A Further Contribution to the Study of the Mortuary Customs of the North American IndiansYarrow, H. C. (Harry Crécy)
History
A Further Contribution to the Study of the Mortuary Customs of the North American Indians
Yarrow, H. C. (Harry Crécy)
Indians of North America -- Funeral customs and rites
Another depository of this kind upon an island in the river a few
miles above gave it the name of Sepulcher Inland. The _Watlala_, a
tribe of the Upper Tsinūk, whose burial place is here described, are
now nearly extinct; but a number of the sepulchers still remain in
different states of preservation. The position of the body, as
noticed by Clarke, is, I believe, of universal observance, the head
being always placed to the west. The reason assigned to me is that
the road to the _mé-mel-ūs-illa-hee_, the country of the dead, is
toward the west, and if they place them otherwise they would be
confused. East of the Cascade Mountains the tribes whose habits are
equestrian, and who use canoes only for ferriage or transportation
purposes, bury their dead, usually heaping over them piles of
stones, either to mark the spot or to prevent the bodies from being
exhumed by the prairie wolf. Among the Yakamas we saw many of their
graves placed in conspicuous points of the basaltic walls which line
the lower valleys, and designated by a clump of poles planted over
them, from which fluttered various articles of dress. Formerly these
prairie tribes killed horses over the graves--a custom now falling
into disuse in consequence of the teachings of the whites.
Upon Puget Sound all the forms obtain in different localities. Among
the Makah of Cape Flattery the graves are covered with a sort of
box, rudely constructed of boards, and elsewhere on the Sound the
same method is adopted in some cases, while in others the bodies are
placed on elevated scaffolds. As a general thing, however, the
Indians upon the water placed the dead in canoes, while those at a
distance from it buried them. Most of the graves are surrounded with
strips of cloth, blankets, and other articles of property. Mr.
Cameron, an English gentleman residing at Esquimalt Harbor,
Vancouver Island, informed me that on his place there were graves
having at each corner a large stone, the interior space filled with
rubbish. The origin of these was unknown to the present Indians.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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