NATIVE PEOPLES: ARTIFACTS
AND REPRODUCTIONS
ARTIFACT OR REPRODUCTION
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DESCRIPTION
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SOURCE
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Wampanoag and
Colonial pots (Courtesy Plimoth Plantation)
The shape of this pot
carries the traditional Wampanoag ceramic characteristics.
Made by Eastern Woodland
Native American pot builders. Used only for ceremonies.
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Wampanoag and Colonial pots (Courtesy Plimoth
Plantation)
Fragments of Eastern
Woodland Native American pot builders
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The shaped wooden hoe, or digging tool, was used by the
Wampanoag people
for agriculture about 500 years ago. It was found in Edgartown, MA.
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Martha’s
Vineyard Museum Map
Project
The
annotations and photographs of these artifacts are the work of West Tisbury
School's seventh grade
social studies class.
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This pot was found in Chilmark by Richard Burt. It was made by
the Wampanoag
Indians in the Late Woodland Period, 700 years ago, from local
Island clay. It was used
for carrying food, or water and cooking.
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Martha’s
Vineyard Museum Map
Project
The
annotations and photographs of these artifacts are the work of West Tisbury
School's seventh grade
social studies class.
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The incised (has designs carved in it) soapstone pipe was
found in Oak Bluffs,
Martha’s Vineyard and was from the cultural period of late Woodland.
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Ancient Wampanoag arrowhead found in Edgartown, Martha’s
Vineyard (Cape Cod). Used for hunting food
by the local Native American tribes
Actual size is 2 1/8 inches
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Wampanoag (named Sudbury by whites), 64" hickory or
black walnut, the first
bow seen by the Massachusetts
pilgrims.Sudbury (Wampanoag)
Fine shooting self bow in hickory by Paul Rodgers. This near-universal self
bow design is patterned
after the artifact in the Harvard
Peabody Museum.
The
taper of the limbs is
perfectly gradual from the riser to the tips in side and back view.
The name refers to the town
in Massachusetts
where the artifact was taken in a skirmish.
Varying lengths and weights, full 28"
draw.
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The Krackow Company
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Native American
Encyclopedia
http://nativeamericanencyclopedia.com/wampum/Quahog and whelk
Wampum are traditional, sacred shell beads
of Eastern Woodlands tribes. They include the white shell beads fashioned from
the North Atlantic channeled whelk shell;
and the white and purple beads made from the quahog, or Western North
Atlantic hard-shelled clam. Woven belts of wampum have been created to
commemorate treaties or historical events, and for exchange in personal
social transactions, such as marriages. In colonial North
America, European colonists often used wampums as currency for
trading with native Americans.wampum made by Elizabeth James Perry (Aquinnah Wampanoag/ Eastern Band Cherokee), c. 2009 Description and manufacture The term initially referred to only the white beads, which are made of the inner spiral, or columella, of the Channeled whelk shell, Busycotypus canaliculatus or Busycotypus carica. Sewant or suckauhock beads are the black or purple shell beads made from the quahog or poquahock clamshell, Mercenaria mercenaria. Common terms for the dark and white beads, often confused, are wampi (white) and saki (dark). In the area of present New York Bay, the clams and whelks used for making wampum are found only along Long Island Sound and Narragansett Bay. The Lenape name for Long Island is Sewanacky, reflecting its connection to the dark wampum. Typically wampum beads are tubular in shape, often a quarter of an inch long and an eighth inch wide. One 17th-century Seneca wampum belt featured beads almost 2.5 inches (65 mm) long. Women artisans traditionally made wampum beads by rounding small pieces of the shells of whelks, then piercing them with a hole before stringing them. Wooden pump drills with quartz drill bits and steatite weights were used to drill the shells. The unfinished beads would be strung together and rolled on a grinding stone with water and sand, until they were smooth. The beads would be strung or woven on deer hide thongs, sinew, milkweed bast, or basswood fibers. Origin The term “wampum” may be derived from the Wampanoag word, Wampumpeag, which means white shell beads. Variations of the word include the Maliseet word, Wapapiyik meaning “white-strings “; the Ojibwe word, Waabaabiinyag, or “white-strings “; Proto-Algonquian *wa·p-a·py-aki, “white-strings [of beads].” In New York, wampum beads have been discovered that date from before 1510. The Haudenosaunee Great Law of Peace, the founding constitution of the Iroquois Confederacy, was codified in a series of wampum belts, now held by the Onondaga Nation. The oral history of the Haudenosaunee says that Ayenwatha, a cannibal who was reformed by the Great Peacemaker, invented wampum to comfort himself. The Peacemaker uses wampum to record and relay messages. The League of the Iroquois was founded, according to some estimates, in 1142. Others place its origin as likely in the 15th or 16th centuries. Upon discovering the importance of wampum as a unit of exchange among tribes, Dutch colonists mass-produced wampum in workshops. John Campbell established such a factory in Passaic, New Jersey, which manufactured wampum into the early 20th century. Uses Wampum is used to mark exchanges for engagement, marriage, and betrothal agreements, as well as for ceremony and condolence ceremonies. In earlier centuries, Lenape girls would wear wampum to show their eligibility for marriage. After marriage had been arranged, a Lenape suitor would give his fiancĂ© and her family gifts of wampum. Perhaps because of its origin as a memory aid, loose beads were not considered to be high in value. Rather it is the belts in total that are wampum. Belts of wampum were not produced until after European contact. A typically large belt of six feet (2 m) in length might contain 6000 beads or more. More importantly, such a belt would be very sacred, as it contained so many memories. Wampum belts were used as a memory aid in Oral tradition, where the wampum was a token representing a memory. Belts were also sometimes used as badges of office or as ceremonial devices of indigenous culture, such as the Iroquois. They were traded widely to tribes in Canada, the Great Lakes region, and the mid-Atlantic. Currency When Europeans came to the Americas, they realized the importance of wampum to Native people. While the Native people did not use it as money, the New England colonies used it as a medium of exchange. Soon, they were trading with the native peoples of New England and New York using wampum. The New England colonies demonetized wampum in 1663.Meanwhile it continued as currency in New York at the rate of eight white or four black wampum equalling one stuiver until 1673. The colonial government issued a proclamation setting the rate at six white or three black to one penny. This proclamation also applied in New Jersey and Delaware.The black shells were considered worth more than the white shells, which led people to dye the latter, and diluted the value of the shells. The ultimate basis for their value was their redeemability for pelts from the Native Americans. As Native Americans became reluctant to exchange pelts for the shells, the shells lost value. Their use as common currency was phased out in New York by the early 18th century. Shinnecock oral history ascribed the wampum market demise to a deadly red tide that decimated the whelk and quahog populations. With stone tools, the process to make wampum was labor intensive. Only the coastal nations had sufficient access to the basic shells to make wampum. These factors increased its scarcity and consequent value among the European traders. Dutch colonists began to manufacture wampum and eventually the primary source of wampum was that manufactured by colonists, a market the Dutch glutted. Writing about tribes in Virginia in 1705, Robert Beverley, Jr. of Virginia Colony describes peak as referring to the white shell bead, valued at 9 pence a yard, and wampom peak as denoting specifically the more expensive dark purple shell bead, at the rate of 18 pence per yard. He says that these polished shells with drilled holes are made from the cunk (conch), while another currency of lesser value, called roenoke was fashioned from the cockleshell. Transcription The American William James Sidis wrote in his 1935 history; “The weaving of wampum belts is a sort of writing by means of belts of colored beads, in which the various designs of beads denoted different ideas according to a definitely accepted system, which could be read by anyone acquainted with wampum language, irrespective of what the spoken language is. Records and treaties are kept in this manner, and individuals could write letters to one another in this way.” Wampum is also used for storytelling. The symbols used told a story in the oral tradition or spoken word. Since there was no written language, wampum was a very important means of keeping records and passing down stories to the next generation. Wampum was durable and so could be carried over a long distance. The Wampum Belt is an important symbol in the Polar Cult. |
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Traditionally corn
has been an integral part of the annual cycle of life for Native American
People and this Festival celebrates the first corn of the season.
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Litchfield Hills and Fairfield County CT TravelTravel Tips for Litchfield Hills and Fairfield County CT |
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When we understood ourselves as
vessels who held love to share, Pottery was elaborate,
sacred and magical. Reviving this art form, that left my people around 1700,
has revealed far more than a clay modeling technique. The shape teaches first
about combined male/female energies used as the foundation of our cooking
pots. Balancing the male/female shapes physically and energetically gives
birth to the spirit essence of each pot . The body of each pot is female,
round and full. It is the place of nuturance where animal, vegetable, mineral
plus the elements of earth, fire, water and air combine to strengthen human
life forces. The collar or top of the pots are male which often have four
points representing the four directions where we seek food and knowledge. The
designs on the collars are usually incised lines paralleling each other to
create a picture, like thought waves paralleling to achieve awareness. The
bottom of the pot is pointed yet not sharp, allowing it to sit in the coals
without smothering them. The pot builders were keenly aware of chemical combinations best suited for their wares. By crushing specific rocks, shells and adding prepared solutions, they created clay bodies which attracted favorable magnetic energies from the atmosphere. These magical vessels enhanced food as medicine and increased our potential to become vessels of love and wisdom. |
 Ramona Peters - Nosapocket |
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David Ostrowski:
"These owl-effigy pipes show strong connections to nature, the
impressive owl's stealth as a hunter and its tantalizing sounds of
communication. It stirred these individuals to the point where they learned
to avail themselves of an owl's wisdom as a guide. The things they learned
were not superstitions but made practical and qualitative differences in
their real lives.”
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Stoneworks & Corn Calendars
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