Besides the flesh and milk of the reindeer the Laplanders eat its blood,
which is boiled down into a sort of pudding. The meat which is not eaten
fresh is dried and stored away. Fish are dried and smoked. Birds and
their eggs are much eaten. Bread, much like the “famine bread” of the
Finns, is made from roots and barks. Soup is made of pine bark mixed
with fat and flour or meal.
The Laplanders who live in settled houses depend upon hunting during the
fall and fishing during the summer. They hunt reindeer, squirrels, and
birds. Wild reindeer they take chiefly by pitfalls: they dig a hole, or
trench, in the path over which the reindeer is likely to pass, and
carefully cover it with branches, earth, and grass. When the animals
have fallen in, they are easily killed. Lapps are fond of the eggs of
water birds, and to secure them they build nests for the birds in trees
near the water, and then rob them after the eggs have been laid.
The Laplanders are great believers in spirits. To summon these they use
drums or tambourines, consisting of a ring of wood over which a membrane
is tightly stretched. This has jingling objects fastened to it which
make a noise when the instrument is beaten or rattled. Upon the membrane
are rudely painted, curious figures, usually in red. Thus the sun,
animals, and human beings are pictured, and are believed to help the
drummer. The Lapps greatly fear their god of storms. He is believed to
drive the storms forth from his cave with a club and to bring them back
with a shovel. They fear him most at the season when the young reindeer
are born, and then pray to him not to let loose the storms, lest the
little creatures perish. Through their sorcerers they secure from this
god, storm strings with three knots tied in them. Each of these knots
represents a storm. If one knot is untied, a little storm is let loose;
if two are untied, a greater one; if three, there is a fearful tempest.
These strings are used against enemies or those who have tried to do
them harm. The neighbors of the little Lapps think these can do them
much harm with their wind strings and other magic, and they dread and
hate them.
XI.
TURKS.
With the Turks we pass from the peoples of Europe to those of Asia, for
the European Osmanli Turks are only the most settled branch of a large
group of peoples, most of whom lead wandering lives and live in Central
and Northern Asia. All speak almost the same language. Formerly there
was a great Turkish Empire, which stretched from the borders of China to
the Caspian Sea. The present peoples of the Turkic group live within
this area and in European Turkey. Among the most important of these
peoples are the Yakuts, Turkomans, Uzbegs, Nogais, Cossacks, and
Osmanli,—the latter being the Turks of European Turkey.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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