|
|
Indian Relics
Nature Bulletin No. 210-A December 11, 1965
Forest Preserve District of Cook County
Seymour Simon, President
Roland F. Eisenbeis, Supt. of Conservation
INDIAN RELICS
The American Indians, before the coming of the white man, were
Stone Age people. Theirs was a hand culture, employing tools of stone,
bone, shell and wood. Certain tribes used copper found near Lake
Superior and elsewhere, but no Indian had learned to use metals like
bronze and iron. Others had learned to weave and made baskets or
clothing out of plant materials. Most tribes made pottery: molding and
baking vessels of clay tempered with sand, powdered rock or shell;
some crude; some very good. They had learned to farm and had
domesticated many useful plants such as corn, beans, squash and
tobacco, but they had not discovered the wheel, nor the plow, and the
dog was their only domestic animal. Some tribes, like the Sioux of the
great plains, were wandering hunters depending upon the buffalo for
food and clothing.
In the making of weapons, tools and ornaments, the Indians were
remarkably ingenious, skillful and patient. They discovered that brittle
stone like flint or chert, which had no "grain" or planes along which it
would split, could be cracked with a cobblestone hammer into flat
pieces or slivers. Then these could be flaked off into desired shapes,
with sharp edges or saw teeth if needed. They discovered that such
stone worked better when freshly dug, so they buried what was not
immediately used, to keep it "green". From creek beds and lake shores,
from rock ledges and caves, or from limestone beds which they
quarried -- using cobblestones as hammers and the antlers of deer or
elk as picks -- the Indians obtained chunks of flint. These were
fashioned into arrowheads, spearheads, knives, scrapers, chisels and
drills, using tools of stone, bone, wood and leather.
Tomahawks, axes, mauls, celts (chisels), gouges for shaping wood,
and mortars with pestles for grinding corn, acorns and seeds, were
usually made from cobblestones of granite or similar material having
the proper density and toughness. These were roughly shaped by
knocking off spalls with a stone hammer. The final shape was
obtained by pecking over the entire surface with smaller tools. Finally,
the tool marks were ground away with a gritty rock like sandstone, and
the surface polished with a softer fine-grained stone.
Pebbles were grooved for weights on fishing nets; or chipped, ground,
polished and drilled to serve as ornaments. Smoking pipes were
sculptured from stone, or molded out of clay and baked. Antlers and
other bones were used for picks, mallets, scrapers, drills, awls, needles
and fishhooks. Shells were used for hoes to scrape wood or hides, to
scale fish, and to make beads for ornament. Porcupine quills were used
lavishly to ornament ceremonial garments, pipe stems, arm bands and
pouches.
Bows,
arrow shafts, war clubs and throwing sticks were made of wood;
as were their drums. Many implements, and boats or "dugouts", were
made of wood. The graceful canoe had a light framework of wood
covered with skins or birch bark. Root and bark fibers were used for
baskets, weaving and fish nets. Deer sinews were used for thread and
lashings. Almost every plant had some use, such as for food, medicine,
dye, clothing, shelter, utensil or implement.
The articles they made of wood, bark, leather, and other plant and
animal materials, have decayed and disappeared. Only their tools of
stone and fragments of pottery -- called "artifacts" -- remain. Nothing
brings home the reality of these original Americans more vividly than
to find a specimen or a fragment of their handiwork.
'Twas a simpler life, and perhaps a happier one.
To return to the Nature Bulletins Click Here! |
|
Update: June 2012
|
|
