Chapter 7

OF THE MANNERS, CUSTOMS, RELIGIOUS OPINIONS AND CEREMONIES OF THE INDIANS.

——1623——

(282 words of apology and prayer)

How few, weak, and raw were we at our first beginning, and there settling, and in the midst of barbarous enemies!

(150 words of prayer and thanksgiving)

… whereas myself and others, in former letters, (which came to the press against my will and knowledge,) wrote that the Indians about us are a people without any religion, or knowledge of any God, therein I erred, though we could then gather no better; for as they conceive of many divine powers, so of one, whom they call Kiehtan, to be the principal and maker of all the rest, and to be made by none.

[That belief is congruous with early modern Christianity, which still recognized, angels, saints, devils and demons.]

He, they say, created the heavens, earth, sea and all creatures contained therein; also that he made one man and one woman, of whom they and we and all mankind came; but how they became so far dispersed, that know they not. At first, they say, there was no sachim or king, but Kiehtan, who dwelleth above in the heavens, whither all good men go when they die, to see their friends, and have their fill of all things. This his habitation lieth far westward in the heavens, they say; thither the bad men go also, and knock at his door, but he bids them quatchet, that is to say, walk abroad, for there is no place for such; so that they wander in restless want and penury.

[The tribes had 200 years of contact with Christians, beginning with basque and Icelandic fishermen. In Mort’s relation, one blond man had recently been buried with honors.]

Never man saw this Kiehtan; only old men tell of him, and bid them tell their children, yea to charge them to teach their posterities the same, and lay the like charge upon them. This power they acknowledge to be good; and when they would obtain any great matter, meet together and cry unto him; and so likewise for plenty, victory, &c. sing, dance, feast, give thanks, and hang up garlands and other things in memory of the same.

Another power they worship, whom they call Hobbamock, and to the northward of us, Hobbamoqui; this, as far as we can conceive, is the devil. Him they call upon to cure their wounds and diseases.

[The healing gods of Pagan antiquity overthrown by primitive Christianity, were regarded as devils by Christians, who seemed to have forgotten Christ’s healing miracles.]

When they are curable, he persuades them he sends the same for some conceived anger against them; but upon their calling upon him, can and doth help them; but when they are mortal and not curable in nature, then he persuades them Kiehtan is angry, and sends them, whom none can cure; insomuch as in that respect only they somewhat doubt whether he be simply good, and therefore in sickness never call upon him. This Hobbamock appears in sundry forms unto them, as in the shape of a man, a deer, a fawn, an eagle, &c. but most ordinarily a snake.

[See the Hippocratic rod and twined serpent, as well as the barber’s pole.]

He appears not to all, but the chiefest and most judicious amongst them; though all of them strive to attain to that hellish height of honor. He appeareth most ordinary and is most conversant with three sorts of people. One, I confess I neither know by name nor office directly; of these they have few, but esteem highly of them, and think that no weapon can kill them; another they call by the name of powah; and the third pniese.

The office and duty of the powah is to be exercised principally in calling upon the devil, and curing diseases of the sick or wounded.

[Powah is the apparent source of the word powwow, which spread across North America by Algonquin guides.]

The common people join with him in the exercise of invocation, but do but only assent, or as we term it, say Amen to that he saith; yet sometime break out into a short musical note with him. The powah is eager and free in speech, fierce in countenance, and joineth many antic and laborious gestures with the same, over the party diseased.

[This is more like the rituals of the pre Christian Europeans, and is an offense to the strict authority of the Judaeo-Christian faiths.]

If the party be wounded, he will also seem to suck the wound; but if they be curable, (as they say,) he toucheth it not, but askooke, that is, the snake, or wobsacuck, that is, the eagle, sitteth on his shoulder, and licks the same. This none see but the powah, who tells them he doth it himself. If the party be otherwise diseased, it is accounted sufficient if in any shape he but come into the house, taking it for an undoubted sign of recovery.

And as in former ages Apollo had his temple at Delphos, and Diana at Ephesus, so have I heard them call upon some as if they had their residence in some certain places, or because they appeared in those forms in the same. In the powah’s speech, he promiseth to sacrifice many skins of beasts, kettles, hatchets, beads, knives, and other the best things they have to the fiend, if he will come to help the party diseased; but whether they perform it, I know not. The other practices I have seen, being necessarily called sometimes to be with their sick, and have used the best arguments I could to make them understand against the same. They have told me I should see the devil at those times come to the party; but I assured myself and them of the contrary, which so proved; yea, themselves have confessed they never saw him when any of us were present. In desperate and extraordinary hard travail in child-birth, when the party cannot be delivered by the ordinary means, they send for this powah; though ordinarily their travail is not so extreme as in our parts of the world, they being of a more hardy nature; for on the third day after child-birth, I have seen the mother with the infant, upon a small occasion, in cold weather, in a boat upon the sea.

Many sacrifices the Indians use, and in some cases kill children. It seemeth they are various in their religious worship in a little distance, and grow more and more cold in their worship to Kiehtan; saying, in their memory he was much more called upon.

[Child sacrifice was at the basis of the Abrahamic faiths, though it was abandoned. It figured prominently in Punic faiths, was practiced by the army of Agamemnon before sailing for Troy, and by a rebel Macedonian commander in 335 B.C. on the approach of Alexander at Pelium.]

The Nanohiggansets exceed in their blind devotion, and have a great spacious house, wherein only some few (that are, as we may term them, priests) come. Thither, at certain known times, resort all their people, and offer almost all the riches they have to their gods, as kettles, skins, hatchets, beads, knives, &c., all which are cast by the priests into a great fire that they make in the midst of the house, and there consumed to ashes. To this offering every man bringeth freely; and the more he is known to bring, hath the better esteem of all men. This the other Indians about us approve of as good, and wish their sachims would appoint the like; and because the plague hath not reigned at Nanohigganset as at other places about them, they attribute to this custom there used.

[A holocaust, or “burnt offering” familiar to ancient Europeans has been above described.]

The pnieses are men of great courage and wisdom, and to those also the devil appeareth more familiarly than to others, and as we conceive, maketh covenant with them to preserve them from death by wounds with arrows, knives, hatchets, &c. or at least both themselves and especially the people think themselves to be freed from the same. And though, against their battles, all of them by painting disfigure themselves, yet they are known by their courage and boldness, by reason whereof one of them will chase almost an hundred men; for they account it death for whomsoever stand in their way. These are highly esteemed of all sorts of people, and are of the sachim’s council, without whom they will not war, or undertake any weighty business.

[An Indian berserker?]

In war their sachims, for their more safety, go in the midst of them. They are commonly men of the greatest stature and strength, and such as will endure most hardness, and yet are more discreet, courteous and humane in their carriages than any amongst them, scorning theft, lying, and the like base dealings, and stand as much upon their reputation as any men. And to the end they may have store of these, they train up the most forward and likeliest boys, from their childhood, in great hardness, and make them abstain from dainty meat, observing divers orders prescribed, to the end that when they are of age, the devil may appear to them; causing to drink the juice of sentry and other bitter herbs, till they cast, which they must disgorge into the platter, and drink again and again, till at length through extraordinary oppressing of nature, it will seem to be all blood; and this the boys will do with eagerness at the first, and so continue till by reason of faintness, they can scarce stand on their legs, and then must go forth into the cold. Also they beat their shins with sticks, and cause them to run through bushes, stumps and brambles, to make them hardy and acceptable to the devil, that in time he may appear unto them.

[Vital physical effort was abhorred by English Christians of the Anglican and Congregationalist bents. So, these same people that outlawed dueling and then boxing among the warrior class, could make no other observation than the concourse with devils to explain warrior conditioning.]

Their sachims cannot be all called kings, but only some few of them, to whom the rest resort for protection, and pay homage unto them; neither may they war without their knowledge and approbation; yet to be commanded by the greater, as occasion serveth. Of this sort is Massassowat, our friend, and Conanacus, of Nanohigganset, our supposed enemy. Every sachim taketh care for the widow and fatherless, also for such as are aged and any way maimed, if their friends be dead, or not able to provide for them.

[This, care of noble orphans and widows by the king, was outlawed in the Magna Carta in 1216, as discussed in The Lies That Bind Us, JL. The widow and orphan in England from 1216 through the early 1800s were given up to slave dealers. See Orphan Nation, JL. These slaves accounted for most of Weston’s planted men. Increase Mather, in 1675, noted that the Indians had an irrational level of care for their children, and, unlike English planters, were not willing to abandon their women and children to save their own skins, Serach for an American Spartacus, JL.]

A sachim will not take any to wife, but such an one as is equal to him in birth; otherwise, they say, their seed would in time become ignoble; and though they have many other wives, yet are they no other than concubines or servants, and yield a kind of obedience to the principal, who ordereth the family and them in it. The like their men observe also, and will adhere to the first during their lives; but put away the other at their pleasure. This government is successive, and not by choice. If the father die before the son or daughter be of age, then the child is committed to the protection and tuition of some one amongst them, who ruleth in his stead till he be of age; but when that is, I know not.

Every sachim knoweth how far the bounds and limits of his own country extendeth; and that is his own proper inheritance. Out of that, if any of his men desire land to set their corn, he giveth them as much as they can use, and sets them their bounds. In this circuit whosoever hunteth, if they kill any venison, bring him his fee; which is the fore parts of the same, if it be killed on the land, but if in the water, then the skin thereof. The great sachims or kings know their own bounds or limits of land, as well as the rest. All travellers or strangers for the most part lodge at the sachim’s. When they come, they tell them how long they will stay, and to what place they go; during which time they receive entertainment, according to their persons, but want not.

Once a year the pnieses use to provoke the people to bestow much corn on the sachim. To that end, they appoint a certain time and place, near the sachim’s dwelling, where the people bring many baskets of corn, and make a great stack thereof. There the pnieses stand ready to give thanks to the people, on the sachim’s behalf; and after acquaint the sachim therewith, who fetcheth the same, and is no less thankful, bestowing many gifts on them.

When any are visited with sickness, their friends resort unto them for their comfort, and continue with them ofttimes till their death or recovery. If they die, they stay a certain time to mourn for them. Night and morning they perform this duty, many days after the burial, in a most doleful manner, insomuch as though it be ordinary and the note musical, which they take one from another and all together, yet it will draw tears from their eyes, and almost from ours also. But if they recover, then because their sickness was chargeable, they send corn and other gifts unto them, at a certain appointed time, whereat they feast and dance, which they call commoco. When they bury the dead, they sow up the corpse in a mat, and so put it in the earth. If the party be a sachim, they cover him with many curious mats, and bury all his riches with him, and enclose the grave with a pale.

[Hence the blond mummy buried in like manner, discovered in Mort’s account in 1621, must have been a leader.]

If it be a child, the father will also put his own most special jеwels and ornaments in the earth with it; also will cut his hair, and disfigure himself very much, in token of sorrow. If it be the man or woman of the house, they will pull down the mats, and leave the frame standing, and bury them in or near the same, and either remove their dwelling or give over housekeeping.

The men employ themselves wholly in hunting, and other exercises of the bow, except at some times they take some pains in fishing. The women live a most slavish life; they carry all their burdens, set and dress their corn, gather it in, seek out for much of their food, beat and make ready the corn to eat, and have all household care lying upon them.

The younger sort reverence the elder, and do all mean offices, whilst they are together, although they be strangers. Boys and girls may not wear their hair like men and women, but are distinguished thereby.

A man is not accounted a man till he do some notable act, or show forth such courage and resolution as becometh his place. The men take much tobacco; but for boys so to do, they account it odious.

All their names are significant and variable; for when they come to the state of men and women, they alter them according to their deeds or dispositions.

[Modern gangs and gyms, as well as ancient Greek warriors, followed a similar deed based naming tradition.]

When a maid is taken in marriage, she first cutteth her hair, and after weareth a covering on her head, till her hair be grown out. Their women are diversely disposed; some as modest, as they will scarce talk one with another in the company of men, being very chaste also; yet other some light, lascivious and wanton. If a woman have a bad husband, or cannot affect him, and there be war or opposition between that and any other people, she will run away from him to the contrary party, and there live; where they never come unwelcome, for where are most women, there is greatest plenty.

[This was the chief English disadvantage, lack of women, or workers.]

When a woman hath her monthly terms, she separateth herself from all other company, and liveth certain days in a house alone; after which, she washeth herself, and all that she hath touched or used, and is again received to her husband’s bed or family. For adultery, the husband will beat his wife and put her away, if he please. Some common strumpets there are, as well as in other places; but they are such as either never married, or widows, or put away for adultery; for no man will keep such an one to wife.

In matters of unjust and dishonest dealing, the sachim examineth and punisheth the same. In case of thefts, for the first offence, he is disgracefully rebuked; for the second, beaten by the sachim with a cudgel on the naked back; for the third, he is beaten with many strokes, and hath his nose slit upwards, that thereby all men may both know and shun him. If any man kill another, he must likewise die for the same. The sachim not only passes the sentence upon malefactors, but executeth the same with his own hands, if the party be then present; if not, sendeth his own knife, in case of death, in the hands of others to perform the same. But if the offender be to receive other punishment, he will not receive the same but from the sachim himself; before whom, being naked, he kneeleth, and will not offer to run away, though he beat him never so much, it being a greater disparagement for a man to cry during the time of his correction, than is his offence and punishment.

[This behavior is semi civilized, with wilder tribes, less dependent on corn, not practicing in group violence.]

As for their apparel, they wear breeches and stockings in one, like some Irish, which is made of deer skins, and have shoes of the same leather.

[Like some Irish? So to mean the closest Europeans to thei easily attained shore.]

They wear also a deer’s skin loose about them, like a cloak, which they will turn to the weather side. In this habit they travel; but when they are at home, or come to their journey’s end, presently they pull off their breeches, stockings and shoes, wring out the water, if they be wet, and dry them, and rub or chafe the same. Though these be off, yet have they another small garment that covereth their secrets. The men wear also, when they go abroad in cold weather, an otter or fox skin on their right arm, but only their bracer on the left. Women, and all of that sex, wear strings about their legs, which the men never do.

The people are very ingenious and observative; they keep account of time by the moon, and winters or summers; they know divers of the stars by name; in particular they know the north star, and call it maske, which is to say, the bear; also they have many names for the winds. They will guess very well at the wind and weather beforehand, by observations in the heavens. They report also, that some of them can cause the wind to blow in what part they list—can raise storms and tempests, which they usually do when they intend the death or destruction of other people, that by reason of the unseasonable weather, they may take advantage of their enemies in their houses. At such times they perform their greatest exploits, and in such seasons, when they are at enmity with any, they keep more careful watch than at other times.

As for the language, it is very copious, large, and difficult. As yet we cannot attain to any great measure thereof; but can understand them, and explain ourselves to their understanding, by the help of those that daily converse with us. And though there be difference in a hundred miles’ distance of place, both in language and manners, yet not so much but that they very well understand each other. And thus much of their lives and manners.

Instead of records and chronicles, they take this course. Where any remarkable act is done, in memory of it, either in the place, or by some pathway near adjoining, they make a round hole in the ground, about a foot deep, and as much over; which when others passing by behold, they inquire the cause and occasion of the same, which being once known, they are careful to acquaint all men, as occasion serveth, therewith; and lest such holes should be filled or grown up by any accident, as men pass by, they will oft renew the same; by which means many things of great antiquity are fresh in memory. So that as a man travelleth, if he can understand his guide, his journey will be the less tedious, by reason of the many historical discourses [which] will be related unto him.

[The origin of writing in European antiquity rose from similar obvious oral traditions. Do note, that Winslow has not made a single racial description of these people, other that that they are larger and more hardy and that the men paint themselves for war, this being the origin of the term “redskin” that red was the color for war. Other paint colors: Black = death, white = spirit/sacred, blue = life.]