Spirit Keepers of the North: Eskimos of Western Alaska 9781512819847

Table of contents :
Spirit Keepers of the North ESKIMOS OF WESTERN ALASKA
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
INTRODUCTION

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THE UNIVERSITY MUSEUM University of Pennsylvania

Copyright 1983

THE UNIVERSITY MUSEUM University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America All artifacts and photographs are housed at The University Museum. Artifact measurement records an object's greatest dimension and includes fur and feathers.

Covet Alaskan Eskimos carried small carvings of animals in pouches, or attached the carvings to weapons and utensils. The ivory figurines pleased animal spirits, provided comfort to captured game, and directed the course of spears, darts, and harpoons.

Negative 11117, Fully equipped umiak at the edge of the landfast ice (Photograph by W.E. Van Valin)

j^Spirit r^eepers of the North ESKIMOS OF WESTERN ALASKA Susan A. Kaplan

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Spirit-Keepers of the North: Eskimos of Western Alaska is an exhibition program featuring Eskimo ethnographic collections housed at The University Museum. Robert H. Dyson, Jr., Director, and Gregory L. Possehl, Associate Director, suggested that the institution display a portion of its northern holdings and provided program support. William R. Coe, Curator of the American Section, and Pamela Hearne, Keeper of the American Section, facilitated use of the collections. Initial study of the Museum's Eskimo holdings was undertaken with the assistance of Richard H. Jordan and Glenn H. Sheehan of Bryn Mawr College. I wish to thank the staff of The University Museum for their assistance. Jack Murray, Exhibition Designer, and Stephen Oliver, Georgianna Grentzenberg, and George Bucher produced and installed the exhibit with speed and enthusiasm. Virginia Greene, Conservator, and Christine Del Re, Assistant Conservator, cleaned and repaired a perplexing array of organic artifacts. Mary Elizabeth Ruwell, Archivist, and her staff guided me through written records. Mary Anne Kenworthy, Photographic Archivist, helped me locate G.B. Gordon's unpublished glass plates. William Clough had the difficult task of photographing the objects for this publication and Fred Schoch had the delicate job of printing the ethnographic photographs. Jennifer Quick edited the manuscript, Martha Phillips designed the publication, and Barbara Murray coordinated its production. Their assistance is much appreciated. This program has reached beyond exhibition walls due to the efforts of Phoebe Resnick, Public Information Officer, Elin Danien, Public Programs Coordinator, Gillian Wakely, Division of Public Education Coordinator, Jeffrey Ray, Docent, Lupe Gonzales, Guide Liaison, and their hard-working staffs. Permission to print "The Village Without Daylight" was generously granted by The Lower Kuskokwim School District. The University Museum wishes to acknowledge Faith-Dorian and Martin Wright for their continued support of the Museum's research and exhibition programs. MUSLUiu

Susan A. Kaplan Visiting Assistant Curator

Thunderbird Bowl Long ago a pair of Thunderbirds inhabited the earth. They made their nest in a giant volcano cone. Every year the birds raised a brood. The baby birds grew large so quickly that the nest could barely hold them. Every day the parent Thunderbirds flew over the land in search of food for their young. They returned to the nest with whole caribou, whales, and even m e n still in their kayaks. These they fed to their babies, who left the remains of kayaks and clothes scattered around the nest. O n e day a brave hunter returned home only to be told that a Thunderbird had carried off his lovely wife, T h e young man, filled with sorrow and anger, did what others feared to do. H e climbed u p to the Thunderbird nest, and, while the adult birds were out hunting, he killed their young. He remained near the nest until the parents returned. Driving arrows and spears into the giant birds he successfully escaped their angry talons and bloody beaks. The wounded birds flew north and have never returned. The Thunderbird painted on the interior of this wooden food bowl is surrounded by symbols occurring in units of four, a sacred number. Like ceremonial masks from the Bering Sea Region, the central image is encircled by a line which defines the Universe. T h e bird's lifeline a n d ribs are shown, as is an organ, possibly the bladder. It is here that the bird's spirit resides. NA 3266, Bering Sea Region (Collected by P.H. Ray) 26 cm

Keouiouk G.B. Gordon, the first scientist from The University Museum to conduct research in Alaska, took this picture of Keouiouk, a 23-year-old Nunivak Island woman, in 1905. Keouiouk and her husband Tukataruk were Gordon's language instructors. Gordon returned to Alaska in 1907 when he travelled from Canada into the interior of Alaska where, accompanied by his brother, he descended the Kuskokwim River by canoe. During these two field trips Gordon collected ethnographic specimens, took approximately 100 photographs of Indian and Eskimo villages and people, and compiled a dictionary of Eskimo words. W.B. Van Valin and E.A. Mcllhenny, on contract to the Museum, also made large, well documented collections which, together with Gordon's materials, form the core of The University Museum's Alaskan Eskimo ethnographic holdings. Other distinguished northern scholars associated with the Museum have included J . Louis Giddings, Froelich G. Rainey, and Frederica de Laguna. Negative 11677, Keouiouk, Nunivak Island Woman (Photograph by G.B. Gordon)

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INTRODUCTION Spirit-Keepers of the North: Eskimos of Western Alaska features artifacts, photographs, and myths which reflect how Western Alaskan Eskimos dealt with a physically and spiritually dangerous world. The publication focuses on the spiritual beliefs of late nineteenth and early twentieth century Northwest Alaskan Eskimos and Bering Sea Eskimos, whose descendants live in Alaska today. Northwest Alaskan Eskimos speak Inupiak, a language also spoken by Canadian and Greenlandic Eskimos. The Inupiak-speakers live between Point Barrow and Norton Sound in a high-Arctic environment where, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, they hunted seals, walrus, beluga, bowhead whales, polar bears, Dall sheep, and caribou. The bowhead whale was their main source of food, and much of the Northwest Alaskan Eskimos' spiritual and ceremonial life centered around preparations for and celebrations of the annual spring whale hunt. Bering Sea Eskimos speak Yupik, as do Eskimos living on St. Lawrence Island and in Siberia. The people referred to in this publication live between Norton Sound and the Kuskokwim River. The low, marshy Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, cut by meandering streams and studded with small lakes, supports quantities of fish, waterfowl, seals, and forbearing animals. Fish are available throughout the year, even in the dead of winter. Due to the abundance of food, the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta was and remains one of the most densely populated regions of the north. While the Northwest Alaskan Eskimos and Bering Sea Eskimos spoke different languages, hunted different animals, and maintained distinct cultural traditions, they shared the belief that every living thing had a spirit capable of adopting a number of forms. Often, animal spirits revealed themselves to people as small, goggled, smiling semihuman faces. Usually a person caught but a fleeting glimpse of such a visage, which might be in the eye of the animal, or concealed in its fur or feathers. Animal spirits resided in the Sky-land and were controlled by tunghat, animal spirit keepers that lived on the moon. Tunghat could be quite malevolent and often were the cause of starvation and disease among humans. When a community was suffering from hunger, a shaman, the intermediary between the spiritual and earthly worlds, flew to the moon to appeal for the release of animals. Mythic beasts roamed the Eskimos' world. Among the most frightening were Thunderbirds, giant eaglelike creatures that fed caribou, whales, and men to their young, and the Worm Man, whose blood-stained face was evidence of his latest meal of human flesh. People asked shamans for charms that served as protection against these and other dangerous creatures. The Western Alaskan Eskimos also believed that like Raven, their creator, particularly powerful men and animals had the capabilities of transformation. According to the Eskimo creation myth, man fell out of a pea pod. Raven alighted on a branch next to man. Raven pushed his beak to the top of his head and transformed himself into a person. He proceeded to instruct man on the ways to survive on earth. The lives of men, animals, and spirits were intricately intertwined. Therefore, concern for the spiritual and supernatural world permeated all aspects of Eskimo life. Hunters were equipped with hunting lore and hunting magic so as not to offend spirits and tunghat, and to protect themselves from dangerous supernatural creatures that lurked about. Animal spirits would resist capture if man had not shown animals proper respect.

While a hunter's weapons might be mechanically perfect, if he made no reference to the spiritual world in their design, the weapons would be ineffectual. Hunters practiced a form of sympathetic magic. Weapons were made out of materials familiar to their intended prey. The pursued animals felt comfortable around the weapons and allowed themselves to be caught. At times spirit-helpers were enlisted to aid in the hunt. Men carved images of their quarrys' chief predators on weapons, thus endowing the implements with the predators' cunning, speed, and strength. The more decorative and finely crafted the weapons, the more effective they were, since animals were attracted to beautiful things. Western Alaskan Eskimo villages contained sod houses that were residences for women and children, and men's houses, large sod structures in which men worked, ate, and slept. The community gathered in the men's houses in the evenings and on ceremonial occasions. Reference to the spiritual and supernatural extended into domestic and ceremonial aspects of village life. Women's skin processing and sewing tools made of bone and ivory bore incised images of animals, spirits, and tunghat. Pictures of captured animals and mythical creatures were painted on wooden ladles and food bowls. Often, animal lifelines were defined, and the creatures were surrounded by circles. The circles, divided into four sections, made symbolic reference to the Universe, to the cardinal points, and to the sacred number four. Fishskin, caribou skin, and birdskin parkas not only kept people warm and dry, but also suggested that the individuals wearing the skins of animals might be in the process of man-animal transformations. In addition to their utilitarian functions, tools, utensils, and clothing served as daily reminders of the need to respect the spirits. The ceremonial lives of the Inupiak- and Yupik-speaking Eskimos differed from one another. Ceremonies of Northwest Alaskan Eskimos focused on the spring whale hunt. Before the beginning of the whaling season, men cleaned their weapons, women sewed new clothes, and people prepared hunting songs and charms. Following a successful whaling season, adults and children engaged in serious activities and games. Men, wearing portraitlike masks and gorgets, paraded through the village and dancers re-created dangerous and successful hunting exploits. While extolling the virtues of whales and expressing hopes that future hunting seasons would be productive, people ate huge quantities of whale meat. Finally, everyone participated in competitions and games. The Eskimos of northwest Alaska believed that the spirit of the whale resided in its skull and immediately returned this pan of a captured animal to the sea. The Bering Sea Eskimos believed that the spirit of an animal resided in its bladder, and the Bladder Festival was the highlight of the Yupik-speakers' ceremonial life. During this festival the inflated bladders of all animals caught during a season were hung in the men's house, and the spirits were fed and entertained with song and dance. The bladders were then punctured and returned to the sea through holes in the ice. Now released, the spirits were free to seek unborn animals whose bodies they would inhabit. If people had shown proper respect, the spirits would return in new bodies, replenishing the earth's supply of game. Bladder festivals performed by Bering Sea Eskimos and whaling feasts celebrated by Northwest Alaskan Eskimos united the spiritual and earthly worlds under one roof. These ceremonies, as well as the Eskimos' rich mythology and complex artistic traditions, gave tangible substance to the Alaskans' beliefs in spiritual forces and physical transformations.

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Map of Western Alaska with Tribal Boundaries

Linguistic and Ecological Boundaries Eskimos living between Point Barrow and Norton Sound spoke Inupiak, while Eskimos inhabiting the coast between Norton Sound and the Kuskokwim River spoke Yupik. In addition to speaking different languages, these two groups of Eskimos maintained different cultural traditions and hunted different animals. The Inupiak speakers lived in a high Arctic environment and relied on whales, walrus, seals, polar bears, and caribou. The Yupik speakers lived in a grassy riverine environment teeming with fish, seals, and waterfowl, their principal subsistence foods. However, the groups shared a belief in tunghat and animal spirits. Negative 11678, Numvak Island Man (Photograph by G.B. Gordon)