USA > Massachusetts > Commonwealth history of Massachusetts, colony, province and state, volume 1 > Part 14
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A third type consisted of a collection of small houses or a single communal house, occupied by a few families at certain times, as when camping at fishing stations or during the plant- ing and harvesting seasons. The coverings of these habita- tions were often removable and could be transported from place to place, the framework being left standing for use another season. Single isolated houses occupied by one or two families, and temporary shelters for hunters, were not un- common.
FORTS (1620-1675)
The larger forts consisted of a score or more cabins en- closed by a high palisade, and the smaller ones sometimes con- tained but a single habitation. These stockades were usually circular or square, and enclosed an area of four acres or more in extent, down to about fifty feet in diameter. There were usually one or two entrances formed by overlapping ends
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FORTS
of the stockade in such a manner as to leave room for pas- sage between them. These entrances were stopped with brush as occasion required.
Roger Williams says that "with friendly joyning" the In- dians built their forts, all the men of a community taking part in the work. The manner of procedure was as follows. After choosing a suitable piece of ground, a trench was dug about three feet deep to receive the ends of the palisades, which were timbers or half-timbers as thick as a man's thigh or the calf of his leg. These were set close together and the earth rammed solidly around them; then a trench about three feet deep was dug parallel with the stockade on its inner side, at a distance of four or five feet from it, and the earth thrown against its base "for a better protection against the enemy's dischargements." Sometimes a trench was dug on both sides of the palisades, which were usually twelve to fifteen feet high above the ground.
Up to the time of Philip's war, stockaded Indian forts existed in various parts of Massachusetts. Two aban- doned forts were seen by the Pilgrims at Cape Cod: the first was near Pamet River, and the second was south of Wellfleet Bay. The latter had evidently been abandoned dur- ing the epidemic. The dead had been buried both within and without the enclosure. Within were frames of houses, the coverings of which had been removed and carried away. The Pilgrims mistook this for a palisaded cemetery. The en- closure was a large one, made of young "spires" set close together in the ground.
The following autumn they discovered two small forts near the present site of Boston. The first was formed of poles set in the ground as close to one another as possible and en- closing a ring forty or fifty feet in diameter. A trench, breast high, was dug on either side. In the midst of this palisade was the frame of a house where the sachem, Nane- pashemet, was buried. About a mile from this fort another was found of similar construction, on the summit of a hill where Nanepashemet had formerly lived and was killed. Gookin says that at Natick there was a handsome fort of a round figure palisaded with trees.
The remains of trenches and embankments marking the
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THE WILDERNESS AND THE INDIAN
sites of these old palisaded enclosures are found in various sections of this commonwealth. One of the best preserved and most extensive of these is at Millis.
HABITATIONS (1620-1675)
The habitations of the Indians of Massachusetts were of two types; the round house, and the long house. (See illustra- tions at p. 154). The shape of the former was hemispherical, the ground plan having a diameter of about ten to sixteen feet. These small lodges were usually occupied by one or two families. The framework consisted of poles set into the ground, two to three feet apart. Several arches were made by binding and lashing opposite poles together; the two tallest arches were in the center, those upon either side being suc- cessively reduced in size. The remaining poles were securely lashed to these arches. To this hemispherical framework were added horizontal poles at intervals, and the whole was securely bound together.
The long house was nearly rectangular in ground plan, fif- teen to twenty or more feet wide, and varied in length ac- cording to the number of families which it sheltered. The smaller, with two fires, usually sheltered four families; while those with three, four or more fires were occupied by six, eight or more families. The framework was made by setting poles in two parallel rows enclosing the sides of the floor space. Opposite poles were bent over and joined in pairs, forming a series of arches of equal height which were fastened together by horizontal poles placed at intervals. The poles for the ends of the hut were set in the ground and joined to the end arches giving the form to the finished hut shown in the illustrations.
The long houses were the typical winter habitations, and with their several fires could be kept more comfortable than the smaller round houses which were more commonly used in summer. According to Wood their houses are smaller in summer when their families are dispersed by reason of heat and occasion. "In winter they make some fiftie or three score feet long, fortee or fiftee men being inmates under one roof."
The earliest account of Indian habitations in the East is
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HABITATIONS
that of Verarzanus, the Florentine who in 1524 spent fifteen days in one of the harbors-which one is the subject of much discussion. His haven, he says, was in latitude 41 degrees 2 terces, that of the northern portion of Buzzards Bay. Mar- thas Vineyard is thought to be the "Island in form of a triangle, distant from the main land three leagues, about the bigness of the Island of Rhodes," though Marthas Vineyard is less than one-fifth the area of the Island of Rhodes. The gulf in which he found a haven was "about 20 leagues in compass." This may have been Buzzards Bay or Narragansett Bay, a portion of which lies in Massachusetts. On the other hand he may have mistaken the peninsula of Cape Cod for an is- land as did Gosnold at first. This peninsula is much nearer the area of Rhodes. A sail of 15 leagues from the cape would have brought him to Boston Harbor. All things considered, the evidence seems to be in favor of one of the two bays previously mentioned; but it is not improbable that this haven may have been Boston. He writes: "We sawe their houses made in circular or rounde fourme 10 or 12 foote in com- passe. . They moove the foresaide houses from one place to another, according to the commoditie of the place and season, wherein they will make their abode, and only taking of the cover."
The council house was of the same form as the long com- munal house, but was sometimes larger, even attaining the length of one hundred feet or more, and a breadth of thirty feet.
We are told by Gookin that "The best sort of their houses are covered very neatly, tight and warm, with barks of trees, slipped from their bodies at such seasons when the sap is up; and made into great flakes with pressures of weighty timbers, when they are green; and so becoming dry they will retain a form suitable for the use they prepare them for.
Birch, chestnut, and oak bark are recorded as being used for the purpose, and it is probable that the bark of other large trees was also used. The bark was fastened to the frame- work so that the pieces overlapped each other like shingles. Poles were fastened over the bark to assist in keeping it in place.
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Portable mats made of the leaves of the cattail-flag were ex- tensively used for lodge coverings. The leaves were firmly sewed together with a needle made from the rib bone of a deer. The leaves were strung together on cords of bast or Indian hemp in such a manner that each alternate leaf lay upon oppo- site sides of the mat. The edges of the mats were very neatly finished. When rolled up they occupied but a small space, and were light, portable and fairly durable.
Temporary lodges were sometimes covered with a thatch of grass or corn husk, or with the boughs of trees. The walls of the more permanent habitations were lined with bullrush mats very neatly woven. These mats were also used for bed- ding and to sit upon. They were woven of undyed rushes in combination with others which were dyed in various colors, the effect of the finished product being much like the coarser varieties of Chinese straw matting. Among the Ojibwa and other tribes of the Great Lakes region, these mats are still in use and good examples may be seen in ethnological mu- seums.
Sometimes, though rarely, a house was built upon a plat- form raised above the ground, probably as a protection from fleas and other vermin. Such was the dwelling of Nane- pashemet seen by the Pilgrims near the present site of Boston. "His house was not like others, but a scaffold was largely built, with poles and planks, some six foote from the ground, and the house upon that, being situated on the top of a hill."
The smaller houses usually were supplied with two opposite entrances. These were about three feet in height, and "ac- cording as the wind sets they close up one door with bark and hang a deer skin or the like before the other." The larger houses had several entrances according to their size and the number of occupants.
INTERIORS (1620-1675)
Over each fire was an opening in the roof about eighteen inches square for the passage of smoke. In windy weather, if the smoke became troublesome, this aperture was screened with a small mat placed upon the top of the lodge and arranged with a cord so as to be turned to the windward side. Disc-
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INTERIORS
shaped hearths about three feet across were often built of small field stones, and it is a very common occurrence to find these hearth stones, burnt a deep red, scattered over plowed fields.
Sometimes a scaffold two feet high was built over the fire- place by driving four crotched sticks into the ground; cross- bars were laid over the crotches, and over these and at right angles to them were placed sticks upon which fish and other food was dried and smoked. The fire was usually made of dry wood (windfalls), but sometimes a tree was felled and the log drawn into the lodge. The fire was maintained on either side of the log near one end, and it was gradually pushed onto the hearth till all was consumed. Small torches made of pitch pine "cloven into little slices" were used as occasion required for lighting the interior of the lodge.
In the better class of habitations, bedsteads were made by setting forked sticks into the earth which supported stout poles, a foot or eighteen inches from the ground. Over these at right angles were laid other poles, or planks. The bedding consisted of a reed mat "two or three fingers thick," or of mats and skins.
This is what the pilgrims at Cape Cod saw in 1620. "The houses were made with long yong Sapling trees bended and both ends stuck into the ground; they were made round, like unto an Arbour, and covered downe to the ground with thicke and well wrought matts, and the doore was not over a yard high, made of a matt to open; the chimney was a wide open hole in the top, for which they had a matt to cover it close when they pleased; one might stand and goe upright in them, in the midst of them were foure little trunches knockt into the ground, and small stickes laid over, on which they hung their Pots and what they had to seeth; round about the fire they lay on matts, which are their beds. The houses were double matted, for as they were matted without, so were they within, with newer & fairer matts. In the houses were found wooden Boules, Trayes and Dishes, Earthen Pots, Hand bas- kets made of crab shells wrought together; also an English Paile or Bucket, it wanted a bayle, but it had two Iron ears; there were also Baskets of sundry sorts, bigger and some lesser, finer and some coarser : some were curiously wrought
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THE WILDERNESS AND THE INDIAN
with blacke and white in pretie works, and sundry other of their household stuffe: Harts horns, and Eagles clawes-and sundry such like things there was; also two or three baskets full of parched Acornes, peeces of fish and a peece of broyled Hering."
INDIAN PHYSICAL APPEARANCE (1524)
The earliest description of the Indians of this state is by Verarzanus. He writes :
"There were amongst these people 2 kings, of so goodly stature and shape as is possible to declare, the eldest is about 40 yeares of ag, the second was a yong man of 20 yeares old. Their apparell was on this manner: the elder had upon his naked body a harts skin, wrought artificialie with divers braunches like Damaske, his head was bare, with the hair tied up behinde with divers knottes: About his neck he had a large chaine garnished with divers stones of sundrie cou- lours, the yong man was almost apparelid after the same manner. This is the goodliest people, and of the fairest con- ditions, that wee have found in this our voyage. The women are of the like conformitie and beawtie, verie hand- some and well favored, they are as well mannered and con- tinente as anye women of good education. There are also of them whiche weare on their armes verie riche skinnes of leopards [bay lynx], they adorne their heades with divers or- naments made of their owne haire, whiche hange downe be- fore on both sides their breasts, others use other kind of dressing them selves."
The hair of the Indians of this section was dressed in va- rious ways, the styles being determined in a measure by the age and station of the individual. At the age of puberty the boys were permitted to wear it long; previous to that period it was cut in various ways. Some of them wore a long fore- top, a long lock on the crown, and one on each side of the head, the rest of the hair being cut even with the scalp. These various styles were probably the distinguishing marks of the different clans. The young men and soldiers frequently wore it long on one side, that of the opposite side being cut short. The long hair upon the left side was bound into a knot. The hair of King Philip's Mount Hope warriors was trimmed
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INDIAN PHYSICAL APPEARANCE
"comb fashion"; that is like a cockscomb, one or both sides of the head being shaved, leaving a ridge of comparatively short upright hair extending across the head from front to back.
Another method which seems to have been quite general was to gather and tie the hair into a long round knot at the back of the head, like a "horse's tail bound with a fillet." In this knot or twist feathers of the eagle or turkey were fas- tened. The front hair was cut short or was shaved far up on the head, the long hair remaining being combed and twisted in various ways and intertwined with feathers as already noted. The beard was rarely allowed to grow, but was re- moved as it appeared.
There is little information as to the methods of dressing women's hair. Champlain saw a girl with her hair very neatly dressed with a skin colored red and bordered on the upper part with little shell beads. A portion of it hung down behind, the rest being braided in various ways. Williams says that the virgins are distinguished "by a bashful falling downe of their haire over their eyes."
Tattooing seems to have been generally practiced. Wood writes that many of the better class bore "upon their cheeks certain pourtratures of beasts, as bears, deares, mooses, wolves, etc., some of fowls, as of eagles, hawkes, etc., which be not a superficial painting but a certain incision or else a raising of their skin by a small sharp instrument under which they con- veigh a certain kind of black unchangeable ink which makes the desired form apparent and permanent." Johnson notes a blue cross tattooed "dyed very deep" over the cheek-bones of the women.
Wood says : "Others have certaine round Impressions downe the outside of their armes and brests, in forme of mullets or spur rowels, which they imprint by searing irons." These star-shaped designs seem to have been favorite ones. They occur on historic lead buttons cast by the Indians in slate molds, and are also found on old splint basketry where they are stamped in color.
Face painting was common with both sexes, and among the men more especially when on war raids. Soot was com- monly used for black, and red earth or the powdered bark of the pine tree for red. These were the more common colors.
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THE WILDERNESS AND THE INDIAN
White, yellow, and blue were also used. The women painted their faces with various colors, and in time of mourning with black. They "painted their faces in the hollow of their eyes and nose with a shining black out of which the tip of their nose appears very deformed, and their cheek bones being of a lighter swart black on which they have a blue cross dyed very deep." When Massasoit first visited the English at Plymouth "His face was paynted with a sad red like murry, and oyled both head and face that hee looked greasily : All his followers likewise were in their faces, in part or in whole painted, some blacke, some red, some yellow and some white, some with crosses and other Antick works."
INDIAN APPAREL (1630-1675)
Nearly all of the early accounts agree that in warm weather both men and women commonly wore only the breech-clout. It was made of the skin of various animals, dressed with or without the hair. Champlain saw the skin of the doe and seal used for this purpose. Archer speaks of seal skin, and Brereton of black tanned skin. Later a strip of European cloth a yard and a half long was used in place of the skin of an animal. A girdle served to support the breech-clout, which passed between the legs of the wearer, its ends being joined to the belt or carried up before and behind between the body and the girdle, over which they hung like an apron, "A flap before and a tail behind." The apron mentioned by Williams, Brereton, and other writers was the broad end of the breech-clout hanging before.
Usually neither sex wore any other garment indoors, and it was not uncommon in early colonial days for both sexes to appear out of doors in this informal dress. In Wood's time, however, the women usually wore an additional short garment of skins or of European cloth wrapped like a blanket about their loins, reaching down to their knees, which they never put off in the company of Europeans.
In addition to the breech-clout, the men sometimes wore close-fitting leggings of tanned deer skin. These were worn for warmth in cold weather, on dress occasions, and by hunt- ers as a protection from brush and briers. Their lower ends
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INDIAN APPAREL
were fastened within the moccasins and their upper extremi- ties were secured by straps to the girdle, which was sometimes ornamented with pendants or "set with forms of birds or beasts." The leggings were ornamented with designs in yel- low, blue and red. The women also sometimes wore leggings. Moccasins were made usually of moose skin, which was thick and durable. When moose skin could not be obtained, deer skin was substituted.
Mantles or robes for use in cold weather were made of the skins of the moose, deer, bear, wolf, beaver, otter, raccoon, fox, and squirrel, and were worn by both sexes. A raccoon skin robe was highly prized. It was "of more esteeme than a coat of beaver, because of the tayles that (hanging round in order) doe adorne the garment, and is therefore so much esteemed by them."
A single skin of the moose, deer, or bear served for a man's robe. Moose skins were commonly dressed without the hair and were made "wondrous white." When used as a mantle the white dressed moose skin was ornamented near its edges with a border in color laid on with size "in form like lace set on by a tailor, and some they strip in size with works of several fashions very curious according to the several fanta- sies of the workmen wherein they strive to excel one another."
Deer-skin mantles were dressed with or without the hair, and a perfect tail enhanced their value. Those especially pre- pared for summer wear were dressed usually without the hair. These garments were fastened at the shoulders or at the waist with a belt. This belt was sometimes hollow and served as a receptacle for parched corn, the usual food for a journey.
The common method of wearing a mantle left one arm ex- posed. In cold weather this arm was usually covered with a "deepe furr'd cat [lynx] skin like a long large muffe which hee shifts to that arm which lieth most exposed to the winde." One of the Indians, who, with Samoset, visited the Pilgrims, wore a "wild cat's skin or such like on one arm" not carried hanging over the arm as some have supposed. The women's robes were longer and fuller than those of the men. Instead of one deer or bear skin two were sewed at full length. These garments were so long as to drag on the ground "like a great ladies train" and were probably for winter wear.
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Beautiful cloaks were manufactured of the iridescent fea- thers of the wild turkey, "woven with twine of their own making," so that nothing could be seen but feathers. These cloaks were usually the work of the old men, but sometimes were made by the women for their children. South of Cape Ann, Champlain saw robes woven of "grasses and hemp scarcely covering the body and coming down only to the thighs." These seem to have been for summer wear, per- haps as a protection from mosquitoes.
IMPLEMENTS AND ORNAMENTS (1620-1675)
The men wore at the girdle a pouch of dressed skin con- taining fire-making implements. A pipe and tobacco were also carried in the pouch, which was sometimes suspended from the neck.
Eagle or turkey feathers were worn in the hair. A head- dress of upright feathers was also worn, which was probably similar to those common among many modern tribes. It was like a coronet, broadwise like a fan or like a turkey-cock's train.
A curious head ornament of colored deer hair was worn, similar to those common among certain western tribes during the century just past. The western examples are fastened to the scalp-lock and cross the head from front to back, the dyed hair of which they are made being longer in front and stand- ing upright. Gookin describes those of New England as "deer shuts made in the fashion of a cock's comb dyed red and crossing their heads like a half-moon." The skin of a black hawk was highly prized as a headdress. White feathered bird skins, a fox's tail, or a rattlesnake skin were also used. Head- bands decorated with wampum and other beads were not uncommon.
Bracelets, necklaces, and head-bands were common, espe- cially among the women. Mrs. Rowlandson saw a necklace of human fingers. Ear pendants of copper were worn at an early period. Pendants in the form of birds, beasts, and fishes, carved from bone, shell, and stone were worn in the ears; also the brilliant skin of the humming bird. Verarzanus saw many plates of wrought copper.
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BEADS AND WAMPUM
At Buzzards Bay in 1602, Brereton saw a "Great store of copper, some very red, some of a paler color [brass]. None of them but have chains, earrings, or collars of this metal. Their chains are many hollow pieces cemented to- gether, each piece of the bigness of one of our reeds, a finger in length, ten or twelve of them together on a string which they wear about their necks. Their collars they wear about their bodies like bandoliers, a handful broad, all hollow pieces like the other but somewhat shorter, four hundred pieces in a collar, very fine and evenly set together."
From archaelogical data we learn that native copper orna- ments were probably unknown to the Indians of Massachu- setts. European copper and brass were acquired at a very early date and skilfully worked into tubular beads and other ornaments. Beads, plates, and triangular arrow points of copper and brass, similar to those seen by Brereton and other writers, have been taken from graves and village sites and may be seen in both public and private collections.
BEADS AND WAMPUM (1620-1675)
Both discoidal and tubular beads of shell were used in New England at an early date, but they were probably rare and highly prized in prehistoric days. Champlain saw shell beads used in embroidery and also as ornaments for the hair. Brace- lets of small shell beads were found by the Pilgrims on the skeleton of a child at Cape Cod. Massasoit wore "a great chain of white bone beads about his neck."
There seems to be little evidence that the smaller tubular shell beads of the variety generally known as wampum were made to any extent by our Indians previous to the beginning of the seventeeth century. Prior to 1627 it was rare, its use being confined to "ye sachems and some spetiall persons that wore a little of it for ornament." This harmonizes with what we have already learned of shell beads from the early explorers.
During the visit of the Dutch to Plymouth in 1627, they sold to the English "50li. worth" of wampum to barter with the Indians for fur and other commodities. It was two years before this small quantity was disposed of. The demand,
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