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The Abenaki Indians ate all kinds of roots, leaves, seeds, grasses, plants, bulbs, flowers, and bark. They found many vegetables growing wild. A lot of Indians planted the seeds from other wild vegetables in their own gardens. The Abenaki Indians relied on corn, beans, and squash for a large part of their diet. Missiquoi, on the eastern shore of Lake Champlain, reportedly had more than 250 acres of corn under cultivation.
In areas with poor soil, the natives used fish to fertilize the plants and increase the yield of the corn. The Indians planted corn when the leaves of a white oak were as big as the ears of a mouse. The crops would come out perfect every time.
The Abenaki even made maple syrup. They boiled it by digging a hole and lining it with skin, then filled it with sap. They built a fire and put rocks in it. They would wait until the rocks got really hot, then they would put them in to heat the sap over and over until it became syrup. They could boil water the same way to cook other foods. Another way they made syrup was to freeze the sap in clay pots, then every morning, you would toss out the ice. If someone does this enough times, it will leave a thin syrup in the clay pot.
Every Abenaki family was assigned separate hunting grounds. In the spring and summer, bands would gather at fixed locations near rivers or the seacoast for planting and fishing. The Abenaki enjoyed several kinds of stew such as squirrel - country style, old fashion squirrel stew, venison and wild rice stew, and Iroquois fish soup.
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The Abenaki Indians wore clothing very different from us. In warm weather the Indians would have a band of bark like a belt with a breech cloth hanging off it. Boys and girls ran around naked until 11 or 12 years old. Indians mostly went barefoot in the summer, but all Abenakis had a pair of moccasins to wear when the weather was cold. The women made most of the clothing. In the winter men wore leggings held up by the belt of the breech cloth. Women wore short dresses of animal skins decorated with shells, bones, and beads. The leggings were made of deer skin. The shirts are made from soft leather. Indians wore headdresses for ceremonies. Headdresses were nothing like our hats. A headdress was assembled with feathers, porcupine quills and hair, animal skin, fox tails and rattlesnake skins. A breech cloth is a simple piece of cloth that is six feet long and a foot wide. It is drawn between the legs and tucked in the front and in the back. Leggings are worn with a breech cloth. |
The Abenaki Indians called their games by a different name then we do. They played them differently, also. For example we call a touch game Tag and they call it Wolf. Some games like lacrosse were played for a test of strength, agility, and endurance.
A game that they played in the winter was called the Snow Snake. The Snow Snake was a long stick that ended in a carved snake head. The stick was slid down a trough in the snow. The person who skidded his snake head the farthest was the winner.
Other games like Moose Stalk were played for the purpose of developing silent movement and keen ears. The game Trail of Silence is a test of art movement, freezing, and the techniques of taking instant and effective cover.
The game of Snow Boat is almost like bobsledding except that in Snow Boat you use a dug out canoe. The canoe slides down an icy trough.
The Indians loved to play gambling games. One of the games was played with dice counters that were made out of flint and were chipped and flattened into square shapes. One side of the counter would be colored. If you throw the dice counters and you either have to get both sides with a color facing up to get high points. Lesser points were awarded for various other combinations.
The woodlands tribes, who hunted and fished by the Atlantic Coast, built homes called wigwams. The men built the pole frames in a 12 foot circle and the women covered the frame with bark, mats, or skins. They were shaped like domes, which looked like large bowls turned upside down. The door would face the East toward the raising sun.
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One family lived in a wigwam. In the center was an open fire, with a smoke hole in the roof to let out the smoke. Around the fire were wooden benches, set like couches against the walls. These platforms, covered by woven grass mats and animal skins, were used for sitting and sleeping. |
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Wetsus were another shelter constructed in a similar manner, but they were elongated instead of circular and would house 2-3 families.
A third kind of shelter used by the natives was the conical wigwam shaped like a tepee. They were covered with white birch strips. The strips were sewn together by hand with spruce roots. Some of these wigwams were ,also, covered with elm bark. This shelter was used only for temporary shelter. On hunting trips the Woodland Indians would use the cone-shaped wigwams.
There are two kinds of Abenaki Indian burials. One is cremation and the other is an earthen burial.
The first step in cremation is drying the dead body in the ceremonial lodge.While the body is drying, the Shaman prepares the cremation site. It is usually on a high sandy piece of ground.
The ceremony begins with a fire in the cremation pit. The dried bones are wrapped in animal skins and thrown into the fire. Tools like knives, arrowheads, axes, and gouges were thrown into the pit in sacred unity to the dead. Ornaments were thrown into the pit in sacred unity to the dead. Ornaments were thrown into the pit to show survival in the spirit world. After the fire had cooled, the Shaman took the ashes and put them into a second pit. Red orche powder was added to give blood,
When women would gather around a sick person, they blackened their faces with soot or charcoal. When the person died, the men blackened their faces. People would cry in sorrow for a month maybe even a year ,if the person was a chief or Sachem. The Indians expressed their sorrow by stroking the head or cheeks of the members of the family. A wise man of the tribe would lead the burial ceremony. He would decorate the body with what ever ornaments the family could afford and then wrap the body in furs.
Meanwhile a grave was dug on a northeast-southeast line. The bottom of the grave was lined with sticks. Next the body was laid to rest on the right side, head to the west facing east. Weapons, tools, and dishes were laid along side the body. The body was now ready for the journey to the "Spirit World."
The Abenakis used different types of canoes for traveling on bodies of water. The first was called a dug-out. It was shaped by burning out a center section of the log and then chopping out the charcoal with an adze. This was repeated until the canoe was hollowed out. As the dug-out began to take shape, it was finished with chisels and scrapers. The dug-out was used on large bodies of water. The second type was called a bark canoe. The bark canoes were made by attaching pieces of birch bark to a light wood frame bent to the shape wanted. The birch bark was then laced together and onto the frame. The seams were water proofed with pitch.
Another way the Indians traveled was by foot on foot trails that criss-crossed all over New England. Even though there was much hatred among some tribes, the Indians traded up and down the rivers and across the hills briskly. There was a lot of trade with the tribes of the Iroquois over the Mohawk Trail. Wampum was produced on Block Island and Long Island and used as barter among the different tribes along the coast in their travels.
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