Haida Permanent Dwellings and Villages
During the summer but few Indians are found at the permanent villages. Occasionally a canoe load returns to deposit a cargo, or to get something needed in the distant summer…
From: Unknown To: 1890 C.E.
Location: Haida Gwaii, British Columbia, Canada; Prince of Wales Island, Alaska, United States
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From The Coast Indians of Southern Alaska and Northern British Columbia by Albert P. Niblack, 1890.
Haida permanent dwellings
Fig. 179, Plate XXXV, represents a Haida house of the conventional pattern. The posts, g g, hollowed out on the backs, as shown, to reduce the weight, with carved faces, are firmly planted in the ground.
The upper ends are also hollowed to receive the enormous log plates, s s, which give strength and solidity to the building.
“Details of Haida house construction, with types of fronts found elsewhere on the Northwest Coast.” Images from text, Albert P. Niblack, 1890.
The carved column, m, at the front of the house, is usually next erected, as the work up to this point requires the co-operation of many hands, the gathering being the occasion of a feast and a grand distribution of presents (a potlatch, as it is called) amongst the participants. Often, through lack of funds, the work of building a house has to be postponed, the whole process often requiring several years.
The expenses are usually reckoned in blankets, as they are the conventional gifts on such an occasion. The huge plates and purlines, the hewn cedar planks, and the logs for posts and carved columns, are gotten out from the forests with great labor and expense, and are towed to the village site, where they are hauled up on skids, and the work of smooth finishing begun.
Plate LXX illustrates an animated scene at Fort Simpson, British Columbia, where a party of Haida are represented as hauling up a log on skids in the process of house construction. The relief carving on the totemic columns and the posts is done either by the owner, if he be expert, or if he be rich, by others hired or kept in the establishment for the purpose.
“Explanation of Plate XXXV.” Albert P. Niblack, 1890.
The materials being ready, the invited guests assemble from far and near, and the different timbers are gotten up to the site of the house. The posts are raised into position by means of rope guys and props, and firmly planted in the deep holes dug in the ground. The plates or huge logs which rest on the uprights are gotten into position by what a sailor would call technically skids and parbuckles.
To describe the process in detail, imagine the four posts (or, as in Plate LXX, six posts) in Fig. 179 firmly planted in the ground, their heads being hollowed out as shown. The log (or plate, as it is technically called in architecture) is rolled to a distance of about 14 feet from the uprights and parallel to its final position. The uprights are braced or shored on the opposite side, while on the adjacent side skids are rested at an angle to form an incline, up which the plate is, by the combined effort of many, gradually rolled.
Ropes are rove over the top of the posts under and over the plate, then back again over the upright. These ropes constitute the parbuckle, which is designed to take the weight of the log and hold it in position. Forked sticks are rested against the log with their other ends in the ground to help the parbuckle take the weight as the plate is gradually rolled up, the forked sticks being gradually also shifted up as it rises. By dint of pushing, shoving with poles, and pulling on the parbuckle, the plate is gotten to the top of the incline.
It is now a question of lifting the dead weight of the log by means of poles and by pulling on the parbuckle. At last the plate is hauled to the top of the upright and rolled into the hollow in which it rests. The carved totemic columns are raised into position by means of poles, props, and rope guys, and firmly imbedded in the deep hole dug for it in the ground. The whole process is an occasion of much ceremony, and the work occupies but a small part of the time, the remainder being filled in with gambling, dancing, feasting, singing, speech-making, and ceremonial display intended to inspire the visitors and guests with the wealth and prowess of the host. Judge Swan says:
“The self-denial of comforts and even necessaries exercised for many years in the accumulation of property by man and wife is very remarkable, but, in their estimation, is amply repaid on the occasion of a distribution of the same and the erection of a decorative column, which in many instances stands in front of an unfinished lodge frame as a visible monument of the owner’s folly and extravagance… …The owner probably lives in the lodge of some relative, or perhaps is dead. It has been beyond his means to finish his house, but for that he cares little; his vanity has been gratified; his pride satisfied. On the day when he stood presiding over his piles of goods and chattels, previous to their distribution amongst his eager and expectant guests, he had reached the summit of his ambition… …He is thenceforth a petty chief of the village.”
In some of the very latest types of the houses, instead of the corner posts i i and the smaller posts r r supporting the eaves-plates e e, there are four posts and two heavy rafters similar to g and s. In either case the eaves-plates e, or one similar to s, are beveled to receive the upper ends of the boards forming the side walls of the house, as shown in w and adjacent details. The heavy plank frames h h and i i are beveled, as shown in section q, to receive the boards forming the end walls, or front and back of the house. The top purlines j j j j form the supports for the roof-planking, and are held in place by the superimposed frames u u. The roofing is formed either of planks or slabs of bark held down by rocks, beams and cross-pieces, as shown in Figure 178.
The smokehole k is surmounted by a frame p p carrying a shutter o, which is closed in the direction of the wind. This shutter has a motion about the axle p p. When the wind changes and blows down the smoke-hole, a chain or rope is pulled and the shutter revolves to the other position against the wind. As the house faces the channel, and the wind usually draws up or down it, the shutter works to face one side of the house or the other. The entrance is shown at a.
Below, the sketch of the house is dotted in the form of the excavated interior. The upper ledge or platform is at the level, d; c is the lower platform. The fire, h, burns on the bare earth, or in a frame-work of boards filled with rocks.
It is here that the family sleep in winter, stretched out on the bare floor or on mats with feet towards the fire. As stated, the occupants of such a house are numerous, amounting in some cases to thirty or forty in all, and the household may embrace a chief, his family, grandchildren, and the families of several of his brothers.
Amongst the Kaigani most of the houses are built on log foundations, a little above the ground, and the European form of door is used. In some cases the carved column is set a few feet off with a small opening in it, but the real entrance to the house is by a doorway, thus keeping up a semblance of the ancient custom. The Haida houses are quite generally excavated, and seldom built on raised foundations. The smaller houses, and not unusually the more modern houses, consist principally of a frame erected on four posts, one at each corner.
Villages
The villages are invariably situated along the shore, and usually near a shelving beach, which admits of easily hauling up the canoes. Often, through the desire to be near a good halibut fishing bank, a very exposed site is of necessity selected. The houses are usually in a single row, a few feet above extreme high water, facing toward the beach and not far back from it. At high water the canoes can be hauled well up between the houses and high-water mark is a space which serves as a street, with a beaten path near the houses and patches of grass beyond. This space serves for hauling up canoes for long periods and drying fish, as well as the usual purposes of a street.
Sometimes the two rows of houses are built, where the space is contracted, with a narrow street between the rows. The houses are not very far apart in the rows, are often in contact, and arranged without regard to rank or precedence. There are one or more carved columns in front of each house. These are at first usually painted (formerly daubed with ochre) but the coat is seldom renewed.
Owing to the bleaching effect of the weather, the columns and houses after a while assume a grayish white appearance, and become covered with moss. In the weather-cracks moss and vegetation flourish, giving a very ancient appearance. At the end of the village is the graveyard, with its variety of sepulchres and mortuary columns of ancient and modern form, as shown in Plate III.
Scattered throughout the villages, in front and near the corners of the houses, are the mortuary or commemorative columns similar to those in the graveyards. These are pictured in all their variety in Plate III.
Behind the village, or at one end, are the small sheds in which the dead are placed.
Names of villages
Considerable confusion has originated in the enumeration of villages amongst the Haida and Kaigani by Europeans, through the different names assigned to the same village. The Indians have their own names, but the traders and others often call a village after the name of the chief; for instance, Kasa-an is popularly called Skowl’s village; the village of Skidegate, Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia, is popularly so called from the name of the hereditary chief; the Haida name is Hyo-hai ha, but the Tsimshian call it Kil-hai oō.
Groups of villages
Each village practically constitutes a tribe. There never have been any permanent leagues or associations of villages to constitute a nation with head ruler, although, tor certain reasons of defense or offense, villages have so co-operated temporarily for mutual benefit or protection. The totemic systems of the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsmishian kings, in some senses uniform, have often operated to make the alliance between phratries and totems of different villages in some measure stronger than the clannish feeling due to close ethnical affinity.
Residence
During the summer but few Indians are found at the permanent villages. Occasionally a canoe load returns to deposit a cargo, or to get something needed in the distant summer camp. Where the fishing and hunting ground is near the village, it is continually occupied, but if at a distance there are times when the village is entirely abandoned, although there may be some camps quite near. Under such circumstances property is entirely safe.
Early in the summer, during the first run of salmon, and when birds’ eggs are to be gathered, the Indians are widely scattered. Later on they congregate, but disperse again for the run of King salmon, which lasts well into December. By Christmas time they have all gathered in, and in the long winter nights take place all those social and ceremonial gatherings and feastings of which only a winter’s residence amongst them can give an adequate idea.
Gathered around the blazing fire then are related those legends and traditions which illustrate their beliefs. Then also take place those dances, ceremonials, and theatrical performances which graphically illustrate and perpetuate these traditions, and glorify the prowess and might of the chiefs and their ancestors.
Albert P. Niblack. The Coast Indians of Southern Alaska and Northern British Columbia. US National Museum. 1890.
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