular heads (88.8), and some of the Labrador Eskimo with a degree of dolichocephaly not exceeded even by the Fijian Kai-Colos (65)[757]. But this violent contrast is somewhat toned by the intermediate forms, such as those of the Tlingits, the Aleutian islanders, and the western (Alaskan) Eskimo, by which the transition is effected between the Arctic and the more southern populations. It is not possible at present to indicate even in outline the chronology of any of the ethnic movements outlined above. Warren K. Moorehead[758] agrees with the great majority of American archaeologists in holding the existence of palaeolithic man in North America as not proven[759], the so-called palaeoliths being either rejects or rude tools for rough purposes. When man migrated to America from North and East Asia whenever that period may have been, he appears to have been in that stage of culture—or rather of stone technique—which we term Neolithic, and the drifting movement ceased before he had learnt the use of metals.

A further proof of the antiquity of the migrations is afforded by linguistics. A. F. Chamberlain asserts[760] that "it may be said with certainty, so far as all data hitherto presented are concerned, that no satisfactory proof whatever has been put forward to induce us to believe that any single American Indian tongue or group of tongues has been derived from any Old World form of speech now existing or known to have existed in the past. In whatever way the multiplicity of American Indian languages and dialects may have arisen, one can be reasonably sure that the differentiation and divergence have developed here in America and are in no sense due to the occasional intrusion of Old World tongues individually or en masse.... Certain real relationships between the American Indians and the peoples of north-eastern Asia, known as 'Paleo-Asiatics,' have, however, been revealed as a result of the extensive investigations of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition.... The general conclusion to be drawn from the evidence is that the so-called 'Paleo-Asiatic' peoples of north-eastern Asia, i.e. the Chukchee, Koryak, Kamchadale, Gilyak, Yukaghir, etc. really belong physically and culturally with the aborigines of north-western America.... Like the modern Asiatic Eskimo they represent a reflex from America and Asia, and not vice versa.... It is the opinion of good authorities also that the 'Paleo-Asiatic' peoples belong linguistically with the American Indians rather than with the other tribes and stocks of northern or southern Asia. Here we have then the only real relationship of a linguistic character that has ever been convincingly argued between tongues of the New World and tongues of the Old."

It is not merely that the American languages differ from other forms of speech in their general phonetic, structural and lexical features; they differ from them in their very morphology, as much, for instance, as in the zoological world class differs from class, order from order. They have all of them developed on the same polysynthetic lines, from which if a few here and there now appear to depart, it is only because in the course of their further evolution they have, so to say, broken away from that prototype[761]. Take the rudest or the most highly cultivated anywhere from Alaska to Fuegia—Eskimauan, Iroquoian, Algonquian, Aztec, Tarascan, Ipurina, Peruvian, Yahgan—and you will find each and all giving abundant evidence of this universal polysynthetic character, not one true instance of which can be found anywhere in the eastern hemisphere. There is incorporation with the verb, as in Basque, many of the Caucasus tongues, and the Ural-Altaic group; but it is everywhere limited to pronominal and purely relational elements.

But in the American order of speech there is no such limitation, and not merely the pronouns, which are restricted in number, but the nouns with their attributes, which are practically numberless, all enter necessarily into the verbal paradigm. Thus in Tarascan (Mexico): hopocuni = to wash the hands; hopodini = to wash the ears, from hoponi = to wash, which cannot be used alone[762]. So in Ipurina (Amazonia): nicuÇacatÇaurumatiniÍ = I draw the cord tight round your waist, from ni, I; cuÇaca, to draw tight; tÇa, cord; tÚruma, waist; tini, characteristic verbal affix; Í, thy, referring to waist[763].

We see from such examples that polysynthesis is not a primitive condition of speech, as is often asserted, but on the contrary a highly developed system, in which the original agglutinative process has gone so far as to attract all the elements of the sentence to the verb, round which they cluster like swarming bees round their queen. In Eskimauan the tendency is shown in the construction of nouns and verbs, by which other classes of words are made almost unnecessary, and one word, sometimes of interminable length, is able to express a whole sentence with its subordinate clauses. H. Rink, one of the first Eskimo scholars of modern times, gives the instance: "SuÉrÚkame-autdlÁsassoq-tusaramiuk-tuningingmago-iluarÍn-gilÁt = they did not approve that he (a) had omitted to give him (b) something, as he (a) heard that he (b) was going to depart on account of being destitute of everything[764]." Such monstrosities "are so complicated that in daily speech they could hardly ever occur; but still they are correct and can be understood by intelligent people[765]."

He gives another and much longer example, which the reader may be spared, adding that there are altogether about 200 particles, as many as ten of which may be piled up on any given stem. The process also often involves great phonetic changes, by which the original form of the elements becomes disguised, as, for instance, in the English hap'oth = half-penny-worth. The attempt to determine the number of words that might be formed in this way on a single stem, such as igdlo, a house, had to be given up after getting as far as the compound igdlorssualiortugssarsiumavoq = he wants to find one who will build a large house.

It is clear that such a linguistic evolution implies both the postulated isolation from other influences, which must have disturbed and broken up the cumbrous process, and also the postulated long period of time to develop and consolidate the system throughout the New World. But time is still more imperiously demanded by the vast number of stock languages, many already extinct, many still current all over the continent, all of which differ profoundly in their vocabulary, often also in their phonesis, and in fact have nothing in common except this extraordinary polysynthetic groove in which they are cast. There are probably about 75 stock languages in North America, of which 58 occur north of Mexico.

But even that conveys but a faint idea of the astonishing diversity of speech prevailing in this truly linguistic Babel. J. W. Powell[766] points out that the practically distinct idioms are far more numerous than might be inferred even from such a large number of mother tongues. Thus, in the Algonquian[767] linguistic family he tells us there are about 40, no one of which could be understood by a people speaking another; in Athapascan from 30 to 40; in Siouan over 20; and in Shoshonian a still greater number[768]. The greatest linguistic diversity in a relatively small area is found in the state of California, where, according to Powell's classification, 22 distinct stocks of languages are spoken. R. B. Dixon and A. L. Kroeber[769] show however that these fall into three morphological groups which are also characterised by certain cultural features. It is the same, or perhaps even worse, in Central and in South America, where the linguistic confusion is so great that no complete classification of the native tongues seems possible. Clements R. Markham in the third edition of his exhaustive list of the Amazonian tribes[770] has no less than 1087 entries. He concludes that these may be referred to 485 distinct tribes in all the periods, since the days of AcuÑa (1639). Deducting some 111 as extinct or nearly so, the total amounts to "323 at the outside" (p. 135). But for such linguistic differences, large numbers of these groups would be quite indistinguishable from each other, so great is the prevailing similarity in physical appearance and usages in many districts. Thus Ehrenreich tells us that, "despite their ethnico-linguistic differences, the tribes about the head-waters of the Xingu present complete uniformity in their daily habits, in the conditions of their existence, and their general culture[771]," though it is curious to note that the art of making pottery is restricted here to the Arawak tribes[772]. Yet amongst them are represented three of the radically distinct linguistic groups of Brazil, some (BakaÏri and Nahuqua) belonging to the Carib, some (AuetÖ and Kamayura) to the Tupi-Guarani, and some (Mehinaku and Vaura) to the Arawak family. Obviously these could not be so discriminated but for their linguistic differences. On the other hand the opposite phenomenon is occasionally presented of tribes differing considerably in their social relations, which are nevertheless of the same origin, or, what is regarded by Ehrenreich as the same thing, belong to the same linguistic group. Such are the Ipurina, the Paumari and the Yamamadi of the Purus valley, all grouped as Arawaks because they speak dialects of the Arawakan stock language. At the same time it should be noted that the social differences observed by some modern travellers are often due to the ever-increasing contact with the whites, who are now encroaching on the Gran Chaco plains, and ascending every Amazonian tributary in quest of rubber and the other natural produce abounding in these regions. The consequent displacement of tribes is discussed by G. E. Church[773].

In the introduction to his valuable list Clements Markham observes that the evidence of language favours the theory that the Amazonian tribes, "now like the sands on the sea-shore for number, originally sprang from two or at most three parent stocks. Dialects of the Tupi language extend from the roots of the Andes to the Atlantic, and southward into Paraguay ... and it is established that the differences in the roots, between the numerous Amazonian languages, are not so great as was generally supposed[774]." This no doubt is true, and will account for much. But when we see it here recorded that of the Carabuyanas (Japura river) there are or were 16 branches, that the Chiquito group (Bolivia) comprises 40 tribes speaking "seven different languages"; that of the Juris (Upper Amazons) there are ten divisions; of the Moxos (Beni and MamorÉ rivers) 26 branches, "speaking nine or, according to Southey, thirteen languages"; of the UaupÉs (Rio Negro) 30 divisions, and so on, we feel how much there is still left to be accounted for. Attempts have been made to weaken the force of the linguistic argument by the assumption, at one time much in favour, that the American tongues are of a somewhat evanescent nature, in an unstable condition, often changing their form and structure within a few generations. But, says Powell, "this widely spread opinion does not find warrant in the facts discovered in the course of this research. The author has everywhere been impressed with the fact that savage tongues are singularly persistent, and that a language which is dependent for its existence upon oral tradition is not easily modified[775]." A test case is the Delaware (Leni LenapÉ), an Algonquian tongue which, judging from the specimens collected by Th. Campanius about 1645, has undergone but slight modification during the last 250 years.

In this connection the important point to be noticed is the fact that some of the stock languages have an immense range, while others are crowded together in indescribable confusion in rugged upland valleys, or about river estuaries, or in the recesses of trackless woodlands, and this strangely irregular distribution prevails in all the main divisions of the continent. Thus of Powell's 58 linguistic families in North America as many as 40 are restricted to the relatively narrow strip of coastland between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific, ten are dotted round the Gulf of Mexico from Florida to the Rio Grande, and two disposed round the Gulf of California, while nearly all the rest of the land—some six million square miles—is occupied by the six widely diffused Eskimauan, Athapascan, Algonquian, Iroquoian, Siouan, and Shoshonian families. The same phenomenon is presented by Central and South America, where less than a dozen stock languages—Opatan, Nahuatlan, Huastecan, Chorotegan, Quichuan, Arawakan, Gesan (Tapuyan), Tupi-Guaranian, Cariban—are spread over millions of square miles, while many scores of others are restricted to extremely narrow areas. Here the crowding is largely determined, as in Caucasia, by the altitude (Andes in Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia; Sierras in Mexico).

It is strongly held by many American ethnologists that the various cultures of America are autochthonous, nothing being borrowed from the Old World. J. W. Powell[776], who rendered such inestimable services to American anthropology, affirmed that "the aboriginal peoples of America cannot be allied preferentially to any one branch of the human race in the Old World"; that "there is no evidence that any of the arts of the American Indians were borrowed from the Orient"; that "the industrial arts of America were born in America, America was inhabited by tribes at the time of the beginning of industrial arts. They left the Old World before they had learned to make knives, spear and arrowheads, or at least when they knew the art only in its crudest state. Thus primitive man has been here ever since the invention of the stone knife and the stone hammer." He further contended that "the American Indian did not derive his forms of government, his industrial or decorative arts, his languages, or his mythological opinions from the Old World, but developed them in the New"; and that "in the demotic characteristics of the American Indians, all that is common to tribes of the Orient is universal, all that distinguishes one group of tribes from another in America distinguishes them from all other tribes of the world."

This view has been emphasised afresh by Fewkes[777], though of recent years it has met with vigorous opposition. At the conclusion of his article "Die melanesische Bogenkultur und ihre Verwandten[778]" Graebner attempts to trace the cultural connection of South America with South-east Asia rather than with the South Seas, the main links being represented by head-hunting, certain types of skin-drum and of basket, and in particular three types of crutch-handled paddle. According to him the spread of culture has taken place by the land route and Behring Strait, not across the Pacific by way of the South Seas, a view to which he adheres in his later work. An ingenious and detailed attempt has also been made by Pater Schmidt[779] to trace the various cultures determined for Oceania and Africa in South America. Apart from the great linguistic groups usually adopted as the basis of classification, Schmidt would divide the South American Indians according to their stage of economic development into collectors, cultivators, and civilised peoples of the Andean highlands. Though this series may have the appearance of evolution, in point of fact "each group is composed of peoples differing absolutely in language and race, who brought with them to South America in historically distinct migrations at all events the fundamentals of their respective cultures.... As we pass in review the cultural elements of the separate groups, their weapons, implements, dwellings, their sociology, mythology, and religion we discover the innate similarity of these groups to the culture-zones of the Old World in all essential features[780]." The author proceeds to work out his theory in great detail; the earlier cultures he too considers have travelled by the enormously lengthy land route by way of North America, only the "free patrilineal culture" (Polynesia and Indonesia) having reached the west coast directly by sea[781].

W. H. Holmes[782] draws attention to analogies between American and foreign archaeological remains, for example the stone gouge of New England and Europe. He hints at influences coming from the Mediterranean and even from Africa. "Even more remarkable and diversified are the correspondences between the architectural remains of Yucatan and those of Cambodia and Java in the far East. On the Pacific side of the American continent strange coincidences occur in like degree, seeming to indicate that the broad Pacific has not proved a complete bar to intercourse of peoples of the opposing continents ... it seems highly probable considering the nature of the archaeological evidence, that the Western World has not been always and wholly beyond the reach of members of the white, Polynesian, and perhaps even the black races."

Walter Hough[783] gives various cultural parallels between America and the other side of the Pacific but does not commit himself. S. Hagar[784] brings forward some interesting correspondences between the astronomy of the New and of the Old Worlds, but adopts a cautious attitude.

More recently the problem has been attacked with great energy by G. Elliot Smith[785]. His investigations into the processes of mummification and the tombs of ancient Egypt led him to comparative studies, and he notes that certain customs seem to be found in association, forming what is known as a culture-complex. For example, "in most regions the people who introduced the habit of megalithic building and sun worship also brought with them the practice of mummification." Also associated with these are:—stories of dwarfs and giants, belief in the indwelling of gods and great men in megalithic monuments, the use of these structures in a particular manner for special council, the practice of hanging rags on trees in association with such monuments, serpent worship, tattooing, distension of the lobe of the ear, the use of pearls, the conch-shell trumpet, etc. In a map showing the distribution of this "heliolithic" culture-complex he indicates the main lines of migration to America, one across the Aleutian chain and down the west coast to California, the other and more important one, across the Pacific to Peru, and thence to various parts of South America, through Central America to the southern half of the United States. Contrary to Schmidt, Elliot Smith postulates contact of cultures rather than actual migrations of people; he considers it possible that a small number of aliens arriving by sea in Peru, for example, might introduce customs of a highly novel and subversive character which would take root and spread far and wide. The Peruvian custom of embalming the dead certainly presents analogies to that of ancient Egypt, and Elliot Smith is convinced that "the rude megalithic architecture of America bears obvious evidence of the same inspiration which prompted that of the Old World." In a later paper Elliot Smith[786] adduces further evidence in support of his thesis "that the essential elements of the ancient civilization of India, Further Asia, the Malay Archipelago, Oceania, and America were brought in succession to each of these places by mariners, whose oriental migrations (on an extensive scale) began as trading intercourse between the Eastern Mediterranean and India some time after 800 B.C. and continued for many centuries." This dissemination was in the first instance due to the Phoenicians and there are "unmistakable tokens that the same Phoenician methods which led to the diffusion of this culture-complex in the Old World also were responsible for planting it in the New[787] some centuries after the Phoenicians themselves had ceased to be" (l.c. p. 27). Further evidence along the same lines is offered by W. J. Perry[788] who has noted the geographical distribution of terraced cultivation and irrigation and finds that it corresponds to a remarkable extent with that of the "heliolithic" culture-complex, and by J. Wilfrid Jackson[789] who has investigated the Aztec Moon-cult and its relation to the Chank cult of India, the money cowry as a sacred object among North American Indians[790], shell trumpets and their distribution in the Old and New World[791] and the geographical distribution of the shell purple industry[792]. He points out that we have ample evidence of the practice of this ancient industry in several places in Central America, and refers to Zelia Nuttall's interesting paper on the subject[793]. Elliot Smith also discusses "Pre-Columbian Representations of the Elephant in America[794]" and remarks "coincidences of so remarkable a nature cannot be due to chance. They not only confirm the identification of the elephant in designs in America, but also incidentally point to the conclusion that the Hindu god Indra was adopted in Central America with practically all the attributes assigned to him in his Asiatic home." Elliot Smith believes that practically every element of the early civilisation of America was derived from the Old World. Small groups of immigrants from time to time brought certain of the beliefs, customs, and inventions of the Mediterranean area, Egypt, Ethiopia, Arabia, Babylonia, Indonesia, Eastern Asia and Oceania, and the confused jumble of practices became assimilated and "Americanised" in the new home across the Pacific as the result of the domination of the great uncultured aboriginal populations by small bands of more cultured foreigners. These highly suggestive studies will force adherents of the theory of the indigenous origin of American culture to reconsider the grounds for their opinions and will lead them to turn once more to the writings of Bancroft[795], Tylor[796], Nuttall[797], Macmillan Brown[798], Enoch[799] and others.

There is no satisfactory scheme of classification of the American peoples. Although there is a good deal of scattered information about the physical anthropology of the natives it has not yet been systematised and no classification can at present be based thereon. A linguistic classification is therefore usually adopted, but a geographical or cultural grouping, or a combination of the two, has much practical convenience. As Farrand[800] points out "It must never be forgotten that the limits of physical, linguistic and cultural groups do not correspond; and the overlapping of stocks determined by those criteria is an unavoidable complication."

An inspection of the map of the distribution of linguistic stocks of North America prepared by J. W. Powell[801] which represents the probable state of affairs about 1500 A.D. shows that a few linguistic stocks have a wide distribution while there is a large number of restricted stocks crowded along the Pacific slope. The following are the better known tribes of the more important stocks together with their distribution.

Eskimauan (Eskimo), along the Arctic coasts from 60° N. lat. in the west, to 50° in the east. Athapascan, northern group, DÉnÉ or Tinneh (including many tribes), interior of Alaska, northern British Columbia and the Mackenzie basin, and the Sarsi of south-eastern Alberta and northern Montana; southern group, Navaho and Apache in Arizona, New Mexico and northern Mexico; the Pacific group, a small band in southern British Columbia, others in Washington, Oregon and northern California. Algonquian, south and west of Canada, the United States east of the Mississippi, the whole valley of the Ohio, and the states of the Atlantic coast. Blackfoot of Montana, Alberta, south and further east, Cheyenne and Arapaho of Minnesota. The main group of dialects is divided into the Massachusett, Ojibway (Ojibway, Ottawa, Illinois, Miami, etc.) and Cree types. The latter include the Cree, Montagnais, Sauk and Fox, Menomini, Shawnee, Abnaki, etc. Iroquoian, in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec; Hurons in the valley of the St Lawrence and lake Simcoe. Neutral confederacy in western New York and north and west of lake Erie. The great confederacy of the Iroquois or "Five Nations" (Seneca, Cayuga, Oneida, Onondaga and Mohawk, to which the Tuscarora were added in 1712) in central New York; the Conestoga and Susquehanna to the south. A southern group was located in eastern Virginia and north Carolina, and the Cherokee, centred in the southern Appalachians from parts of Virginia and Kentucky to northern Alabama. Muskhogean of Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, including the Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, Seminole, etc. and the Natchez. There are several small groups about the mouth of the Mississippi. Caddoan. The earliest inhabitants of the central and southern plains beyond the Missouri belonged to this stock, the largest group occupied parts of Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas, it consists of the Caddo, Wichita, etc. and the Kichai, the Pawnee tribes in parts of Nebraska and Kansas and an offshoot, the Arikara in North Dakota. Siouan, a small group in Virginia, Carolina, Catawba, etc. and a very large group, practically occupying the basins of the Missouri and Arkansas, with a prolongation through Wisconsin, where were the Winnebago. The main tribes are the Mandan, Crow, Dakota, Assiniboin, Omaha and Osage. Shoshonian of the Great Plateau and southern California. The two outlying tribes were the Hopi of north Arizona and the Comanche who ranged over the southern plains. Among the plateau tribes are the Ute, Shoshoni, Mono and LuiseÑo. Yuman, from Arizona to Lower California.

From the data available J. R. Swanton and R. B. Dixon draw the following conclusions[802]. "It appears that the origin of the tribes of several of our stocks may be referred back to a swarming ground, usually of rather indefinite size but none the less roughly indicated. That for the Muskhogeans, including probably some of the smaller southern stocks, must be placed in Louisiana, Arkansas and perhaps the western parts of Mississippi and Tennessee, although a few tribes seem to have come from the region of the Ohio. That for the Iroquoians would be along the Ohio and perhaps farther west, and that of the Siouans on the lower Ohio and the country to the north including part at least of Wisconsin. The dispersion area for the Algonquians was farther north about the Great Lakes and perhaps also the St Lawrence, and that for the Eskimo about Hudson Bay or between it and the Mackenzie river. The Caddoan peoples seem to have been on the southern plains from earliest times. On the north Pacific coast we have indications that the flow of population has been from the interior to the coast. This seems certain in the case of the Indians of the Chimmesayan stock and some Tlinglit subdivisions. Some Tlinglit clans, however, have moved from the neighbourhood of the Nass northward. Looking farther south we find evidence that the coast Salish have moved from the inner side of the coast ranges, while a small branch has subsequently passed northward to the west of it. The Athapascan stock in all probability has moved southward, sending one arm down the Pacific coast, and a larger body presumably through the Plains which reached as far as northern Mexico. Most of the stocks of the Great Plateau and of Oregon and California show little evidence of movement, such indications as are present, however, pointing toward the south as a rule. The Pueblo Indians appear to have had a mixed origin, part of them coming from the north, part from the south. In general there is to be noted a striking contrast between the comparatively settled condition of those tribes west of the Rocky mountains and the numerous movements, particularly in later times, of those to the east."

With regard to the Pacific coast Dixon[803] notes that it "has apparently been occupied from the earliest times by peoples differing but little in their culture from the tribes found in occupancy in the sixteenth century. Cut off from the rest of the country by the great chain of the Cordilleras and the inhospitable and arid interior plateaus, the tribes of this narrow coastal strip developed in comparative seclusion their various cultures, each adopted to the environment in which it was found....

"In several of the ingenious theories relating to the development and origin of American cultures in general, it has been contended that considerable migrations both of peoples and of cultural elements passed along this coastal highway from north to south. If, however, the archaeological evidence is to be depended on, such great sweeping movements, involving many elements of foreign culture, could hardly have taken place, for no trace of their passage or modifying effect is apparent.... We can feel fairly sure that the prehistoric peoples of each area were in the main the direct ancestors of the local tribes of today....

"In comparison with the relative simplicity of the archaeological record on the Pacific coast, that of the eastern portion of the continent is complex, and might indeed be best described as a palimpsest. This complexity leads inevitably to the conclusion that here there have been numerous and far-reaching ethnic movements, resulting in a stratification of cultures."

W. H. Holmes has compiled a map marking the limits of eleven areas which can be recognised by their archaeological remains[804]. He points out that the culture units are, as a matter of course, not usually well-defined. Cultures are bound to over-lap and blend along the borders and more especially along lines of ready communication. In some cases evidence has been reported of early cultures radically distinct from the type adopted as characteristic of the areas, and ancestral forms grading into the later and into the historic forms are thought to have been recognised. Holmes frankly acknowledges the tentative character of the scheme, which forms part of a synthesis that he is preparing of the antiquities of the whole American continent.

North America is customarily divided into nine areas of material culture, and though this is convenient, a more correct method, as C. Wissler points out[805], is to locate the respective groups of typical tribes as culture centres, classifying the other tribes as intermediate or transitional. The geographical stability of the material culture centres is confirmed by archaeological evidence which suggests that the striking individuality they now possess resulted from a more or less gradual expansion along original lines. The material cultures of these centres possess great vitality and are often able completely to dominate intrusive cultural unity. Thus tribes have passed from an intermediate state to a typical, as when the Cheyenne were forced into the Plains centre, and the Shoshonian Hopi adopted the typical Pueblo culture. Wissler comes to the conclusion that "the location of these centres is largely a matter of ethnic accident, but once located and the adjustments made, the stability of the environment doubtless tends to hold each particular type of material culture to its initial locality, even in the face of many changes in blood and language." It is from his valuable paper that the material culture traits of the following areas have been obtained.

I. Eskimo Area. The fact that the Eskimo live by the sea and chiefly upon sea food does not differentiate them from the tribes of the North Pacific coast, but they are distinguished from the latter by the habit of camping in winter upon sea ice and living upon seal, and in the summer upon land animals. The kayak and "woman's boat," the lamp, harpoon, float, woman's knife, bowdrill, snow goggles, trussed-bow, and dog traction are almost universal. The type of winter shelter varies considerably, but the skin tent is general in summer and the snow house, as a more or less permanent winter house, prevails east of Point Barrow.

The mode of life of all the Eskimo, as F. Boas[806] has pointed out, is fairly uniform and depends on the distribution of food at the different seasons. The migrations of game compel the natives to move their habitations from time to time, and as the inhospitable country does not produce vegetation to an extent sufficient to support human life they are forced to depend entirely upon animal food. The abundance of seals in Arctic America enables man to withstand the inclemency of the climate and the sterility of the soil. The skins of seals furnish the materials for summer garments and for the tent, their flesh is almost their only food, and their blubber their indispensable fuel during the long dark winter when they live in solid snow houses. When the ice breaks up in the spring the Eskimo establish their settlements at the head of the fiords where salmon are easily caught. When the snow on the land has melted in July the natives take hunting trips inland in order to obtain the precious skins of the reindeer, or of the musk-ox, of whose heavy pelts the winter garments are made. Walrus and the ground seal also arrive and birds are found in abundance and eaten raw.

The Eskimo[807] occupy more than 5000 miles of seaboard from north-east Greenland to the mouth of the Copper river in western Alaska. Many views have been advanced as to the position of their centre of dispersion; most probably it lay to the west of Hudson Bay. Rink[808] is of opinion that they originated as a distinct people in Alaska, where they developed an Arctic culture; but Boas[809] regards them "as, comparatively speaking, new arrivals in Alaska, which they reached from the east." A westward movement is supported by myths and customs, and by the affinities of the Eskimo with northern Asiatics. There was always hostility between the Eskimo and the North American Indians, which, apart from their very specialised mode of life, precluded any Eskimo extension southwards. The expansion of the Eskimo to Greenland is explained by Steensby[810] as follows:—the main southern movement would have followed the west coast from Melville Bay, rounded the southern point and proceeded some distance up the east coast. From the Barren Grounds north-west of Hudson Bay the Polar Eskimo followed the musk-ox, advanced due north to Ellesmere Land, then crossed to Greenland, and, still hunting the musk-ox, advanced along the north coast and down the east coast towards Scoresby Sound. Another line of migration apparently started from the vicinity of Southampton Island and pursued the reindeer northwards into Baffin Land; on reaching Ponds Inlet these reindeer-hunting Eskimo for the most part turned along the east coast.

Physically the Eskimo constitute a distinct type. They are of medium stature, but possess uncommon strength and endurance; their skin is light brownish yellow with a ruddy tint on the exposed parts; hands and feet are small and well formed; their heads are high, with broad faces, and narrow high noses, and eyes of a Mongolian character. But great varieties are found in different parts of the vast area over which they range. The Polar Eskimo of Greenland, studied by Steensby, were more of American Indian than of Asiatic type[811]. Of their psychology this writer says, "For the Polar Eskimos life is deadly real and sober, a constant striving for food and warmth which is borne with good humour, and all dispensations are accepted as natural consequences, about which it is of no use to reason or complain." "The hard struggle for existence has not permitted the Polar Eskimo to become other than a confirmed egoist, who knows nothing of disinterestedness. Towards his enemies he is crafty and deceitful—he does not attack them openly, but indulges in backbiting.... It is only during the hunt that a common interest and a common danger engender a deeper feeling of comradeship[812]."

Still less Mongolian in type are the "blond Eskimo" recently encountered by StefÁnsson in south-west Victoria Island[813], who are regarded by him as very possibly the mixed descendants of Scandinavian ancestors who had drifted there from west Greenland. It is known that Eric the Red discovered Greenland in the year 982 and that 3 years later settlers went there from the Norse colony in Iceland.

The winter snow houses, which are about 12 × 15 ft. in diameter and 12 ft. high, usually with annexes, are always occupied by two families, each woman having her own lamp and sitting on the ledge in front of it. If more families join in making a snow house, they make two main rooms. Whenever it is possible the men spend the short days in hunting and each woman prepares the food for her husband. The long nights are mainly spent in various recreations. The social life in the summer settlement is somewhat different. The families do not cook their own meals, but a single one suffices for the whole settlement. The day before it is her turn to cook the woman goes to the hills to fetch enough shrubs for the fire. When a meal is ready the master of the house calls out and everybody comes out of his tent with a knife, the men sit in one circle and the women in another. These dinners, which are always held in the evening, are almost always enlivened by a mimic performance. The great religious feasts take place just before the beginning of winter.

There are three forms of social grouping: the Family, House-mates, and Place-mates. (1) The family consists of a man, his wife or wives, their children and adopted children; widows and their children may be adopted, but the woman retains her own fireplace. Sometimes men are adopted, such as bachelors without any relatives, cripples, or impoverished men. Joint ownership and use of a boat and house, and common labour and toil in obtaining the means of support define the real community of the family. (2) House-mates are families that join together to build and occupy and maintain the same house. This form of establishment is especially common in Greenland, but each family keeps its separate establishment inside the common house. (3) Place-fellows. The inhabitants of the same hamlet or winter establishment form one community although no chief is elected or authority acknowledged.

Generally children are betrothed when very young. The newly married pair usually live at first with the wife's family. Both polygyny and polyandry occur. A man may lend or exchange his wife for a whole season or longer, as a sign of friendship. On certain occasions it is even commanded by religious law. There is no government, but there is a kind of chief in the settlement, though his authority is very limited. He is called the "pimain," i.e. he who knows everything best. He decides the proper time to shift the huts from one place to another, he may ask some men to go sealing, others to go deer hunting, but there is not the slightest obligation to obey him. The men in a community may form themselves into an informal council for the regulation of affairs. The decorative art of the Eskimo is not remarkably developed, but the pictorial art consists of clever sketches of everyday scenes and there is a well developed plastic art. Many of the carvings are toys and are made for the pleasure of the work. "The religious views and practices of the Eskimo while, on the whole, alike in their fundamental traits, show a considerable amount of differentiation in the extreme east and in the extreme west. It would seem that the characteristic traits of shamanism are common to all the Eskimo tribes. The art of the shaman (angakok) is acquired by the acquisition of guardian spirits.... Besides the spirits which may become guardian spirits of men, the Eskimo believes in a great many others which are hostile and bring disaster and death.... The ritualistic development of Eskimo religion is very slight[814]."

II. Mackenzie Area. Skirting the Eskimo area is a belt of semi-Arctic lands almost cut in two by Hudson Bay. To the west are the DÉnÉ tribes, who are believed to fall into three culture groups, an eastern group, Yellow Knives, Dog Rib, Hares, Slavey, Chipewyan and Beaver; a south-western group, Nahane, Sekani, Babine and Carrier; and a north-western group, comprising the Kutchin, Loucheux, Ahtena and Khotana. The material culture of the south-western group is deduced from the writings of Father Morice[815]. All the tribes are hunters of large or small game, caribou are often driven into enclosures, small game taken in snares or traps; various kinds of fish are largely used, and a few of the tribes on the head waters of the Pacific take salmon; large use of berries is made, they are mashed and dried by a special process; edible roots and other vegetable foods are used to some extent; utensils are of wood and bark; there is no pottery; bark vessels are used for boiling with or without stones; travel in summer is largely by canoe, in winter by snowshoe; dog sleds are used to some extent, but chiefly since trade days, the toboggan form prevailing; clothing is of skins; mittens and caps are worn; there is no weaving except rabbit-skin garments, but fine network occurs on snowshoes, bags, and fish nets, materials being of bark fibre, sinew and babiche; there is also a special form of woven quill work; the typical habitation seems to be the double lean-to, though many intrusive forms occur; other material culture traits include the making of fish-hooks and spears; a limited use of copper; and poorly developed work in stone.

The physical characteristics vary very much from tribe to tribe. The Sekani, according to Morice, are slender and bony, in stature rather below the average, with a narrow forehead, hollow cheeks, prominent cheekbones, small eyes deeply sunk in their orbit, the upper lip very thin and the lower somewhat protruding, the chin very small and the nose straight. The Carriers, on the contrary, are tall and stout, without as a rule being too corpulent. The men average 1.66 m. in height. Their forehead is much broader than that of the Sekani, and less receding than is usual with American aborigines. The face is full, and the nose aquiline. All the tribes are remarkably unwarlike, timid, and even cowardly. Weapons are seldom used and in personal combat, which consists in a species of wrestling, knives are previously laid aside. The fear of enemies is a marked feature, due in part, doubtless, to traditional recollection of the raids of earlier days. Their honesty is noted by all travellers. Morice records that among the Sekani a trader will sometimes go on a trapping expedition, leaving his store unlocked, without fear of any of its contents going amiss. Meantime a native may call in his absence, help himself to as much powder and shot or any other item as he may need, but he will never fail to leave there an exact equivalent in furs.

The eastern DÉnÉ are nomad hunters who gather berries and roots, while the western are semi-sedentary, living for most of the year in villages when they subsist largely on salmon. The former are patrilineal and the latter are grouped into matrilineal exogamic totemic clans. The headmen of the clans formed a class of privileged nobles who alone owned the hunting grounds. Morice speaks of clan, honorific and personal totems. The first two were adopted from coastal tribes, the honorific was assumed by some individuals in order to attain a rank to which they were not entitled by heredity. The "personal totem" is the guardian spirit or genius, the belief in which is common to nearly all North American peoples. Shamanism prevails throughout the area. The mythology almost always refers to a "Transformer" who visited the world when incomplete and set things in order. They have the custom of the potlatch[816]. If a man desires another man's wife he can challenge the husband to a wrestling match, the winner keeps the woman[817].

III. North Pacific Coast Area. This culture is rather complex with tribal variations, but it can be treated under three subdivisions, a northern group, Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian; a central group, the Kwakiutl tribes and the Bellacoola; and a southern group, the Coast Salish, Nootka, Chinook, Kalapooian, Waiilatpuan, Chimakuan and some Athapascan tribes. The first of these seem to be the type and are characterised by: the great dependence upon sea food, some hunting upon the mainland, large use of berries (dried fish, clams and berries are the staple food); cooking with hot stones in boxes and baskets; large rectangular gabled houses of upright cedar planks with carved posts and totem poles; travel chiefly by water in large seagoing dug-out canoes some of which had sails; no pottery nor stone vessels, except mortars; baskets in checker, those in twine reaching a high state of excellence among the Tlingit; coil basketry not made; mats of cedar bark and soft bags in abundance; no true loom, the warp hanging from a bar and weaving with the fingers downwards; clothing rather scanty, chiefly of skin, a wide basket hat (the only one of the kind on the continent, apparently for protection against rain); feet usually bare, but skin moccasins and leggings occasionally made; for weapons the bow, club and a peculiar dagger, no lances; slat, rod and skin armour; wooden helmets, no shields; practically no chipped stone tools, but nephrite or green stone used; wood work highly developed; work in copper possibly aboriginal but, if so, weakly developed. The central group differs in a few minor points; twisted and loosely woven bark or wool takes the place of skins for clothing and baskets are all in checkerwork. Among the southern group appears a strong tendency to use stone arrowheads, and a peculiar flat club occurs, vaguely similar to the New Zealand type[818].

Physically the typical North Pacific tribes are of medium stature, with long arms and short bodies. Among the northern branches the stature averages 1.675 m. (5 ft. 6 in.), the head is very large with an average index of 82.5. The face is very broad, the nose concave or straight, seldom convex, with slight elevation. Among the southern tribes, notably the Kwakiutl, the stature averages 1.645 m. (5 ft. 4¾ in.), the cephalic index is 84.5, the face very broad but also of great length, the nose very high, rather narrow and frequently convex.

The social relations of these peoples vary from tribe to tribe, but on the whole they fall into a sequence from north to south. In the northern portion descent is matrilineal, but patrilineal in the south. J. G. Frazer does not accept the view of Boas "that the Northern Kwakiutl have borrowed both the rule of maternal descent and the division into totemic clans from their more northerly neighbours of alien stocks; in other words, that totemism and mother-kin have spread southward among a people who had father-kin and no totemic system[819]." He inclines "to the other view, formerly favoured by Boas himself, namely, that the Kwakiutl are in a stage of transition from mother-kin to father-kin[820]."

Each village is autonomous and originally may have been restricted to a single totem clan. The population is divided into three ranks, nobles, common people and a low caste consisting of poor people and serfs who cannot participate in the secret societies. In addition there is a totemic grouping. There may be several totemic clans in one village and the same totem may not only occur in every village, but may extend from one tribe to another. This suggests that there were originally two, or in some cases more than two, totemic clans which in process of time became subdivided into sub-clans; these, while retaining the crest of the original clan, acquired fresh ones, and the families contained in each sub-clan may have their special crest or crests in addition. New crests and names are constantly being introduced. Marriage is forbidden between people of the same crest, irrespective of the tribe. The natives according to Boas do not consider themselves descendants from their totem. A wife brings her father's position, crest and privileges as a dower to her husband, who is not allowed to use them himself, but acquires them for the use of his son, in other words this inheritance is in the female line.

The widely spread American custom of a youth acquiring a guardian spirit is far more prevalent among the southern section than the northern, but among the Kwakiutl he can only obtain as his patron, one or more of a limited number of spirits which are hereditary in his clan. In the northern tribes the secret societies are coextensive with the totemic clans; among the Kwakiutl they are connected with guardian spirits and it is significant that during the summer, when the people are scattered, society is based on the old clan system, but when the people live together in villages in the winter, society is reorganised on the basis of the secret societies. There is a highly developed system of barter of which the blanket is now the unit of value, formerly the units were elk-skins, canoes or slaves. Certain symbolic objects have attained fanciful values. A vast credit system has grown up based on the custom of loaning property at high interest, at the great festivals called "potlatch" and by it the giver gains great honour. The religion is closely related to the totemic beliefs; supernatural aid is given by the spirits to those who win their favour. The raven is the chief figure in the mythology; he regulates the phenomena of nature, procures fire, daylight, and fresh water, and teaches men the arts.

To the south, and extending inland to the divide, forming a much less characteristic group are the Salish or Flat-heads who are allied to the Athapascans. The coastal Salish assimilate the culture just described, but the plateau Salish are more democratic, less settled and more individualistic in religious matters[821]. The Chinooks or Flat-heads of the lower reaches of the Columbia river are nearly extinct. They deformed the heads of infants. These tribes and the Shahapts or Nez PercÉs are differentiated by garments of raw hides, cranial deformation, absence of tattooing and plain bows, but they still have communal houses though without totem posts. They cook by means of heated stones and have zoomorphic masks[822].

IV. Plateau Area. The Plateau area lies between the North Pacific Coast area and the Plains. It is far less uniform than either in its topography, the south being a veritable desert while the north is moist and fertile. The traits may be summarised as: extensive use of salmon, deer, roots (especially camas) and berries; the use of a handled digging stick, cooking with hot stones in holes and baskets; the pulverisation of dried salmon and roots for storage; winter houses, semi-subterranean, a circular pit with a conical roof and smoke hole entrance; summer houses, movable or transient, mat or rush-covered tents and the lean-to, double and single; the dog sometimes used as a pack animal; water transportation weakly developed, crude dug-outs and bark canoes being used; pottery not known; basketry highly developed, coil, rectangular shapes, imbricated technique; twine weaving in flexible bags and mats; some simple weaving of bark fibre for clothing; clothing for the entire body usually of deerskins; skin caps for the men, and in some cases basket caps for women; blankets of woven rabbit-skin; the sinew-backed bow prevailed; clubs, lances, and knives, and rod and slat armour were used in war, also heavy leather shirts; fish spears, hooks, traps and bag nets were used; dressing of deerskins highly developed; upright stretching frames and straight long handled scrapers; wood work more advanced than among Plains tribes, but insignificant compared to North Pacific Coast area; stone work confined to the making of tools and points, battering and flaking; work in bone, metal, and feathers very weak[823].

Of the tribes of this area, the interior Salish, the Thompson, Shushwap and Lillooet, appear to be the most typical of those concerning which any information is available. The Shahapts or Nez PercÉs, and the Shoshoni show some marked Plains traits. "The interior Salish are landsmen and hunters, and from time immemorial have been accustomed to follow their game over mountainous country. This mode of life has engendered among them an active, slender, athletic type of men; they are considerably taller and possess a much finer physique than their congeners of the coastal region, who are fishermen, passing the larger portion of their time on the water squatting in their canoes, never walking to any place if they can possibly reach it by water. The typical coast Salish are a squat thick-set people, with disproportionate legs and bodies, slow and heavy in their movements, and as unlike their brothers of the interior as it is possible for them to be[824]."

The Thompsons represented the Salish at their highest and best, both morally and physically, and their ethical precepts and teaching set a very high standard of virtue before the advent of the Europeans. Hill-Tout says that receptiveness and a wholesale adoption of foreign fashions and customs are their striking qualities, and "if they have fallen away from these high standards, as we fear they have, the fault is not theirs but ours.... We assumed a grave responsibility when we undertook to civilise these races[825]."

The simplest form of social organisation is found among the interior hunting tribes, where a state of pure anarchy may be said to have formerly prevailed, each family being a law unto itself and acknowledging no authority save that of its own elderman. Each local community was composed of a greater or less number of these self-ruling families. There was a kind of headship or nominal authority given to the oldest and wisest of the eldermen in some of the larger communities, where occasion called for it or where circumstances arose in which it became necessary to have a central representative. This led in some centres to the regular appointing of local chiefs or heads whose business it was to look after the material interest of the commune over which they presided; but the office was always strictly elective and hedged with manifold limitations as to authority and privilege. For example, the local chief was not necessarily the head of all undertakings. He would not lead in war or the chase unless he happened to be the best hunter or the bravest and most skilful warrior among them; and he was subject to deposition at a moment's notice if his conduct did not meet with the approval of the elders of the commune. His office or leadership was therefore purely a nominal one. All hunting, fishing, root, and berry grounds were common property and shared in by all alike.... In one particular tribe even the food was held and meals were taken in common, the presiding elder or headman calling upon a certain family each day to provide and prepare the meals for all the rest, every one, more or less, taking it in turn to discharge this social duty[826].

V. Californian Area. Of the four sub-culture areas noted by Kroeber[827] the central group is the most extensive and typical. Its main characteristics are: acorns as the chief vegetable food, supplemented by wild seeds, while roots and berries are scarcely used; the acorns are made into bread by a roundabout process; hunting is mostly of small game, fishing wherever possible; the houses are of many forms, all simple shelters of brush or tule, or more substantial conical lean-to structures of poles; the dog was not used for packing and there were no canoes, but rafts of tule were used for ferrying; no pottery but high development of basketry both coil and twine; bags and mats scanty; cloth or other weaving of simple elements not known; clothing simple and scanty; feet usually bare; the bow the only weapon, usually sinew-backed; work in skins, wood, bone etc., weak, in metals absent, in stone work not advanced. In the south modifications enter with large groups of Yuman and Shoshonian tribes where pottery, sandals and wooden war clubs are intrusive. The extinct Santa Barbara were excellent workers in stone, bone and shell, and made plank canoes.

Topographical variation produces consequent changes in mode of life as the well watered and wooded country of Oregon and Northern California gradually merges into the warm dry climate of South California with decreasing moisture towards the tropics. As Kroeber says[828], "From the time of the first settlement of California, its Indians have been described as both more primitive and more peaceful than the majority of the natives of North America.... The practical arts of life, the social institutions and the ceremonies of the Californian Indians are unusually simple and undeveloped. There was no war for its own sake, no confederation of powerful tribes, no communal stone pueblos, no totems, or potlatches. The picturesqueness and the dignity of the Indians are lacking. In general rudeness of culture the Californian Indians are scarcely above the Eskimo.... If the degree of civilisation attained by people depends in any large measure on their habitat, as does not seem likely, it might be concluded from the case of the Californian Indians that natural advantages were an impediment rather than an incentive to progress.... It is possible to speak of typical Californian Indians and to recognise a typical Californian culture area. A feature that should not be lost sight of is the great stability of population.... The social organisation was both simple and loose.... Beyond the family the only bases of organisation were the village and the language." In so simple a condition of society difference of rank naturally found but little scope. The influence of chiefs was comparatively small, and distinct classes, as of nobility or slaves, were unknown. Individual property rights were developed and what organisation of society there was, was largely on the basis of property. The ceremonies are characterised by a very slight development of the extreme ritualism that is so characteristic of the American Indians, and by an almost entire absence of symbolism of any kind. Fetishism is also unusual. One set of ceremonies was usually connected with a secret religious society; during initiation members were disguised by feathers and paint, but masks were not worn. There was also an annual tribal spectacular ceremony held in remembrance of the dead. In the north-west portion of the state a somewhat more highly developed and specialised culture existed which has some affinities with that of the north-west tribes, as is indicated by a greater advance in technology, a social organisation largely upon a property basis and a system of mythology that is suggestive of those further north. The now extinct tribes of the Santa Barbara islands and adjacent mainland were more advanced. They alone employed a plank-built canoe instead of the balsas or canoe-shaped bundles of rushes of the greater part of California. They made stone bowls and did inlaid work. Like the North Californians and tribes further north they buried instead of burning their dead. The eastern tribes shade off into their neighbours. The LuiseÑo, the southernmost of the Shoshonians, had puberty rites for girls and boys[829]. The belief in a succession of births "is reminiscent of Oceanic and Asiatic ways of thought[830]." [About] 1788 a secret cult arose inculcating, with penalties, obedience, fasting, and self-sacrifice on initiates[831].

VI. Plains Area. The chief traits of this culture are the dependence upon the bison ("buffalo") and the very limited use of roots and berries; absence of fishing; lack of agriculture; the tipi or tent as the movable dwelling and transportation by land only, with the dog and the travois (in historic times, with the horse); no baskets, pottery, or true weaving; clothing of bison and deerskins; there is high development of work in skins and special bead technique and raw-hide work (parfleche, cylindrical bag etc.), and weak development of work in wood, stone and bone. This typical culture is manifested in the Assiniboin, Arapaho, Blackfoot, Crow, Cheyenne, Comanche, Gros Ventre, Kiowa, Kiowa-Apache, Sarsi and Teton-Dakota[832]. Among the tribes of the eastern border a limited use of pottery and basketry may be added, some spinning and weaving of bags, and rather extensive agriculture. Here the tipi alternates with larger and more permanent houses covered with grass, bark or earth, and there was some attempt at water transportation. These tribes are the Arikara, Hidatsa, Iowa, Kansa, Mandan, Missouri, Omaha, Osage, Oto, Pawnee, Ponca, Santee-Dakota[833], Yankton-Dakota[833] and Wichita.

On the western border other tribes (Wind River Shoshoni, Uinta and Uncompahgre Ute) lack pottery but produce a rather high type of basketry, depending far less on the bison but more on deer and small game, making large use of wild grass seeds.

On the north-eastern border the Plains-Ojibway and Plains-Cree combine many traits of the forest hunting tribes with those found in the Plains.

The Dakota or Sioux are universally conceded to be of the highest type, physically, mentally and probably morally of any of the western tribes. Their bravery has never been questioned by white or Indian and they conquered or drove out every rival except the Ojibway. Their physical characteristics are as follows: dark skin faintly tinged with red, facial features more strongly marked than those of the Pacific Coast Indians, nose and lower jaw particularly prominent and heavy, head generally mesocephalic and not artificially deformed. They are a free and dominant race of hunters and warriors, necessarily strong and active. Their weapons of stone, wood, bone and horn are tomahawk, club, flint knife, and bow and arrow. All their habits centre in the bison, which provided the staple materials of nutrition and industry. Drawing and painting were done on prepared bison skins and elaborately carved pipes were made for ceremonial use.

They are divided into kinship groups, with inheritance as a rule in the male line. The woman is autocrat of the home. Exogamy was strictly enforced in the clan but marriage within the tribe or with related tribes was encouraged. The marriage was arranged by the parents and polygyny was common where means would permit. Government consisted in chieftainship acquired by personal merit, and the old men exercised considerable influence.

Religious conceptions were based on a belief in Wakonda or Manito[834], an all-pervading spirit force, whose cult involved various shamanistic ceremonials consisting of dancing, chanting, feasting and fasting. Most distinctive of these is the Sun dance, practised by almost all the tribes of the plains except the Comanche. It is an annual festival lasting several days, in honour of the sun, for the purpose of obtaining abundant produce throughout the year.

The Sun dance was not only the greatest ceremony of the Plains tribes but was a condition of their existence. More than any other ceremony or occasion, it furnished the tribe the opportunity for the expression of emotion in rhythm, and was the occasion of the tribe becoming more closely united. It gave opportunity for the making and renewing of common interests, the inauguration of tribal policies, and the renewing of the rank of the chiefs; for the exhibition, by means of mourning feasts, of grief over the loss of members of families; for the fulfilment of social obligations by means of feasts; and, finally, for the exercise and gratification of the emotions of love on the part of the young in the various social dances which always formed an interesting feature of the ceremony[835].

Being strongly opposed by the missionaries because it was utterly misunderstood[836], and finding no favour in official circles, the Sun dance has been for many years an object of persecution, and in consequence is extinct among the Dakota, Crows, Mandan, Pawnee, and Kiowa, but it is still performed by the Cree, Siksika (Blackfoot), Arapaho, Cheyenne, Assiniboin, Ponca, Shoshoni and Ute, though in many of these tribes its disappearance is near at hand, for it has lost part of its rites and has become largely a spectacle for gain rather than a great religious ceremony[837].

The Pawnee do not differ at all widely from the Dakota, but have a somewhat finer cast of features. They are more given to agriculture, raising crops of maize, pumpkins, etc. The Pawnee type of hut is characteristic, consisting of a circular framework of poles or logs, covered with brush, bark and earth. Their religious ceremonies were connected with the cosmic forces and the heavenly bodies. The dominating power was Tirawa generally spoken of as "Father." The winds, thunder, lightning and rain were his messengers. Among the Skidi the morning and evening stars represented the masculine and feminine elements, and were connected with the advent and perpetuation on earth of all living forms. A series of ceremonies relative to the bringing of life and its increase began with the first thunder in the spring and culminated at the summer solstice in human sacrifice, but the series did not close until the maize, called "mother corn," was harvested. At every stage of the series certain shrines or "bundles" became the centre of a ceremony. Each shrine was in charge of an hereditary keeper, but its rituals and ceremonies were in the keeping of a priesthood open to all proper aspirants. Through the sacred and symbolic articles of the shrines and their rituals and ceremonies a medium of communication was believed to be opened between the people and the supernatural powers, by which food, long life and prosperity were obtained. The mythology of the Pawnee is remarkably rich in symbolism and poetic fancy and their religious system is elaborate and cogent. The secret societies, of which there were several in each tribe, were connected with the belief in supernatural animals. The functions of these societies were to call the game, to heal diseases, and to give occult powers. Their rites were elaborate and their ceremonies dramatic[838].

The Blackfeet or Siksika[839], an Algonquian confederacy of the northern plains, agree in culture with the Plains tribes generally, though there is evidence of an earlier culture, approximately that of the eastern woodland tribes. They are divided into the Siksika proper, or Blackfeet, the Kainah or Bloods, and the Piegan, the whole being popularly known as Blackfoot or Blackfeet. Formerly bison and deer were their chief food and there is no evidence that they ever practised agriculture, though tobacco was grown and used entirely for ceremonial purposes. The doors of their tipis always faced east. They have a great number of dances—religious, war and social—besides secret societies for various purposes, together with many "sacred bundles" around every one of which centres a ritual. Practically every adult has his personal "medicine." The principal deities are the Sun, and a supernatural being known as Napi "Old Man," who may be an incarnation of the same idea. The religious activity of a Blackfoot consists in putting himself into a position where the cosmic power will take pity upon him and give him something in return. There was no conception of a single personal god[840].

The Arapaho, another Algonquian Plains tribe, were once according to their own traditions a sedentary agricultural people far to the north of their present range, apparently in North Minnesota. They have been closely associated with the Cheyenne for many generations[841]. The annual Sun Dance is their greatest tribal ceremony, and they were active propagators of the ghost-dance religion of the last century which centred in the belief in the coming of a messiah and the restoration of the country to the Indians[842].

The Cheyenne, also of agricultural origin, have been for generations a typical prairie tribe, living in skin tipis, following the bison over large areas, travelling and fighting on horseback. In character they are proud, contentious, and brave to desperation, with an exceptionally high standard for women. Under the old system they had a council of 44 elective chiefs, of whom four constituted a higher body, with power to elect one of their number as head chief of the tribe. In all councils that concerned the relations with other tribes, one member of the council was appointed to argue as proxy or "devil's advocate" for the alien people. The council of 44 is still symbolised by a bundle of 44 invitation sticks, kept with the sacred medicine-arrows, and formerly sent round when occasion arose to convene the assembly. The four medicine-arrows constitute the tribal palladium which they claim to have had from the beginning of the world. It was exposed once a year with appropriate rites, and is still religiously preserved. No woman, white man, or even mixed blood of the tribe has ever been allowed to come near the sacred arrows. In priestly dignity the keepers of the medicine-arrows and the priests of the Sun dance rites stood first and equal[843].

VII. Eastern Woodland Area[844]. The culture north of the Great Lakes and east of the St Lawrence is comparable to that of the DÉnÉ (see p. 361), the main traits being: the taking of caribou in pens; the snaring of game; the importance of small game and fish, also of berries; the weaving of rabbit-skins; the birch canoe; the toboggan; the conical skin or bark-covered shelter; the absence of basketry and pottery and the use of bark and wooden utensils. To this northern group belong the Ojibway north of the lakes, including the Saulteaux, the Wood Cree, the Montagnais and the Naskapi. Further south the main body falls into three large divisions: Iroquoian tribes (Huron, Wyandot, Erie, Susquehanna and Five Nations); Central Algonquian to the west of the Iroquois (some Ojibway, Ottawa, Menomini, Sauk and Fox[845], Potawatomi, Peoria, Illinois, Kickapoo, Miami, Piankashaw, Shawnee and Siouan Winnebago); Eastern Algonquian (Abnaki group and Micmac).

The Central group west of the Iroquois appears to be the most typical and the best known and the following are the main culture traits: maize, squashes and bean were cultivated, wild rice where available was a great staple, and maple sugar was manufactured; deer, bear and even bison were hunted; also wild fowl; fishing was fairly developed, especially sturgeon fishing on the lakes; pottery poor, but formerly used for cooking vessels, vessels of wood and bark common; some splint basketry; two types of shelter prevailed, a dome-shaped bark or mat-covered lodge for winter and a rectangular bark house for summer, though the Ojibway used the conical type of the northern border group; dug-out and bark canoes and snowshoes were used, occasionally the toboggan and dog traction; weaving was of bark fibre (downward with fingers), and soft bags, pack lines and fish nets were made; clothing was of skins; soft-soled moccasins with drooping flaps, leggings, breech-cloth and sleeved shirts for men, for women a skirt and jacket, though a one-piece dress was known; robes of skin or woven rabbit-skin; no armour or lances; bows of plain wood and clubs; in trade days, the tomahawk; work in wood, stone and bone weakly developed; probably considerable use of copper in prehistoric times; feather-work rare.

In the eastern group agriculture was more intensive (except in the north) and pottery was more highly developed. Woven feather cloaks were common, there was a special development of work in steatite, and more use was made of edible roots.

The Iroquoian tribes were even more intensive agriculturalists and potters. They made some use of the blow-gun, developed cornhusk weaving, carved elaborate masks from wood, lived in rectangular houses of peculiar pattern, built fortifications and were superior in bone work[846].

In physical type the Ojibways[847], who may be taken as typical of the central Algonquians, were 1.73 m. (5 ft. 8 in.) in height, with brachycephalic heads (82 in the east, 80 in the west, but variable), heavy strongly developed cheek-bones and heavy and prominent nose. They were hard fighters and beat back the raids of the Iroquois on the east and of the Foxes on the south, and drove the Sioux before them out upon the Plains. According to Schoolcraft, who was personally acquainted with them and married a woman of the tribe, the warriors equalled in physical appearance the best formed of the North-West Indians, with the possible exception of the Foxes.

They were organised in many exogamous clans; descent was patrilineal although it was matrilineal in most Algonquian tribes. The clan system was totemic. There was a clan chief and generally a tribal chief as well, chosen from one clan in which the office was hereditary. His authority was rather indefinite.

As regards religion W. Jones[848] notes their belief in a cosmic mystery present throughout all Nature, called "Manito." It was natural to identify the Manito with both animate and inanimate objects and the impulse was strong to enter into personal relations with the mystic power. There was one personification of the cosmic mystery; and this was an animate being called the Great Manito. Although they have long been in friendly relations with the whites Christianity has had but little effect on them, largely owing to the conservatism of the native medicine-men. The Medewiwin, or grand medicine society, was a powerful organisation, which controlled all the movements of the tribe[849].

The Iroquois[850] are not much differentiated in general culture from the stocks around them, but in political development they stand unique. The Five Nations, Mohawk, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga and Seneca (subsequently joined by the Tuscarora), formed the famous League of the Iroquois about the year 1570. Each tribe remained independent in matters of local concern, but supreme authority was delegated to a council of elected sachems. They were second to no other Indian people north of Mexico in political organisation, statecraft and military prowess, and their astute diplomats were a match for the wily French and English statesmen with whom they treated. So successful was this confederacy that for centuries it enjoyed complete supremacy over its neighbours, until it controlled the country from Hudson Bay to North Carolina. The powerful Ojibway at the end of Lake Superior checked their north-west expansion, and their own kindred the Cherokee stopped their progress southwards.

The social organisation was as a rule much more complex and cohesive than that of any other Indians, and the most notable difference was in regard to the important position accorded to the women. Among the Cherokee, the Iroquois and the Hurons the women performed important and essential functions in their government. Every chief was chosen and retained his position and every important measure was enacted by the consent and cooperation of the child-bearing women, and the candidate for a chieftainship was nominated by the suffrages of the matrons of this group. His selection from among their sons had to be confirmed by the tribal and the federal councils respectively, and finally he was installed into office by federal officers. Lands and the "long houses" of related families belonged solely to the women.

VIII. South-eastern Area. This area is conveniently divided by the Mississippi, the typical culture occurring in the east. The Powhatan group and the Shawnee are intermediate, and the chief tribes are the Muskhogean (Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, etc.) and Iroquoian tribes (Cherokee and Tuscarora) with the Yuchi, Eastern Siouan, Tunican and Quapaw. The main culture traits are: great use of vegetable food and intensive agriculture; maize, cane (a kind of millet), pumpkins, watermelons and tobacco being raised. Large use of wild vegetables, the dog, the only domestic animal, eaten; later chickens, hogs, horses and cattle quickly adopted; large game, deer, bear and bison, in the west; turkeys and small game also hunted; some fishing (with fish poison); of manufactured foods bears' oil, hickory-nut oil, persimmon bread and hominy are noteworthy, together with the famous black drink[851]; houses generally rectangular with curved roofs, covered with thatch or bark, often with plaster walls, reinforced with wicker work; towns were fortified with palisades; dug-out canoes were used for transport. Clothing chiefly of deerskins and bison robes, shirt-like garments for men, skirts and toga-like, upper garments for women, boot-like moccasins in winter; there were woven fabrics of bark fibre, fine netted feather cloaks, and some bison hair weaving in the west (the weaving being downwards with the fingers); baskets of cane and splints, the double or netted basket and the basket meal sieve being special forms; knives of cane, darts of cane and bone; blow-guns in general use; pottery good, coil process, with paddle decorations; a particular method of skin dressing (macerated in mortars), good work in stone, but little in metal[852].

The Creek women were short though well formed, while the warrior according to Pickett[853] was "larger than the ordinary race of Europeans, often above 6 ft. in height, but was invariably well formed, erect in his carriage, and graceful in every movement. They were proud, haughty and arrogant, brave and valiant in war." As a people they were more than usually devoted to decoration and ornament; they were fond of music and ball play was their most important game. Each Creek town had its independent government, under an elected chief who was advised by the council of the town in all important matters. Certain towns were consecrated to peace ceremonies and were known as "white towns," while others, set apart for war ceremonials, were known as "red towns." The solemn annual festival of the Creeks was the "busk" or puskita, a rejoicing over the first-fruits of the year. Each town celebrated its busk whenever the crops had come to maturity. All the worn-out clothes, household furniture, pots and pans and refuse, grain and other provisions were gathered together into a heap and consumed. After a fast, all the fires in the town were extinguished and a priest kindled a new fire from which were made all the fires in the town. A general amnesty was proclaimed, all malefactors might return to their towns and their offences were forgiven. Indeed the new fire meant the new life, physical and moral, which had to begin with the new year[854].

The Yuchi houses are grouped round a square plot of ground which is held as sacred, and here the religious ceremonies and social gatherings take place. On the edges stand four ceremonial lodges, in conformity with the four cardinal points, in which the different clan groups have assigned places. The square ground symbolises the rainbow, where in the sky-world, Sun, the mythical culture-hero, underwent the ceremonial ordeals which he handed down to the first Yuchi. The Sun, as chief of the sky-world, author of the life, the ceremonies and the culture of the people, is by far the most important figure in their religious life. Various animals in the sky-world and vegetation spirits are recognised, besides the totemic ancestral spirits, who play an important part.

According to Speck[855] "the members of each clan believe that they are relatives and, in some vague way, the descendants of certain pre-existing animals whose names and identity they now bear. The animal ancestors are accordingly totemic. In regard to the living animals, they, too, are the earthly types and descendants of the pre-existing ones, hence, since they trace their descent from the same sources as the human clans, the two are consanguinely related." Thus the members of a clan feel obliged not to do violence to the wild animals having the form or name of their tutelaries, though the flesh and fur may be obtained from the members of other clans who are under no such obligations. The different individuals of the clan inherit the protection of the clan totems at the initiatory rites, and thenceforth retain them as their protectors through life.

Public religious worship centres in the complex annual ceremony connected with the corn harvest and includes the making of new fire, clan dances impersonating totemic ancestors, dances to propitiate maleficent spirits and acknowledge the assistance of beneficent ones in the hope of a continuance of their benefits, scarification of the males for sacrifice and purification, taking an emetic as a purifier, the partaking of the first green corn of the season, and the performance of a characteristic ball game with two sticks.

The middle and lower portions of the Mississippi valley with out-lying territories exhibit archaeological evidence of a remarkable culture, higher than that of any other area north of Mexico. This culture was characterised by "well established sedentary life, extensive practice of agricultural pursuits, and construction of permanent works—domiciliary, religious, civic, defensive and mortuary, of great magnitude and much diversity of form." The people, some, if not all of whom were mound-builders, were of numerous linguistic stocks, Siouan, Algonquian, Iroquoian, Muskhogean, Tunican, Chitimachan, Caddoan and others, and "these historic peoples, remnants of which are still found within the area, were doubtless preceded by other groups not of a distinct race but probably of the same or related linguistic families. This view, in recent years, has gradually taken the place of the early assumption that the mound culture belonged to a people of high cultural attainments who had been succeeded by Indian tribes. That mound building continued down to the period of European occupancy is a well established fact, and many of the burial mounds contain as original inclusions articles of European make[856]."

These general conclusions are in no way opposed to De Nadaillac's suggestion that the mounds were certainly the work of Indians, but of more civilised tribes than the present Algonquians, by whom they were driven south to Florida, and there found with their towns, council-houses, and other structures by the first white settlers[857]. It would appear, however, from F. H. Cushing's investigations, that these tribal council-houses of the Seminole Indians were a local development, growing up on the spot under conditions quite different from those prevailing in the north. Many of the vast shell-mounds, especially between Tampa and Cape Sable, are clearly of artificial structure, that is, made with definite purpose, and carried up symmetrically into large mounds comparable in dimensions with the Indian mounds of the interior. They originated with pile dwellings in shallow water, where the kitchen refuse, chiefly shells, accumulates and rises above the surface, when the building appears to stand on posts in a low mound. Then this type of structure comes to be regarded as the normal for house-building everywhere. "Through this natural series of changes in type there is a tendency to the development of mounds as sites for habitations and for the council-house of the clan or tribe, the sites being either separate mounds or single large mounds, according to circumstances. Thus the study of the living Seminole Indians and of the shell-mounds in the same vicinity ... suggests a possible origin for a custom of mound-building at one time so prevalent among the North American Indians[858]." But if this be the genesis of such structures, the custom must have spread from the shores of the Gulf inland, and not from the Ohio valley southwards to Florida.

IX. South-western Area. On account of its highly developed state and its prehistoric antecedents, the Pueblo culture appears as the type, though this is by no means uniform in the different villages. Three geographical groups may be recognised, the Hopi[859], the ZuÑi[860] and the Rio Grande[861].

The culture of the whole may be characterised by: main dependence upon maize and other cultivated foods (men doing the cultivating and cloth-weaving instead of women); use of a grinding stone instead of a mortar; the art of masonry; loom or upward weaving; cultivated cotton as a textile material; pottery decorated in colour; unique style of building and the domestication of the turkey. Though the main dependence was on vegetable food there was some hunting; the eastern villages hunted bison and deer, especially Taos. Drives of rabbits and antelopes were practised, the unique hunting weapon being the curved rabbit stick. Woven robes were usual. Men wore aprons and a robe when needed. Women wore a garment reaching from shoulder to knee fastened on the right shoulder only. In addition to cloth robes some were woven of rabbit-skin and some netted with turkey feathers. Hard-soled moccasins were worn, those for women having long strips of deerskin wound round the leg. Pottery was highly developed, not only for practical use. Basketry was known but not so highly developed as among the non-Pueblo tribes. The dog was not used for transportation and there were no boats. Work in stone and wood not superior to that of other areas; some work in turquoise, but none in metal.

Many tribes appear to be transitional to the Pueblo type. Thus the Pima once lived in adobe houses, though not of Pueblo type, they developed irrigation but also made extensive use of wild plants, raised cotton, wove cloth, were indifferent potters but experts in basketry. The Mohave, Yuma, Cocopa, Maricopa and Yavapai built a square flat-roofed house of wood, had no irrigation, were not good basket-makers (except the Yavapai) but otherwise resembled the Pima. The Walapai and Havasupai were somewhat more nomadic.

The Athapascan tribes to the east show intermediate cultures. The Jicarilla and Mescalero used the Plains tipi, gathered wild vegetable food, hunted bison, had no agriculture or weaving, but dressed in skins, and had the glass-bead technique of the Plains. The western Apache differed little from these, but rarely used tipis and gave a little more attention to agriculture. In general the Apache have certain undoubted Pueblo traits, they also remind one of the Plains, the Plateaus, and, in a lean-to like shelter, of the Mackenzie area. The Navaho seem to have taken their most striking features from European influence, but their shelter is of the northern type, while costume, pottery and feeble attempts at basketry and formerly at agriculture suggest Pueblo influence[862].

Pueblo culture takes its name from the towns or villages of stone or adobe houses which form the characteristic feature of the area. These vary according to the locality, those in the north being generally of sandstone, while adobe or sun-dried brick was employed to the south. The groups of dwellings were generally compact structures of several stories, with many small rooms, built in terrace fashion, the roof of one storey forming a promenade for the storey next above. Thus from the front the structure is like a gigantic staircase, from the back a perpendicular wall. The upper houses were and still are reached by means of movable ladders and a hatchway in the roof. Mainly in the north but scattered throughout the area are the remains of dwellings built in natural recesses of cliffs, while in some places the cliff face is honeycombed with masonry to provide habitations.

Although doubtless designed for purposes of hiding and defence, many of the cliff houses were near streams and fields and were occupied because they afforded shelter and were natural dwelling places; many were storage places for maize and other property: others again were places for outlook from which the fields could be watched or the approach of strangers observed. In some districts evidence of post-Spanish occupancy exists. From intensive investigation of the cliff dwellings it is evident that the inhabitants had the same material culture as that of existing Pueblo Indians, and from the ceremonial objects which have been discovered and the symbolic decoration that was employed it is equally clear that their religion was essentially similar. Moreover the various types of skulls that have been recovered are similar to those of the present population of the district. It may therefore be safely said that there is no evidence of the former general occupancy of the region by peoples other than those now classed as Pueblo Indians or their neighbours.

J. W. Fewkes points out that the district is one of arid plateaus, separated and dissected by deep caÑons, frequently composed of flat-lying rock strata forming ledge-marked cliffs by the erosive action of the rare storms. "Only along the few streams heading in the mountains does permanent water exist, and along the cliff lines slabs of rock suitable for building abound; and the primitive ancients, dependent as they were on environment, naturally produced the cliff dwellings. The tendency toward this type was strengthened by intertribal relations; the cliff dwellers were probably descended from agricultural or semi-agricultural villagers who sought protection against enemies, and the control of land and water through aggregation in communities.... Locally the ancient villages of Canyon de Chelly are known as Aztec ruins, and this designation is just so far as it implies relationship with the aborigines of moderately advanced culture in Mexico and Central America, though it would be misleading if regarded as indicating essential difference between the ancient villagers and their modern descendants and neighbours still occupying the pueblos[863]."

Each pueblo contains at least one kiva, either wholly or partly underground, entered by means of a ladder and hatchway, forming a sacred chamber for the transaction of civil or religious affairs, and also a club for the men. In some villages each totemic clan has its own kiva. The Indians are eminently a religious people and much time is devoted to complicated rites to ensure a supply of rain, their main concern, and the growth of crops. Among the Hopi from four to sixteen days in every month are employed by one society or another in the carrying out of religious rites. The secret portions of these complicated ceremonies take place in the kiva, while the so-called "dances" are performed in the open.

The clan ancestors may be impersonated by masked men, called katcinas, the name being also applied to the religious dramas in which they appear[864].

In reference to J. Walter Fewkes' account of the "Tusayan Snake Ceremonies," it is pointed out that "the Pueblo Indians adore a plurality of deities, to which various potencies are ascribed. These zoic deities, or beast gods, are worshipped by means of ceremonies which are sometimes highly elaborate; and, so far as practicable, the mystic zoic potency is represented in the ceremony by a living animal of similar species or by an artificial symbol. Prominent among the animate representatives of the zoic pantheon throughout the arid region is the serpent, especially the venomous and hence mysteriously potent rattlesnake. To the primitive mind there is intimate association, too, between the swift-striking and deadly viper and the lightning, with its attendant rain and thunder; there is intimate association, too, between the moisture-loving reptile of the subdeserts and the life-giving storms and freshets; and so the native rattlesnake plays an important rÔle in the ceremonies, especially in the invocations for rain, which characterize the entire arid region[865]."

Fewkes pursues the same fruitful line of thought in his monograph on The Feather Symbol in Ancient Hopi Designs[866], showing how amongst the Tusayan Pueblos, although they have left no written records, there survives an elaborate paleography, the feather motif in the pottery found in the old ruins, which is in fact "a picture writing often highly symbolic and complicated," revealing certain phases of Hopi thought in remote times. "Thus we come back to a belief, taught by other reasoning, that ornamentation of ancient pottery was something higher than simple effort to beautify ceramic wares. The ruling motive was a religious one, for in their system everything was under the same sway. Esthetic and religious feelings were not differentiated, the one implied the other, and to elaborately decorate a vessel without introducing a religious symbol was to the ancient potter an impossibility[867]."

Physically the Pueblo Indians are of short stature, with long, low head, delicate face and dark skin. They are muscular and of great endurance, able to carry heavy burdens up steep and difficult trails, and to walk or even run great distances. It is said to be no uncommon thing for a Hopi to run 40 miles over a burning desert to his cornfield, hoe his corn, and return home within 24 hours. Distances of 140 miles are frequently made within 36 hours[868]. In disposition they are mild and peaceable, industrious, and extraordinarily conservative, a trait shown in the fidelity with which they retain and perpetuate their ancient customs[869]. Labour is more evenly divided than among most Indian tribes. The men help the women with the heavier work of house-building, they collect the fuel, weave blankets and make moccasins, occupations usually regarded as women's work. The women carry the water, and make the pottery for which the region is famous[870].

A. L. Kroeber has made a careful study of ZuÑi sociology[871] and come to the conclusion that the family is fundamental and the clan secondary, though kinship terms are applied to clan mates in a random fashion, and even the true kinship terms are applied loosely. In view of the obvious preËminence of the woman, who receives the husband into her and her mother's house, it is worthy of note that she and her children recognise her husband's relatives as their kin as fully as he adopts hers. The ZuÑi are not a woman-ruled people. As regards government, women neither claim nor have any voice whatever, nor are there women priests, nor fraternity officers. Even within the house, so long as a man is a legitimate inmate thereof, he is master of it and of its affairs. They are a monogamous people. Divorce is more easy than marriage, and most men and women of middle age have been married to several partners. Marriage in the mother's clan is forbidden; in the father's clan, disapproved. The phratries have no social significance, there is no central clan house, no recognised head, no meeting, council or any organisation, nor does the clan as such ever act as a body. The clans have little connection with the religious societies or fraternities. There are no totemic tabus nor is there worship of the clan totem. People are reckoned as belonging to the father's clan almost as much as to that of the mother. If one of the family of a person who belongs to a fraternity falls sick the fraternity is called in to cure the patient, who is subsequently received into its ranks. The ZuÑi fraternity is largely a body of religious physicians, membership is voluntary and not limited by sex. At Hopi we hear of rain-making more than of doctoring, more of "priests" than of "theurgists." The religious functions of the ZuÑi are most marked in the ceremonies of the Ko-tikkyanne, the "god-society" or "masked-dancer society," and it is with these that the kivas are associated. They are almost wholly concerned with rain. Only men can become members and entrance is compulsory. Kroeber believes that "the truest understanding of ZuÑi life, other than its purely practical manifestation, can be had by setting the ettowe ['fetish'] as a centre. Around these, priesthoods, fraternities, clan organisation, as well as most esoteric thinking and sacred tradition, group themselves; while, in turn, kivas, dances, and acts of public worship can be construed as but the outward means of expression of the inner activities that radiate around the nucleus of the physical fetishes and the ideas attached to them[872]."