Ethnobotany of the Ojibwe Indians 18

Ethnobotany of the Ojibwe Indians 18

OJIBWE FIBER PLANTS

 

 

ACERACEAE (MAPLE FAMILY)

 

=Red Maple= (_Acer rubrum_ L.), “cicigîmeˈwîc”. This leaf is frequently

used in the Ojibwe beadwork designs. In fact, many leaves, flowers and

fruits furnish designs. Since the plants are sacred to their midewiwin

or medicine lodge, it is common for them to use especially valuable

remedies in their designs. These may be worked in either porcupine

quills or beads. Shell and copper beads were used in the older work,

while tiny glass beads obtainable from the whites are now used. Indian

women are usually most apt at their own aboriginal designs and do a

rather poor job, when they are given a white man’s design to copy.

In the early days, the Indian men drew outline pictures on birchbark

scrolls to remind them of midewiwin rituals, practices and medicines.

Indian women experimented with plant materials laid upon birch bark

until they found the design that suited them. Deer horns burned in the

fire to furnish charcoal or else flour was used to coat the underside

of a leaf, which was then pressed upon birch bark to leave its outline

as from a carbon copy. The birch bark design would be placed beneath

the native bead loom, as shown in plate 48, fig. 1, and the pattern

copied in beads. Sashes, anklets, bracelets, kneelets, belts, coats and

waists were beaded, also moccasins. The public is not very discerning

in choosing real Indian designs, but the ethnologist can quickly pick

the originals, even though he may never have seen that tribe of Indians

before.

 

=Mountain Maple= (_Acer spicatum_ Lam.), “cacagobiˈmûk” [emetic bark].

The three-lobed leaf of the Mountain Maple is a great favorite with

Ojibwe women for design work for beading, and it is more often seen

than any other kind of leaf.

 

=Sugar Maple= (_Acer saccharum_ Marsh.), “înênatîg” [Indian tree].[144]

Paddles for stirring maple sugar or wild rice while scorching or

parching it, bowls and many other objects of utility were made by the

Ojibwe from this wood.

 

 

APOCYNACEAE (DOGBANE FAMILY)

 

=Spreading Dogbane= (_Apocynum androsaemifolium_ L.), “wesaˈwûskwûn”

[nearly blue flowers]. The Flambeau women used to use the outer rind

for fine sewing. In the fall, when mature this fiber makes one of the

strongest native fibers, stronger even than the cultivated hemp to

which it is related.

 

 

BETULACEAE (BIRCH FAMILY)

 

=Paper Birch= (_Betula alba_ L. var. papyrifera [Marsh.] Spach)

“wîgwas”. Birch occupies almost as important a position in the life of

the Ojibwe as dates do in the life of an Arabian or cocoanuts in the

life of a South Sea Islander. The bark is used for buckets, baskets,

wigwam covering, and canoes. Patterns for their decorative art were

made upon the bark; records of their medicine lodge ritual were kept

on its virgin surface. It and cedar form the two most sacred trees of

the Ojibwe, both of which are so useful to them. They regard the birch

bark as a distinct contribution from Winabojo and point to the fact

that it is the last part of the tree to decay. It keeps its form even

after the wood has changed to dust and can be readily slipped from

the wood in decayed logs. It also has the property of protecting from

decay articles stored in it. They claim that a birch is never struck by

lightning, hence offers a safe harbor in a thunderstorm.

 

No birch or cedar is gathered by the Ojibwe without due offering of

tobacco to Winabojo and Grandmother Earth. Families make a pilgrimage

to birch groves during the latter part of June and in July to gather

their supply of birch bark, because it peels most easily at that time.

As everyone knows, there are many layers of bark on a birch tree

ranging from the thinnest paper to quite heavy pieces that make very

durable canoes.

 

George L. Waite, Honorary Curator of Botany in this museum, made a

special series of pictures, thirty in number, detailing every step

in the manufacture of their canoes or “tciman” as they call them.

Ogabeˈgijîg [rift in the clouds] and his wife Cawasînoˈkwe [rays of

light from cloud] both 80 years old, about the only old couple at Lac

du Flambeau, still remembering the proper Ojibwe method of making a

birchbark canoe were engaged to carry on the work. Important steps are

shown in plates accompanying this bulletin.

 

To find a tree with thick bark suitable for canoe-making often

necessitates a considerable journey on foot as it did in this case. The

trunk should be ten to fifteen inches in diameter, smooth and straight

as can be selected. Paper birches are of slow growth and the usual

specimen of that diameter will be from fifty to seventy years old.

This tree was collected with all the proper ceremony. Into a hole in

the ground at the base of the tree, tobacco was placed as an offering.

Tobacco was smoked by the man, who saluted the cardinal points of the

compass, and likewise heaven and earth. The tree was then cut down.

They say that usually it will be left standing on the stump, so that

the bark may be undamaged, but for this canoe where the outside of the

bark becomes the inside of the canoe, they felled crossed logs to hold

it off the ground.

 

To remove the bark, a long perpendicular slit is made the length

desired. From this cut the bark is laid back on either side, with an

axe, and peeled from the log as shown in plate 52, fig. 1. To overcome

the natural curl of the bark, it is then rolled up with the inner side

outmost, in proper lengths and tied with inner bark of the basswood,

which is their ready cord material. With a tump-line over the head, as

shown in plate 52, fig. 2, the man is ready to carry the bark home,

where he will make the canoe.

 

The framework was made of White Cedar or Arbor Vitae because it

is light, elastic, strong and easy to split. In plate 53, fig. 1,

Ogabeˈgijîg is shown splitting the cedar log to obtain the ribs and

framework. There are two lengths, sixteen feet for top rails, and six

feet for ribs, as shown in plate 53, fig. 2. The curves of the prow and

stern are obtained by slitting a stave twelve times so that it may be

bent at right angles, tied securely with basswood string, and held in

place until dried as shown in plate 54, fig. 1.

 

A staked form eighteen feet long is next laid out on the ground, as

shown in plate 54, fig. 2. The bark is secured between the two stakes

so that it cannot slip and is then ready for sewing together. Large

rocks are piled inside to overcome any tendency of the bark to curl.

The sewing material is the root of Jack Pine. These are especially

suitable since they are long and straight. Ogabeˈgijîg is seen pulling

them out of the ground after digging with a grub hoe, in plate 55, fig.

1. The central core is tough and is about the same diameter at the tip

as it is close to the main trunk of the tree. It is split into two and

coiled, to furnish a very tough flexible cord. The coils are shown with

Cawasînoˈkwe under the Jack Pine tree from whence they came in plate

55, fig. 2. Both cedar sticks and root fiber are sunk in the lake till

needed.

 

Sewing makes awl holes necessary, and a White Oak wood awl is used.

Both ends are drawn through the same hole with a lock stitch, like

the shoemaker used to use in putting on half soles. All holes must be

caulked and made watertight. Pitch is obtained from a Balsam, Norway

Pine, or White Pine. Notches made in the tree trunk fill with resin in

ten days. This is boiled with tallow in a kettle, as shown in plate

56, fig. 1. The resin is cooked a second time to obtain the pitch and

Hemlock or Larch bark is used to furnish the heat, because it produces

more steady heat than a wood fire.

 

Cawasînoˈkwe is seen again sewing the canoe into its form in plate

56, figure 2, and is shown applying pitch to the seams in plate 57,

figure 1. Decorations are made with native dyes such as blue clay and

red ochre. Nowadays white men’s colors are used and clan marks painted

on each end. Ogabeˈgijîg uses a bear picture for his clan mark while

Cawasînoˈkwe belongs to the chicken clan. The finished canoe is seen in

plate 57, fig. 2, as they are launching it upon Flambeau Lake. Very few

Ojibwe can still make a real birch bark canoe in this manner and the

museum considers this series of photographs a valuable one.

 

The tree is later salvaged for firewood, but the bark may be used right

away as soon as obtained. Emergency trays or buckets may be fashioned

at once in the woods, or the bark may be stored for future use. The

application of heat is all that is necessary to bend it in any shape

desired. Although it is highly inflammable, still buckets of birch bark

can be used to cook meats. Where water covers the inside of the vessel,

it will not burn. The Ojibwe woman saves scraps of birchbark to kindle

or light fires with them. A handy torch which will burn all night can

be made by rolling birch bark tightly. It is often used by the Ojibwe

in lieu of candles.

 

Nearly any kitchen utensil common to the white man, can be duplicated

in birchbark by the Ojibwe. Even funnels for pouring hot lard are

easily made. The mokoks or baskets are made for gathering and storing

berries, for storing maple sugar, dried fish, meat, or any food.

The birchbark keeps the food from spoiling. Some of the mokoks for

gathering berries or carrying maple sap, have bark handles like bucket

handles, as shown in plate 49, fig. 1, while larger storage baskets

have no handles, but a lid, or sometimes a flap of the basket itself is

used to close it tightly. All sorts of drying trays are made from birch

bark. Shallow trays for winnowing wild rice are also made of it.

 

Sheets of bark are sewed together with basswood string and made into

birchbark rolls, used as waterproof roofing for wigwams, as shown in

plate 46, fig. 2. Sticks tied across the end of the roll keep it from

splitting and tearing. A fine opportunity to see these bark rolls

was afforded during the Court of Neptune pageant in 1926 on the lake

front in Milwaukee, when the writer brought down over a hundred Ojibwe

Indians from Lac Court Oreilles, Wisconsin, and set up a model old time

village of eleven wigwams. There they lived for a week demonstrating

their former methods of life, jerking meats over open fires, as shown

in plate 47, fig. 2, and practicing their native arts and crafts.

 

=Low Birch= (_Betula pumila_ L. var. _glandulifera_ Regel), “bîneˈmîc”

[partridge bush]. The Flambeau Ojibwe use the twigs of this dwarf birch

for the ribs of baskets, where sweet grass is the weaving material.

 

=Hazelnut= (_Corylus americana_ Walt.), “mûkwoˈbagaˈnak”.[145] A

crooked stick with an enlarged base such as can often be obtained in a

hazel bush makes the favorite drum stick for the Flambeau Ojibwe. The

finer twigs are bound into a bundle, with the tips sheared, to serve as

a primitive broom or brush to be used on the bare ground in the wigwam.

The finer twigs may also be used as ribs in making woven baskets for

collecting or storing acorns or hard fruits.

 

 

CAPRIFOLIACEAE (HONEYSUCKLE FAMILY)

 

=Downy Arrow-wood= (_Viburnum pubescens_ [Ait.] Pursh), “wabanweˈak”

[east stick]. The bark of this species furnished one of the ingredients

of a Pillager Ojibwe kinnikinnik, which the writer smoked and

pronounces good.

 

 

COMPOSITAE (COMPOSITE FAMILY)

 

=Woolly Yarrow= (_Achillea lanulosa_ Nutt.), “wabîgwon” [white flower].

The flower heads are used in the kinnikinnik mixture for smoking by the

Flambeau Ojibwe. This mixture, is not however smoked for pleasure, but

in medicine lodge ceremonies for ceremonial purposes.

 

=White Sage= (_Artemisia ludoviciana_ Nutt.), “bebejiˈgoganjîˈ

wîˈngûsk” [horse hollow tube]. While the Pillager Ojibwe use this plant

as a horse medicine, they report that their neighbors the Sioux use it

in their smoking tobacco.

 

 

CORNACEAE (DOGWOOD FAMILY)

 

=Alternate-leaved Dogwood= (_Cornus alternifolia_ L. f.), “mosoˈmîc”

[moose tree]. The bark of this dogwood is used for kinnikinnik, while

the twigs are used in thatching and for various purposes by the

Pillager Ojibwe.

 

=Panicled Dogwood= (_Cornus paniculata_ L’Her.), “meskwabiˈmîc” [red

tree]. The Flambeau Ojibwe make kinnikinnik from the bark of this species for smoking.