Tuesday, January 23, 2024
View from the Watch House
Colonialist fence lawfare
Beginning in 1620s: Acquiring
use of “abandoned” cornfields and village sites by treaties, early settler
colonists began writing fence laws and making wooden rail fences. Common fields
and crops at first, extending into uplands for pastures and firewood etc.
later.
From 1673 and up to about 1740, the people living at the Nonnewaug Wigwams were planting in these "Indian cornfields" while south of there the early settler colonists were also planting:
A preexisting low stone “big snake effigy” fuel break of
unknown age might enclose or border “something for something” (a road, a
stream, places not to be burned, or multiple patches of blueberries to be burnt
over on a staggered 4 year schedule etc.) but it’s not a legal 4 and a half foot high fence...
In 1740, when the Nonnewaug Wigwams were "abandoned" by the Pootatuck in the eyes of the colonists, the wooden rail fences appeared as the area became divided into "Home Lotts."
("Great Serpents can be Protective Spirits, Guardian Snakes having control over weather and water – and protection against both the fires caused by lightning shot from the eyes of the Thunder Beings (Thunderbirds) as well as the controlled burning Indigenous Peoples used to maintain Balance and create Abundance," writes Tim MacSweeney)
William Cothren, Woodbury Connecticut's favorite historian,
mentions burning and cultural landscape management: “They encamped on Good
Hill that night. The next day they proceeded to the valley to examine their
possessions. Much of the intervals and plains on the river, throughout the
whole extent of the first purchase, had been divested of trees and undergrowth,
by the Indian custom of burning over the woods in the autumn, and the natives
had for many years raised their slender crops of corn, beans and tobacco, in
these pleasant valleys, before the whites set foot in Connecticut. By this
method, the forests were cleared of underbrush, so that the hunters could
better pursue their game, and could have some open spots for their rude
husbandry."
Cothren’s footnotes the passage with a quote from "Hildreth:”
“While the red men
possessed the country, and every autumn set fire to the fallen leaves, the
forests presented a most noble and enchanting appearance. The annual firings
prevented the growth of shrubs and underbrush, and destroying the lower
branches of the trees, the eye roved with delight from ridge to ridge, and from
hill to hill; which like the divisions of an immense temple, were crowded with
innumerable pillars, the branches of whose shafts interlocking, formed the
arch-work of support to that leafy roof, which covered and crowned the whole.
But since the white man took possession, the annual fires have been checked,
and the woodlands are now filled with shrubs and young trees, obstructing the
vision on every side, and converting these once beautiful forests into a rude
and tasteless wilderness.”' - Hildreth
"Hildreth" in the footnote turns out to be:
"S.P. Hildreth, (an) early historian of Marietta, Ohio, writing in 1848,
said: “The yearly autumnal fires of the Indians…had destroyed all the shrubs
and undergrowth of woody plants….and in their place had sprung up the buffalo
clover, and the wild pea vine, with various other indigenous plants and grapes,
supplying the most luxuriant …pastures to the herds of deer and buffalo….”
(Hildreth, 1848, pp.484-485).
I found Hildreth hiding in an article called: References on
the American Indian Use of Fire in Ecosystems:
itcnet.org/file_download/5d76d377-8025-4780-8511-4dc8d0596e45
“And yet we are surrounded by these snake-like effigies in stone that may well simply be, in some places, fuel breaks for low ground fires set by these “Indians,” Sherlock Stones mused. “Quite the mystery, my dear Possum, quite the mystery.”
"Musical Row of Stones" is a term Norman Muller uses:
Sunday, January 14, 2024
Indigenous Gardens Cultivate Healing
BY & & ANDY STEC
NOV 9, 2023
“The common design was an effort by white settlers to
recreate the prestigious Ivy League campuses of Princeton, Harvard, and Yale,
Marler says. These kinds of landscapes are “all based on European ideals of
what is valuable and beautiful,” she says. This has conditioned Americans to
associate places of learning with European landscapes instead of local,
Indigenous ones.”
“By dismantling Indigenous landscapes, settler-colonists
reimagine them as their own. Environmental historian Traci Brynn Voyles
describes the process by which non-white lands are recast as valueless and
available for erasure as “wastelanding.”
"Thanks to the efforts of student advocates over the years,
OSU now has Native signage and Indigenous plants on campus, and in the future
there will be Indigenous cultural burning. Thinking back over her time at OSU,
Eisenberg says, “I would have never imagined that we would get to this point...”
Thursday, January 04, 2024
(Happy to be) Waking Up on Turtle Island
Years ago, a sprinkle of snow
like this might have sent me on a long walk,
Along rows of stones snaking across the landscape,
just to see what I just might see...
This morning I'm just taking a short walk,
Over to some Stone Prayers, some Káhtôquwukansh
Happy to be Alive and Waking Up on Turtle Island...
For All
Ah to be alive
on a mid-September morn
fording a stream
barefoot, pants rolled up,
holding boots, pack on,
sunshine, ice in the shallows,
northern rockies.
Rustle and shimmer of icy creek waters
stones turn underfoot, small and hard as toes
cold nose dripping
singing inside
creek music, heart music,
smell of sun on gravel.
I pledge allegiance to the soil
of Turtle Island,
and to the beings who thereon dwell
one ecosystem
in diversity
under the sun
With joyful interpenetration for all.
under the sun
With joyful interpenetration for all.
Gary Snyder
Sunday, December 24, 2023
Winter Solar Standstill (Nonnewaug)
Looking toward the west,
The Circa 1700 Nonnewaug Watch House in 1989:
Looking East:
Below: Just above the road you might make out a zigzag row...
Serpent Guarding 29 Nonnewaug:
Monday, December 18, 2023
Colonialist Armchair Investigation
I can’t remember the
term for the term of a term which one has just suddenly invented at the moment,
but here’s the phrase: Colonialist Armchair Investigation. My longtime
associate Mr. Peter Waksman knows just what I mean I know because he has
alluded to the phenomenon as well, all those times when he’s said that some of
these “Indians never built in stone in New England” Denialists need to get out
of their armchairs and “take to the woods” and take a look around.
But neither Peter nor I were the first to say
something like that.
Here’s what Dr. Bruce
G. Trigger had to say about something like that:
The name of the
region where Peter and I found ourselves wandering about in, looking for
stacked stone features, is known as New England. If I say instead that we’ve
been making observations of Indigenous Stonework at “The Eastern Gate of Turtle
Island,” most people (from their armchairs) would not have a clue where we were
talking about. Right away, one has to use the Colonialist term, the “New
England,” to even begin a discussion of where we are investigating which.
The second category, colonialist archaeology, refers to
archaeology practiced by colonizers in a colonized country. Examples show that
colonial archaeologists often emphasized the primitiveness or lack of
accomplishments of the ancestors of colonized people to justify discriminatory
behavior as well as colonization itself. The United States, New Zealand, and
parts of sub-Saharan Africa are examples of countries and regions that
experienced periods of colonialist archaeology.
Third, Trigger pointed out that states with worldwide
political, economic, and cultural power have produced imperialist
archaeological traditions. He included in this category the archaeological
traditions of the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States after
the advent of processual archaeology. Archaeologists working within an
imperialist tradition take for granted the superiority and universal
applicability of their theoretical and methodological approaches. They also
exert a strong influence on research around the world through their writings,
the international nature of their research projects, and the key role they play
in training archaeologists from various parts of the world..."
https://anthropology.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/habu_multiple_narrtatives.pdf
: "Nationalist, Colonialist, and Imperialist
Archaeologies that claim most of the credit for the majority of an
incredible amount of stonework may well be the sort of “Alternative Archaeology”
or Pseudoscience that cherry picks a small bit of documentation for a small
amount of stonework, as if Denialism is science with no need for further
investigation."
Nationalist, Colonialist, and Imperialist Archaeologies are also “Alternative Archaeologies.”
It’s like, Indians of the Hemisphere were doing things with
earth and shell and stone.
Everywhere else but not Here in my Town and all around New
England,
Those Indians didn’t build anything except campfire hearths
with stones until the Europeans came in and “learned them how.”
And except of course for and Gazillions Gazillions of
Projectile Points.
And those hammerstones and net weights.
And all those fishweirs in the rivers, by the sea:
On dryland no Indian has a clue how to stack a
stone on another,
But stick some Indians in some water 3000 years ago,
And there you go...
One might ask: What is nationalist archaeology?
One might ask: What is ultranationalist archaeology?
"Nationalism and archaeology have been closely related since at least the nineteenth century. Archaeological interpretations and ancient history can be manipulated for nationalist purposes, such as cultivating national mythologies and national mysticism," writes Mr. Wikipedia.
Friday, December 15, 2023
Jipji'jk “moon of the wintertime” and the "Huron Carol"
I’ve heard that stories in general, and stories about the Big Snake Being or Horned Serpent in particular, aren’t (and “weren’t”) told until the Winter Solstice occurs. A person shouldn’t even speak the name of the Great Serpent until that solar event.
Jean de Brébeuf wrote the lyrics, in the
native language of the Huron/Wendat people, probably in 1642. He probably had
help with those words from First Nations language speakers.
This
morning, some of those words caught my eye in a very different way than they
ever had before…
“Na kesikewiku'sitek jipji'jk*
majita'titek
It was in the moon of the wintertime when all the birds had fled
Kji-Niskam
petkimasnika ansale'wilitka
That mighty Gitchi Manitou sent
angels…”
"Jesous
Ahatonhia" ("Jesus, he is born")
The "Huron Carol" (or "Twas
in the Moon of Wintertime")
*The Mi'kmaw word
"sisipk" is preferred by many to "jipji'jk"
for "birds".
https://firstnationhelp.com/huron.html
Jipijka'm:
The plural form of their name is Jipijkamak or Jipijkmak,
and the female form is Jipijkamiskw or Jipijkamiskwa.
Alternate
spellings: Jupijkám, Tcipitckaam, Chipitchkam, Chepitchcalm, Kchi
Pitchkayam, Ktchi Pitchkaam, Chepechcalm, Chepichkaam, Chepitchkaam,
Che-Pitch-Calm, Chepichealm, Jibichkam, Jipijkma, Chepitkam, Ktchi-Pitchkayam
Pronunciation: chih-pitch-kawm
Also known as: The plural form of their name is Jipijkamak or Jipijkmak, and the female form is Jipijkamiskw or Jipijkamiskwa.
http://www.native-languages.org/jipijkam.htm
Mi'kmaq (Mi'kmaw, Micmac, Mikmaq, Mikmak) Language: “The
Mi'kmaq language, Mi'kmawi'simk, is
an Algonquian language spoken by 8000 Indians in the Canadian Maritimes
(particularly Nova Scotia) and a few US communities in the Northeast. The
Mi'kmaq dialect spoken in Quebec is called Restigouche (or Listuguj) and can be
hard for other native speakers to understand.”
http://www.native-languages.org/mikmaq.htm
From the Mi'kmaw-English Lexicon, another version:
"Na kesikewiku'sitek sisipk Majita'titek,
Majita'titek, Kji-Niskam petkimasni…"
jipjl'j n., bird
jipijka'm: crocodile (!), • Mi'kmaw-English Lexicon page 80
Kesikewiku's/Kjiku's: “December;
the great month”
kaqtukow, kaqtukwew n., thunder
sislp: “bird”
snake: mte'skm
snake (a horned) serpent:
jipijka'm
Grandfather (my)
(traditional form); my father-in-law (contemporary form): niskamij
God: Niskam
https://naig2023.com/wp-content/uploads/education/Mi_kmaq_Lexicon.PDF
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