Great Basin
I. Who were the Great Basin peoples? Lived in the Great Basin area Klamath, Washo, Paiute, Mono, Panamint Shoshone, Kawaiisu, Tubatulabal. Modoc transitional.
A. Environment very harsh, soil poor in most places, but also lush environs around places of water.
1. Resulted in spotty and sparse peopling. Oldest occupation 9,000 B.P.
a. Coprolites, textiles, mummy (willow leaf), packrat nests at Wendover, Tommy Tucker, etc.
b. Waves of successive occupation.
c. Mostly Shoshone spoken believed to have emigrated from south-central plains in “Shoshone wedge.”
d. Simple burials with few artifacts interred.
e. Emphasis not on endless accumulation of personal possessions.
2. Relied on annual seeds, pine nuts, agave and yucca roots, wokas (water lily) seed, rabbit and rodents, undulates for food.
a. Pine nuts (most favored food) gathered with a long hooked stick. Removed from cones and roasted in twined parching tray. Shells removed then roasted a second time.
B. Architecture mostly Wikiup of woven-reed mats or grass bundles over wooden-pole frame.
1. Early occupations cave centered.
2. Replaced by tepees and canvas tents in historic period.
C. Personal adornment varied by season.
1. Men and women wore shirt and skirt or pants of woven, shredded, sagebrush bark and leather or hemp cords.
a. Originally the garments were serape style.
2. Hair centrally parted and braided or worn loose with hairband.
D.Fibers.
1. Baskets are made in an amazing variety. Twined and coiled are both typical.
a. Paiute made twined baskets. Pitched water bottles, with narrow necks. Later shaped like canteens
b. Washo are the most successful basketmakers of the area in historic times. Datsolalee coiled willow baskets. Geometric isolated design forms. Panamint and Kawaiisu baskets similar but banded patterns quite common.
i. Willow rod foundation, bracken fern root.
c. Klamath baskets twined cattail in shades of brown. Bands main design element.
d. Cradle boards twined of willow on chokecherry frame.
2. Tules (reeds) served many purposes.a. Boats made of cattail ropes binding tule bundles. Need only one tool. Lasted one season.
b. Duck decoys made of tules.
c. Made mats to sleep and sit on and to cover house frames.
3. Cordage made from Indian Hemp apocynum.
4. Brushes made from wild rye grass root bundles.
E. Uses of trees.
1. Spears, harpoons, bows.
2. House-frame poles.
3. Harvesting poles, deadfall traps.
4. Tools.
5. Pitch used as glue and waterproofing.
F. Animal products.
1. Bones used as harpoon tips, scraping tools, awls.
2. Hides made into buckskin, tanned with brains and spinal columns.
a. strips used to lash babies into cradle boards. Covered frame of cradle board for older baby.
3. Duck skins used for decoys. Duck bones made into beads.
4. Rabbit skins used whole or made into ropes and woven into blankets.
5. Grebe bills used as awls.6. Antlers used to flake points.
G. Minerals and stone.
1. Red ocher pigment mined from Mount Grant.
a. Put on feet to scare rattlesnakes.
b. Cured and prevented disease (diaper rash).
c. Cave paintings.
d. Arrow paint.
e. Body paint.
f. Ghost Dance clothing.
2. Arrow points of obsidian.
3. Metates and manos.
4. Deadfall traps.
5. Hunting blinds.
II. Ghost Dance religion was born at a time when the U.S. Government was not honoring treaties. For example the Umatilla Reservation agency only received $200 of the $44,000.00 promised over two year period.
A. In 1859 Tavibo (means White Man), Paiute shaman, began religion in Nevada.
1. Teachings prophesied the end of the world, and the sure destruction of whites by flood followed by rebirth of earth, ancestors, and herds in a return to precontact paradise.
2. Started in north central Nevada, spread rapidly to northern California all of Oregon and Nevada.
3. Tavibo dies and Wovoka, his son, leaves to work for Whites and takes Anglo name, Jim Wilson. No one to perform rites and rituals.
B. Jim Wilson works for Whites but reads bible every night. Finally leaves Wilson’s to join a band of landless Paiutes, resume identity as Wovoka.
1. During peregrinations met apostles of other Indian religions.
a. Blowers who exhaled the bad form them selves upon greeting.
b. Shakers of Peugeot Sound who eschewed white introduced evils, but used the sign of the cross, bells, and candles.
c. Dreamers who believed labor was for fools like white men and sought enlightenment in reflection. Most of the Nez Pierce who followed Chief Joseph were Dreamers.
2. Wovoka combines aspects of new religious ideas, his heritage and his own ideology. Restarts Ghost Dance in 1886.
a. Began in Mason Valley, soon spread, began to falter, even though Wovoka made three trips to the mountains for messages from God.
3. Wovoka died and was reborn.
a. Said he carried a message from God of the coming of a new world where Indians will not be slaves, where the Indian dead would return to life, where the earth would be renewed.
b. His recovery coincided with an eclipse of the sun, dates were widely published in almanacs.
c. Caused other “miracles” like ice in summer, astrologic events.
4. Religion resurges in popularity. Wovoka begins wide travels.
a. Crossed Rockies Unitahs and Utes in Colorado.
b. Crossed Sierras to visit Lava Beds Modocs, Yokuts and Pit River peoples.
c. Into Arizona to visit Mojave and Chemehuevi.
d. Into Idaho to visit the Grosiute and Shoshone.
e. Into Wyoming to visit the Arapaho who were at the time being visited by some Sioux and Crow people. Was similar to existing Arapaho dance.
5. The Dance was a circle dance performed by both men and women.
a. Was an ecstatic dance of peace, lasting many days and nights.
b. Dance was accompanied by singing of dancers.
c. At some locations the dance was punctuated by an icy plunge.
d. Required special clothes embellished with special signs which made the wearerimpervious to bullets and were painted with a powdered red ocher, gathered from sacred Mount Grant. Wovoka had the pigment made into cakes which he gave to all visiting delegates. Some believe the clothing aspect was borrowed from the Mormons who believed the Indian people were the lost tribe of Israel, the Lamenites, and made a special effort to mormonize the Indian people. The Mormon initiates wore sacred white robes with mystical symbols and some believed their robes made them invulnerable. The Ghost Dance clothing was likewise believed to make the wearer invulnerable.