A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary JemisonSeaver, James E. (James Everett)
History
A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary Jemison
Seaver, James E. (James Everett)
Jemison, Mary, 1743-1833; Seneca Indians
When the time for planting arrives, and the soil is prepared, the squaws
are assembled in the morning, and conducted into a field, where each
plants one row. They then go into the next field, plant once across,
and so on till they have gone through the tribe. If any remains to
be planted, they again commence where they did at first, (in the same
field,) and so keep on till the whole is finished. By this rule they
perform their labor of every kind, and every jealousy of one having done
more or less than another, is effectually avoided.
Each squaw cuts her own wood; but it is all brought to the house under
the direction of the overseer--each bringing one back load.
* * * * *
OF THEIR METHOD OF COMPUTING TIME, AND KEEPING THEIR RECORDS.
This is done by moons and winters: a moon is a month, and the time from
the end of one winter to that of another, a year.
From sunset till sunrise, they say that the sun is asleep. In the old of
the moon, when it does not shine in the night, they say it is dead. They
rejoice greatly at the sight of the new moon.
In order to commemorate great events, and preserve the chronology of
them, the war Chief in each tribe keeps a war post. This post is a
peeled stick of timber, 10 or 12 feet high, that is erected in the town.
For a campaign they make, or rather the Chief makes, a perpendicular
red mark, about three inches long and half an inch wide; on the opposite
side from this, for a scalp, they make a red cross, thus, +; on another
side, for a prisoner taken, they make a red cross in this manner, X',
with a head or dot, and by placing such significant hireoglyphics in
so conspicuous a situation, they are enabled to ascertain with great
certainty the time and circumstances of past events.
Hiokatoo had a war-post, on which was recorded his military exploits,
and other things that he tho't worth preserving.
* * * * *
ANECDOTES.
Hiokatoo used to say that when he was a young man, there lived in the
same tribe with him an old Indian warrior, who was a great counsellor,
by the name of Buck-in-je-hil-lish. Buckinjehillish having, with
great fatigue, attended the council when it was deliberating upon war,
declared that none but the ignorant made war, but that the wise men
and the warriors had to do the fighting. This speech exasperated his
countrymen to such a degree that he was apprehended and tried for being
a witch, on the account of his having lived to so advanced an age; and
because he could not show some reason why he had not died before, he was
sentenced to be tomahawked by a boy on the spot, which was accordingly
done.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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