THE SERPENT'S COPPER SCALES
William A. Fox
Versions of this paper were
presented at the 36th Annual Midwest Conference, La Crosse, Wisconsin, October
1991;
and at the 25th Annual Meetings of the Canadian Archaeological Association,
London, Ontario, May 1992.
A version of this paper also appeared in Wanikan, Newsletter of the Thunder
Bay Chapter, OAS 9 1(3) and in
Kewa. the newsletter of the London Chapter of the Ontario Archaeological
Society 92-3.
Original page numbers from the Kewa paper, from which this version is derived,
have been added in (grey).
Along with Dr. Ron Hancock of the SLOWPOKE Reactor Facility at the University of Toronto, the writer has embarked on an extensive program of metallic artifact trace element analysis, focusing on sixteenth century material from southern Ontario. This study was not aimed at identifying the timing of the initial arrival of European metals into the region, although this has been a spin-off result (see Hancock et al 1991). Rather, the objective has been to document the pattern of native copper (ie. copper derived from North American sources) use during the Protohistoric and Early Historic periods. The writer's continuing research into the Odawa trading sphere, as evidenced by ceramic vessel and lithic distribution patterns has led naturally in this direction (Fox l990a, l990b). The following are some observations arising from research to date.
Quimby (1939, 1963 and 1966) documented the presence of beads, hair pipes, so-called awls, and particularly, tanged native copper knives from Late Woodland sites in the upper Great Lakes. Wright (1966) reported a similar range of native copper tools from the Late Woodland Pic River site on the north shore of Lake Superior, while the same assemblage characterized the later occupations at the Juntunen site on Bois Blanc Island, Michigan (McPherron 1967).
In addition, it is not surprising to see identical forms on fourteenth and fifteenth century sites in southern Ontario such as the Middleport and MacLeod Ontario Iroquoian villages (Reed 1990; Figure 1). Excavations on the early sixteenth century prehistoric Huron Draper village produced eight native copper artifacts; including a tanged knife, a ring, three tubular beads and two small nodules of copper (Finlayson and Pihl 1980). The slightly later Seed-Barker village produced a small fragment of European copper (Hancock et al. 1991), while the mid-sixteenth century Beeton, McPherson and Hanes villages all have European metal artifacts, in addition to native copper (Figure 1). The latter specimens include only beads and hammered sheet fragments.
Thirty copper and brass artifacts were recovered from the ca. 1600 A.D. MacMurchy site near the south shore of Georgian Bay (Garrad 1978). This roughly 10 acre village is the earliest in the area and is assumed to be Khionontateronon or Petun. The usual range of tubes or beads, tinkling cones and rings and bracelets are present; however, seven out of nineteen copper artifacts were found to be of native copper. This is surprising, because all the artifacts but one were fabricated from sheet copper, which was assumed to be of European kettle origin (a logical assumption when one realizes that the Basques alone traded over 500 "kettles of red copper" in three expeditions to the St. Lawrence between 1584 and 1587 {Turgeon 1990:85). Interestingly,
(page 3)
Figure 1:Archaeological Site
Distribution. (1) Middleport; (2) MacLeod; (3) Draper; (4) Seed-Barker;
(5) Beeton; (6) McPherson; (7) Hanes; (8) MacMurchy/Buckingham Ossuary;
(9) Midland Ossuary; (10) Victoria County Knife; (11) Hunter's Point.
(page 4)
the sheet native copper from MacMurchy averages 0.30 mm in thickness, less than half that of European kettle copper, which averaged 0.68 mm in thickness. Evidently, care was being taken to obtain the maximum fabricated product from the native material.
Turning to some ethnohistoric observations, we can find further insights into native copper procurement in the Northeast. As early as the 1530's Europeans became aware of the existence of native copper in the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence drainage. During Jacques Cartier's second voyage a Native male informed him on August 17 of 1535 that their copper (caignetdazé) came from the Saguenay (Biggar 1924:106), which roughly translated meant "out west" (Trigger 1987:197). In the succeeding seventeenth century, Champlain met with an Algonquin chief in June of 1610 who presented him with "...a piece of copper a foot long...very fine and pure" (Biggar 1925:123). The chief stated that this "...metal was abundant where he had obtained it, which was on the bank of a river near a large lake..." (Ontonagon River?), and that "....it was taken out in pieces, and when melted was made into sheets and smoothed out with stones" (Biggar 1925:123).
Sagard later observed, "One of our Frenchmen (Grenole?) had been trading among a nation towards the north, about a hundred leagues from us (Huronia), getting copper from a mine" (Wrong 1939:135). By the late seventeenth century, Jesuits entering the Lake Superior basin, such as Father Allouez in 1665, were being instructed to obtain information on the copper deposits. Allouez finally convinced the local bands to identify source locations, and in passing noted that the Odawa of Lake Superior made sacrifices to Mishipizheu in order to still the water and bring sturgeon, and that they took copper nuggets from the Superior shores for their medicine bags (Rajnovich nd:60).
In the 1669-70 Relation of Father Claude Dablon we learn more of the symbolic significance of native copper to the local peoples. In a report entitled "Of the Copper Mines Which Are Found in Lake Superior", Dablon relates a story about four men who landed on Michipicoten Island and collected many copper nuggets. A great voice spoke to them asking "Who are those robbers carrying off from me my children's cradles and playthings?" (Thwaites 1899:155). Dablon continues "Some say it was Thunder because there are many storms there; and others that it was a certain spirit whom they call Missibizi, who passes among these peoples for the God of the waters, as Neptune did among the Pagans." He then relates how all four men died shortly thereafter.
Subsequent eighteenth and nineteenth century observations among local Algonkian speaking groups re-affirm the veneration accorded native copper and its symbolic association with Mishipizheu. As Vecsey (1990:74) notes, the great underwater lion/homed serpent composite manitou not only controlled terrestrial game and the fishes, but it could create stormy waters and often sunk canoes. "It gave copper to the Indians, who cut the metal from the being's horns as it raised them above the surface of the water... Those who attempted to take the copper without offering proper payment met severe punishment from the Underwater Manitou" (Vecsey 1990:75). (page 5)
Figure 2: Native Copper Mishipizheu From the Buckingham Ossuary.
Archaeological evidence of this symbolic connection is widespread during the Protohistoric and Early Historic periods in the form of copper serpents from Oneota sites to the west, such as the New Galena Mound Group and Lane circular enclosure (Wedel 1959) on the Iowa River and several in Wisconsin (McKern 1945), from the Dumaw Creek village (Quimby 1966) and Summer Island site (Brose 1970) in the Lake Michigan basin; and from Ontario sites in Sault Ste. Marie (W. Ross personal communication) and the Brantford vicinity (Kenyon 1972) to the east; and from the Madisonville village in the Ohio drainage to the south (Griffin 1966, Hooton 1920).
Perhaps the most spectacular representation found so far is a native copper specimen recovered during a 1977 salvage excavation of the late sixteenth century Buckingham ossuary near the MacMurchy village on the south shore of Georgian Bay (Figure 1). This burial pit was unusual in a number of ways, including its excavation into heavy clay and its range of exotic shell and copper artifacts. Bracelets of European copper and brass were recovered, along with a small European copper ladle, once suspended by a leather thong, and a sheet native copper cutout of a bird. The most dramatic find was a native copper effigy of Mishipizheu (Figure 2), complete with blunt face and crenated serpentine body.
The back of this effigy is reminiscent of some large copper pieces reported from Huronia around the turn of the century by David Boyle (1891 and 1906). He noted the accidental discovery of an ossuary at the Midland City driving park in his annual report for 1890-91 (Figure 1). The only artifacts described are a large native copper knife with a crenated dorsal edge (Figure 3) and a native copper adze. Pelt sections were preserved adjacent to both specimens. A similar, slightly smaller knife is described from Victoria County in Boyle's annual report for 1905. This one was found "under a large pine stump" (Boyle 1906:25). (page 6)
Figure 3: Native Copper Knife From the Midland City
Driving Park Ossuary.
Quarter-sized. From Boyle 1891: 60, Figure 145.
Are these knives Protohistoric in age? Do they symbolize Mishipizheu? The answer to both questions, I believe, is affirmative. While the Victoria County specimen lacks specific provenience, it does derive from an area of sixteenth century Huron settlement. The Midland knife was recovered from what was described as an ossuary in the heart of Huron territory. The closest village, the Jones site, is also sixteenth century in age (J. Hunter personal communication). Certainly in form they do not equate with any of Wittry's (1957) Old Copper Complex types, but do look rather like overgrown and elaborate versions of Quimby's (1963:196) tanged "butter knife" class, typical of Late Woodland sites.
While pondering these knives I was reminded of a sixteenth century observation by Cartier. After he had kidnapped the St. Lawrence Iroquois chief Donnacona, he was proceeding downriver in May of 1536, when at the Ile aux Coudres they were approached by a canoe bearing Indians from the River Saguenay. Cartier allowed them to board the vessel and observed "And to Donnacona they gave three bundles of beaver and seal-skins, with a large copper knife from the Saguenay and other gifts, and presented the Captain with a string of wampum" (Biggar 1924:233). One wonders what would constitute a "large" knife for Cartier. It is unlikely to have been a typical Late Woodland specimen measuring 3.5 to 4.0 centimetres in length (McPherron 1967:171), and more likely may have been in the size range of the Huronia knives. If the specimens from Huronia did symbolize Mishipizheu, what better parting gift for Donnacona's trans-Atlantic trip than a knife representing the Underwater Manitou who controlled the waves?
A later malevolent manifestation of this symbolic system can also be considered here. While serving as regional archaeologist for northwestern Ontario, the author chanced to see an unusual magic kit from a Lake of the Woods Indian reserve. This composite killing machine had been collected from an abandoned house on the reserve by the curator of the Lake of the Woods Museum, at the invitation of local residents. Only later did she learn its function. Briefly, the (page 7) wooden stock, with wooden human effigy and reflective copper insert, was pointed at an intended victim and a death ray was shot into him or her by the shaman. Grim (1987:89) illustrates a similar "...wooden figure...used as evil ‘medicine' to summon harmful manitou power against another person...", from Lake Winnipeg.
Paddy Reid, the Ministry of Culture and Communications regional archaeologist in Kenora, relocated the kit, including the triangular copper insert, as well as a copper point wrapped in red cotton cloth. While reviewing artifact slides from the Ballynacree site on Lake of the Woods, he was surprised to see a pair of similar pointed copper pieces from the French period stratum, which he believes relates to the early eighteenth century home village of La Marte Blanche, La Verendrye's Cree guide and mentor (C. Reid personal communication).
Pondering this coincidence, the author considered the stock-like component of the evil medicine magic kit, and the brass dragon musket sideplates (Figure 4) found at the Ash Rapids site at the nearby entrance to Shoal Lake (Reid 1978:6). Reid observes that:
Although the origin or reason for introduction of the dragon motif is still somewhat obscure and the dates proposed by a number of authors are either contradictory or vague, it is known that the motif first appeared in North America around 1700 on Queen Anne muskets... The motif had all but disappeared from civilian guns after 1740 but became the almost exclusive design for sideplates on trade guns for North America (Russell 1957: 129) and indeed had come to mean to the Indians that the article was genuine.... Reid (1978:3)
0___1___2 cm
Figure 4: Brass Dragon Sideplate From a Musket.
(page 8)
Figure 5: Hunter's Point Brass Bracelet.
I would suggest that the brass dragon symbolized more than musket quality and other data provided by Reid (1978) tends to support this hypothesis. I believe that it cannot be coincidence that two out of the three dragon sideplates from archaeological contexts display missing heads, while two more specimens consist solely of head fragments (Reid 1978). Fully four of the five reported specimens are mutilated and I would suggest "killed" in this manner upon removal from the musket. Is this ritual killing of spiritual power akin to the earlier tradition of removing heads from discarded ceramic and stone effigy pipes (Fox 1979:83)?
That Mishipizheu could also associated with brass has been evidenced recently at the Hunter's Point site, a ca. 1640 Odawa village on the west shore of Georgian Bay (Molnar 1991). Here a brass bracelet inscribed with not one, but two horned serpents was discovered in 1990 (Figure 5). Also, had not Radin (1923) noted that "the Winnebago regarded the axes, knives and guns they received from the French as holy;"? Had not Johann Kohl's friend Keatanang, chief of the Ontonagon Band referred to a native copper boulder as "..our hope and our protection. Through it I have caught many beavers, killed many bears. Through its magic assistance I have been victorious in all my battles and with it I have killed other foes" (Kohl 1985:62)? What item better than a roaring musket to embody the power of life and death over man and game which characterized the king of the underworld?
Whether or not this hypothesis holds true, evidence concerning the symbolic nature of metals, both native and European, provides strong support for George Hamell's (1987:90) hypothesized "...precontact Indian mythical reality which served as the paradigm for the Indians' contact behaviour." Native copper and later European copper and brass artifacts provide "...evidence for continuities and syncretisms in the Indians' technological and social manipulation of European trade goods..." (Hamell 1987:90). (page 9)
Acknowledgements
As a study of this sort grows, it requires the cooperation of many researchers and institutions. Dr. Ron Hancock and Larry Pavlish of the University of Toronto conducted the metal source identifications upon which this article is based. Artifacts were made available for study by Dr. Gary Crawford, Dr. Marti Latta and John Reid of the University of Toronto, Peta Daniel of the Royal Ontario Museum, Paul Lennox and Gary Warrick of the Ontario Ministry of Transportation, Dr. Ron Williamson and Martin Cooper of Archaeological Services Inc., Dana Poulton of Mayer, Poulton and Associates, Jim Shropshire and Dr. Bill Fitzgerald. Valuable data, advice and support was offered by Grace Rajnovich, Charles Garrad, James Hunter, Dr. Marti Latta, Paul Lennox, and by Bill Ross, C.S. Paddy Reid and Neal Ferris of the Ontario Ministry of Culture and Communications.
As is true and traditional to say, the concepts and interpretations presented in this paper are the sole responsibility of the author. It represents an initial and somewhat tangential product of a larger metallic artifact study, which will be reported in full upon completion of the trace element analyses.
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