Chapter X: Household Tools, Implements, and Weapons

Implements for grinding foods were important. Mountain Maidu, in fact all Maidu tribes, ground some acorns on flat bed rock. When the resultant holes which eventually developed in the rock surfaces became deep, they were abandoned as the acorn meal tended to pack into hard lumps at the bottoms thereof. A heavy flat stone grinding slab was most frequently used. However, all Lassen area tribes had portable stone mortar bowls too. The Atsugewi and mountain Maidu did not make these nor did they use them for grinding food. Such portable stone mortars were found, evidently having been fashioned by more ancient tribes. Supernatural powers were ascribed to these mortars, and they were used only by shamans or medicine men. The Maidu thought that stone mortar bowls were made by Coyote at the time of creation and scattered over the world for the use of mankind. Others believed the mortars to have been “first people” originally, who were turned to stones in this form upon the coming of the Indian people at which time other “first people” were transformed into animals.

As has been described under the preparation of acorn mush, local tribes used the flat stone pounding slab under an open bottomed hopper basket, most commonly. The hopper basket of the Atsugewi and mountain Maidu was usually of twined construction and bound often with buckskin about the basal edge. Mountain Maidu sometimes employed their coiling technique in making the acorn pounding basket. It was from this tribe, at the turn of the century, that Atsugewi learned to make their pounding hopper baskets of the stronger coiled construction.

Pestles of stone were long, smoothed, and sometimes flattened on the sides. This resulted from use of these implements also as rubbing or mulling stones for processing small seeds on flat slabs without employment of basket hoppers. The pestles were always without the ornamentation used by certain other California tribes. The pounding end of the food grinding pestles are ever so slightly convex—their grinding surfaces are nearly flat. This is in contrast to pestles used in the deep bowl-shaped portable stone mortars for ceremonial purposes. The grinding ends of these pestles were strongly rounded, nearly hemispherical in shape.

The muller or small seed crusher used on the flat grinding slab without a hopper basket was of oval or rectangular shape, and it too was unornamented.

Small brushes used in miscellaneous food preparation were made of pounded dried soap-plant bulb fibers.

Hot rocks for cooking were usually handled with two sticks. None of our tribes used spoons. Crude obsidian knives with, or more commonly without, bone handles were used for many chores.

Yana used split cobble stones for cutting and scraping operations. Their stone knives sometimes had wrapped buckskin handles.

Bone awls, usually with wrapped handles, were commonly used for sewing buckskin and other hides. Atsugewi are said by some to have had both eyed and open notched needles of bone for sewing skins and tule mats.

The wooden shuttle for net weaving was a stick notched at both ends and was used by all of the local tribes. A squarish wooden net mesh spacer permitted nets to be properly made.

Mountain Maidu used deer antler wedges for splitting wood while Atsugewi used wooden wedges—especially of mountain-mahogany. Wedges were usually driven with simple wooden clubs, though rocks might be employed for the purpose.

Drills for boring holes in shell work and for making pipes and the like were used by Atsugewi only. Such drills were wooden shafts with stone points. These were rotated by rolling the shaft between the palms of the hands. Where the drill was not in use, holes were made in pieces of wood with live coals. Sometimes unfinished clamshell money was received in trade perhaps at a discount. Such pieces were strung tightly onto a cord and the whole string was then rolled between two flat stones thus grinding the shell edges to make the well formed disks characteristic of clam shell money.

Fire making drills were of greater importance. All local tribes employed them. Those of this area were one-piece hand rotated affairs which did not utilize the labor saving drill bow of the midwest. A long buckeye wood stick about half an inch thick was twirled on a notched block of incense-cedar or juniper wood. A bed of dry shredded grass and incense-cedar or other flammable tinder was used to nourish the spark into flame. Both sexes made fire among the Yana and Yahi, but unless the men were away, Atsugewi and mountain Maidu women did not make fire. Buckeye was uncommon or lacking in the areas of the latter tribes, so this material had to be traded from the Yana and Yahi. Buckeye fire making sticks commanded quite a price, a piece two feet long often selling for ten completed arrows. Since fire making required much effort and skill, fire was rarely allowed to go out. A “slow match” consisting of a piece of punky wood in which the fire smouldered was usually carried along.

It was as true in prehistoric America as it is today that weapons were essential to existence. Weapons were necessary not only for warfare—whether aggressive or defensive—but for the securing of game for food since domestication of animals was not practiced.

The bow and arrow was the only important weapon of California Indians. Local bows were rather short and quite broad in cross-section. We quote Garth’s “Atsugewi Ethnography” on the subject as follows:

“... The best bows were made by the Atsuge, who had a supply of yew
wood ... along the western borders of their territory. The Paiute were
anxious to trade for Atsuge bows and considered them much superior to
their own. In making the bow a piece of yew wood was selected, split,
and shaved down with flints and pumice stone to the required form and
thickness. After it had been wrapped in green grass and roasted in hot
ashes, the bow was bent to required shape (recurved tips with a slight
incurve at the middle), which it retained when it cooled off. Sinew,
taken from the back of a deer, was softened by chewing and was then
glued on the back of the bow in short strips, which were rubbed out as
flat as possible with a smooth piece of bone. Salmon skins were boiled
to make the glue.

“The designs painted in green and red on the backs of bows are among
the few examples of masculine art. The painting was done with a
feather tip. The sinew for the bowstring ... was chewed to make it
soft and then it was made into a two-ply cord by rolling it with the
open hand on the thigh. After salmon glue was rubbed in to make the
fibers stick together, the string was stretched by tying a rock to one
end and allowing it to hang down from some support. A tassel ... of
mole skin might be attached to the end of the bow for decoration....

“Montgomery Creek” Indian, part white—good archer

An Atsugewi type bow characteristically short, broad, sinew backed
and held at 45 degree angle in shooting. Note the painted
decoration]

“... Flint tipped arrows ... were made of cane or rose and had
foreshafts of Serviceberry, or they might be entirely of Service wood.
Cane arrows ... with a sharp-pointed foreshaft of Serviceberry were
commonly used for small animals and birds. Such arrows might be
unfeathered ... (an informant) recalled a bird arrow ... with a barbed
wooden point. Deer-bone pointed arrows were sometimes used for killing
deer and other game. Voegelin reports that these arrows were also
sometimes barbed. Flint-tipped arrows were about thirty inches long
... arrows for small game were somewhat shorter than flint-tipped
arrows ... the wood was ordinarily dried before it was used. The end
of the Serviceberry foreshaft was cut into a dowel which was inserted
in the soft pithy center of the main shaft, the juncture being wrapped
with sinew. A notch one-fourth of an inch deep was cut in the butt. A
laterally notched obsidian arrow point was inserted in the split end
of the foreshaft and bound on with cross lashings of sinew. The
binding was ordinarily waterproofed with pitch.

“Two small grooved pumice stones were used to smooth arrow shafts. The
foreshaft was painted red as an indication that poison had been
applied to the point. Other bands or stripes of color toward the nock
end of the arrow served as ownership marks ... the stripes might run
spirally as on a stick of candy ... all kinds of colors being used for
painting arrows. Feathers were split along the midrib and were glued
to the shaft, about a finger’s width below the butt, with pitch. Sinew
wrapping bound down each end of the feathers, three of which—about
four inches long—were used to an arrow. The edge of the feather was
burned smooth with a hot coal. Feathers of hawks or similar birds were
used on ordinary arrows, but for the finest arrows—those to be used
for bear and deer—eagle feathers were employed. An arrow wrench of
bone or wood was used for straightening arrows; or they might simply
be straightened by using the teeth as a vise. A flat antelope horn
might be perforated and used as an arrow wrench.... (John La Mar) had
a small triangular stone with a hole in the center ... which, he said
was heated in the fire and used for straightening cane arrows.

“Although the flint points themselves were considered poisonous, an
arrow poison was often used for larger game as well as in war. The
usual method of making poison was to take the liver or pancreas of a
deer and allow it to rot; the material was then smeared on the arrow
point....”

Rattlesnake poison was also employed; however none of the poisoned arrow concoctions were very effective except to start infection of wounds inflicted by arrow points so treated.

a. Goose Valley, design in red (Apwaruge)
b. Goose Valley, design in red (Apwaruge)
c. Drawn by Dave Brown (Atsuge) with outer lines red, inner lines
green

Arrow points found in the park area, in the territory of both Atsugewi and mountain Maidu are most frequently of obsidian, but sometimes are of a dense dull black basalt lava. The term flint is a very loose one, being applied to obsidian, chert, opal, chalcedony, and even to the dense basalt, noted above, in common usage.

Mountain Maidu imported yew wood as this did not commonly grow in their own territory. This tribe, however, also manufactured its own bows. In practically all respects bow and arrow design and execution were identical to that of the Atsugewi. Those of Yana and Yahi were similar too. All tribes of the Lassen area fashioned arrow points with barbs. In addition mountain Maidu flaked points without barbs but with basal stems for attachment were made.

MOUNTAIN MAIDU STONE POINTS

ATSUGEWI KNIFE (?) AND ARROW POINT

SOUTHERN YANA POINTS

The bow was most frequently held in shooting at an angle of about 45 degrees with the arrow on top. Mountain Maidu used that style, too, or else held the bow horizontally with the arrow on top except in case of war when the arrow was held on the underside of the bow. Gifford and Klimak reveal that northern and central Yana held the bow horizontally. Sapir and Spier found that the Yana tribes proper (not Yahi), however held bows vertically in shooting. All tribes considered except Yahi used the primary release of the arrow in shooting. In this method the arrow was held between the index and third fingers, which caught and pulled back the string. The thumb held the other side of the arrow. The Yahi, on the other hand used the Mongolian release; grasping the arrow with the thumb and unbent first joints of the first and second fingers.

“... the arrow was let fly between the index and third finger of the
left hand, which held the bow. Many arrow points were uniface and
curved slightly to one side.... A hunter, when shooting at a distant
object, turned the arrow so that the point curved up; when shooting an
object close by, he turned the arrow so that the point curved down. A
hunter carried at least one arrow in his left hand with his bow. Extra
arrows were carried in a quiver ... (made of) coyote, raccoon, or
other skins. Ordinarily the hunter carried his quiver on his back, but
if he wanted to be able to reach the arrows easily, he hung it on his
... shoulder so that it fell under his left armpit. Arrows were taken
from the quiver with the right hand.”

Inside the quiver, at the bottom, a cushion of dry grass was placed to prevent the stone points from chipping each other.

YAHI STONE POINTS

War clubs were not used. Atsugewi claim to have had a stone axe, sharpened by chipping and lashed with sinew to a split oak or mountain-mahogany handle a foot or so long. It was used for chopping roots and small trees on occasion, but the stone axe was certainly not widely used by California Indians, and even among Atsugewi it may have been unknown until the coming of white man, or knowledge of it may have been gained from Plains Indians after the advent of the horse. The tomahawk, so important to Indians of eastern and midwestern North America, was unknown to California Indians. Trees were normally felled and cut by controlled burning.

Four-foot spears, tipped with large flaked stone points for fighting at close quarters, were used by all local tribes on occasion, but were not numerous. Only the Yana are believed to have thrown the weapon; the more common usage seems to have been by energetically thrusting it.

Knives or daggers as fighting implements were made of chipped obsidian but were quite rare. A short, crude, one edged, stone knife was used widely as a general utility implement, but not in combat nor in killing game. Yana Indians also employed a mussel shell knife for light delicate work around camp. Atsugewi and mountain Maidu sometimes affixed wooden handles to their obsidian knives. These two tribes also fashioned knives of sharpened bone and horn.

Of equipment for warfare, Garth states:

“Defensive armor included rod armor ..., gowns ... of dried elk or
bear skins, and skin helmets which came down over the forehead and
ears, ‘so a man could just see out of it’. The skin armor extended to
the ankles or lower; it was worn over one shoulder so that it
protected only the side of the body turned toward the enemy. Rod
armor, made of serviceberry withes twined together with buckskin
string, was high enough to come up to the neck under the chin and
extended two or three inches below the belt. The Plains Indian shield,
although found among the Surprise Valley Paiute and other Paiute
tribes to the east, was lacking among the Atsugewi,” and all other
tribes of the Lassen area.