THE LAW OF HOSPITALITY AND ITS GENERAL PRACTICE.
When America was discovered in its several parts the Indian tribes
were found in dissimilar conditions. The least advanced tribes were
without the art of pottery, and without horticulture, and were,
therefore, in savagery. But in the arts of life they were advanced
as far as is implied by its Upper Status, which found them in
possession of the bow and arrow. Such were the tribes in the Valley
of the Columbia, in the Hudson Bay Territory, in parts of Canada,
California, and Mexico, and some of the coast tribes of South America.
The use of pottery, and the cultivation of maize and plants, were
unknown among them. They depended for subsistence upon fish, bread,
roots, and game. The second class were intermediate between them and
the Village Indians. They subsisted upon fish and game and the
products of a limited horticulture, and were in the Lower Status of
barbarism. Such were the Iroquois, the New England and Virginia
Indians, the Creeks, Cherokees, and Choctaws, the Shawnees, Miamis,
Mandans, Minmtarees, and other tribes of the United States east of
the Missouri River, together with certain tribes of Mexico and South
America in the same condition of advancement. Many of them lived in
villages, some of which were stockaded, but village life was not as
distinctive and common among them as it was among the most advanced
tribes. The third class were the Village Indians proper, who
depended almost exclusively upon horticulture for subsistence,
cultivating maize and plants by irrigation. They constructed joint
tenement houses of adobe bricks and of stone, usually more than one
story high. Such were the tribes of New Mexico, Mexico, Central
America, and upon the plateau of the Andes. These tribes were in the
Middle Status of barbarism.
The weapons, arts, usages, and customs, inventions, architecture,
institutions, and form of government of all alike bear the impress
of a common mind, and reveal, in their wide range, the successive
stages of development of the same original conceptions. Our first
mistake consisted in overrating the degree of advancement of the
Village Indians, in comparison with that of the other tribes; our
second in underrating that of the latter; from which resulted a third,
that of separating one from the other, and regarding them as
different races. The evidence of their unity of origin has now
accumulated to such a degree as to leave no reasonable doubt upon
the question. The first two classes of tribes always held the
preponderating power, at least in North America, and furnished the
migrating bands which replenished the ranks of the Village Indians,
as well as the continent, with inhabitants. It remained for the
Village Indians to invent the process of smelting iron ore to attain
to the Upper Status of barbarism, and, beyond that, to invent a
phonetic alphabet to reach the first stage of civilization. One
entire ethnical period intervened between the highest class of
Indians and the beginning of civilization.
[Transcriber's Note: Lengthy footnote relocated to chapter end.]
It seems singular that the Village Indians, who first became
possessed of maize, the great American cereal, and of the art of
cultivation, did not rise to supremacy over the continent. With
their increased numbers and more stable subsistence they might have
been expected to extend their power and spread their migrating bands
over the most valuable areas to the gradual displacement of the
ruder tribes. But in this respect they signally failed. The means of
sustaining life among the latter were remarkably persistent. The
higher culture of the Village Indians, such as it was, did not
enable them to advance, either in their weapons or in the art of war,
beyond the more barbarous tribes, except as a superior house
architecture tended to render their villages and their habitations
impregnable to Indian assault. Moreover, in the art of government
they had not been able to rise above gentile institutions and
establish political society. This fact demonstrates the
impossibility of privileged classes and of potentates, under their
institutions, with power to enforce the labor of the people for the
erection of palaces for their use, and explains the absence of such
structures.
Horticulture and other domestic arts spread from the Village Indians
to the tribes in the Lower Status of barbarism, and thus advanced
them materially in their onward progress toward the higher condition
of the Village Indians. Numerous tribes were thus raised out of
savagery into barbarism by appropriating the arts of life of tribes
above them. This process has been a constant phenomenon in the
history of the human race. It is well illustrated in America, where
the Red Race, one in origin and possessed of homogeneous institutions,
were in three different ethnical conditions or stages of culture.
There are certain usages and customs of the Indian tribes generally
which tend to explain their plan of life--their large households,
their houses, and their house architecture. They deserve a careful
consideration and even further investigation beyond the bounds of
our present knowledge. The influence of American civilization has
very generally broken up their old plan of life, and introduced a
new one more analogous to our own. It has been much the same in
Spanish America. The old usages and customs, in the particulars
about to be stated, have now so far disappeared in their pure forms
that their recovery is not free from difficulty. Those to be
considered are the following:
I. The law of hospitality.
II. Communism in living.
III. The ownership of lands in common.
IV. The practice of having but one prepared meal each day--a dinner.
V. Their separation at meals, the men eating first and by themselves,
and the women and children afterwards.
The discussion will be confined to the period of European discovery
and to later periods while these practices remained. The object will
be to show that these usages and customs existed among them when
America was discovered in its several parts, and that they remained
in practice for some time after these several periods.
THE LAW OF HOSPITALITY.
Among the Iroquois hospitality was an established usage. If a man
entered an Indian house in any of their villages, whether a villager,
a tribesman, or a stranger, it was the duty of the women therein to
set food before him. An omission to do this would have been a
discourtesy amounting to an affront. If hungry, he ate; if not hungry,
courtesy required that he should taste the food and thank the giver.
This would be repeated at every house he entered, and at whatever
hour in the day. As a custom it was upheld by a rigorous public
sentiment. The same hospitality was extended to strangers from their
own and from other tribes. Upon the advent of the European race
among them it was also extended to them. This characteristic of
barbarous society, wherein food was the principal concern of life,
is a remarkable fact. The law of hospitality, as administered by the
American aborigines, tended to the final equalization of subsistence.
Hunger and destitution could not exist at one end of an Indian
village or in one section of an encampment while plenty prevailed
elsewhere in the same village or encampment. It reveals a plan of
life among them at the period of European discovery which has not
been sufficiently considered.
A singular illustration of the powerful influence of the custom upon
the Indian mind came to my notice some years ago at the Seneca
Reservation in New York. A Seneca chief, well to do in the world,
with farm lands and domestic animals which afforded him a
comfortable subsistence, had lost his wife by death, and his daughter,
educated in the usages of civilized life, took the position of
housekeeper. The old man, referring to the ancient custom, requested
his daughter to keep the usual food constantly prepared ready to
offer to any person who entered their house, saying that he did not
wish to see this custom of their forefathers laid aside. Their
changed condition, and particularly the adoption of the regular
meals of civilized society, for the time of which the visitor might
reasonably be expected to wait, did not in his mind outweigh the
sanctity of the custom. [Footnote: William Parker was the chief named,
a noble specimen of a Seneca Iroquois.]
In July, 1743, John Bartram made a journey from Philadelphia to
Onondaga to attend, with Conrad Weisar, a council of the Onondaga,
Mohawk, Oneida, and Cayuga chiefs. At Shamokin he quartered with a
trader who had an Indian wife, and at a village of the Delawares.
"As soon as we alighted," he remarks, "they showed us where to lay
our luggage, and then brought us a bowl of boiled squashes, cold.
This I then thought poor entertainment, but before I came back I had
learned not to despise good Indian food. This hospitality is
agreeable to the honest simplicity of ancient times, and is so
persistently adhered to that not only what is already dressed is
immediately set before a traveler, but the most pressing business is
postponed to prepare the best they can get for him, keeping it as a
maxim that he must always be hungry. Of this we found the good
effects in the flesh and bread they got ready for us." [Footnote:
Bartram's Observations, &c, London edition, 1751, p. 16.] We have
here a perfect illustration among the Delawares of the Iroquois rule
to set food before a person when he first entered the house.
Although they had in this case nothing better than boiled squash to
offer, it was done immediately, after which they commenced preparing
a more substantial repast. Delaware and Iroquois usages were the same.
The council at Onondaga lasted two days, at the close of which they
had each day a dinner in common. "This council [first day] was
followed by a feast. After four o'clock we all dined together upon
four great kettles of Indian-corn soup, which we emptied, and then
every chief retired to his home.... The conference [second day] held
till three, after which we dined. The repast consisted of three
great kettles of Indian-corn soup, or thin hominy, with dried eels
and other fish boiled in it, and one kettle full of young squashes
and their flowers boiled in water, and a little meal mixed. This
dish was but weak food. Last of all was served a great bowl-full of
Indian dumplings made of new soft corn cut or scraped off the ear,
with the addition of some boiled beans, lapped well in Indian-corn
leaves. This is good hearty provision." [Footnote: Bartram's
Journal p. 59.]
"Again," he remarks, "we prepared for setting forward, and many of
the chiefs came once more to make their farewells. Some of them
brought us provisions for our journey. We shook hands again and set
out at nine." [Footnote: ib. p. 63]
One of the earliest notices of the hospitality of the Indian tribes
of the United States was by the expedition of Philip Amidas and
Arthur Barlow, under the auspices of Sir Walter Raleigh, which
visited the Algonkin tribes of North Carolina in the summer of 1584.
They landed at the Island of Wocoken, off Albemarle Sound, when
"there came down from all parts great store of people," whose chief
was Granganimeo. "He was very just of his promises, for oft we
trusted him, and would come within his day to keep his word. He sent
us commonly every day a brace of ducks, conies, hares, and fish,
sometimes melons, walnuts, cucumbers, pease, and divers roots....
After this acquaintance, myself, with seven more, went thirty miles
into the river Occam, that runneth toward the city Skicoack, and the
evening following we came to an isle called Roanoak, from the harbor
where we entered seven leagues: At the north end were nine houses,
builded with cedar, fortified round with sharp trees [palisaded] and
the entrance like a turnpike [turnspit]. When we came towards it,
the wife of Granganimeo came running out to meet us (her husband was
absent) commanding her people to draw our boat ashore for beating on
the billows. Others she appointed to carry us on their backs aland,
others to bring our oars into the house for stealing. When we came
into the other room (for there were five in the house) she caused us
to sit down by a great fire; and after took off our clothes and
washed them, of some our stockins, and some our feet in warm water,
and she herself took much pains to see all things well ordered and
to provide us victuals. After we had thus dried ourselves she
brought us into an inner room, where she sat on the board standing
along the house, somewhat like frumenty, sodden venison and roasted
fish; in like manner melons raw, boiled roots, and fruits of divers
kinds. Their drink is commonly water boiled with ginger, sometimes
with sassafras, and wholesome herbs.... A more kind, loving people
cannot be. Beyond this isle is the main land, and the great river
Occam, on which standeth a town called Pomeiok." [Footnote: Smith's
History of Virginia, &c. Reprint from London edition of 1627.
Richmond edition, 1819, i, 83, 84. Amidas and Barlow's account is
also in Hakluyt's Coll. of Voyages, iii, 301-7.]
This is about the first, if not the first, English picture we have
of Indian life and of English and Indian intercourse in America. It
is highly creditable to both parties; to the Indians for their
unaffected kindness and hospitality, and to the English for their
appreciation of both, and for the absence of any act of injustice.
At the same time it was simply an application by the natives of
their rules of hospitality among themselves to their foreign visitors,
and not a new thing in their experience.
In the narrative of the expedition of Hernando de Soto to Florida in
1539, by a gentleman of Elvas, there are references to the customs
of the Indian tribes of South Carolina, the Cherokees, Choctas, and
Chickasas, and of some of the tribes west of the Mississippi, whom
the expedition visited one after another. They are brief and
incomplete, but sufficiently indicate the point we are attempting to
illustrate. It was a hostile rather than a friendly visitation, and
the naturally free hospitality of the natives was frequently checked
and turned into enmity, but many instances of friendly intercourse
are mentioned in this narrative. "The fourth of April the governor
passed by a town called Altamaca, and the tenth of the month he came
to Ocute. The cacique sent him two thousand Indians with a present,
to wit, many conies and partridges, bread of maize, two hens and
many dogs." [Footnote: Historical Collections of Louisiana, part ii.
A Narrative of the Expedition of Hernando de Soto into Florida, by a
Gentleman of Elvas, p. 139.]
Again: "Two leagues before he came to Chiaha, there met him fifteen
Indians loaded with maize which the cacique had sent; and they told
him on his behalf that he waited his coming with twenty barns full
of it." [Footnote: 3 ib. p. 147.] "At Cora the chief commanded his
Indians to void their houses, wherein the governor and his men were
lodged. There was in the barns and in the fields great store of
maize and French beans. The country was greatly inhabited with many
great towns and many sown fields which reached from one to the other".
[Footnote: ib. p 152.]
After crossing the Mississippi, of which De Soto was the first
discoverer, he "rested in Pacaha forty days, in all which time the
two caciques served him with great store of fish, mantles, and skins,
and strove who should do him greatest service". [Footnote: ib. p.
175.]
The justly celebrated Moravian missionary, John Heckewelder, obtained,
through a long experience, an intimate acquaintance with the manners
and customs of the Indian tribes. He was engaged in direct
missionary labor, among the Delawares and Munsees chiefly, for
fifteen years (1771-1786) on the Muskingum and Cuyahoga in Ohio,
where, besides the Delawares and Munsees, he came in contact with
Tuscaroras and other tribes of Iroquois lineage. He was conversant
with the usages and customs of the Indian tribes of Pennsylvania and
New York. His general knowledge justifies the title of his work,
"History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations, who once
inhabited Pennsylvania and the neighboring States," and gives the
highest credibility to his statements.
In discussing the general character of the Indians, he remarks as
follows: "They think that he [the Great Spirit] made the earth and
all that it contains for the common good of mankind; when he stocked
the country that he gave them with plenty of game, it was not for
the benefit of a few, but of all. Everything was given in common to
the sons of men. Whatever liveth on the land, whatsoever groweth out
of the earth, and all that is in the rivers and waters flowing
through the same, was given jointly to all, and ever one is entitled
to his share. From this principle hospitality flows as from its
source. With them it is not a virtue, but a strict duty; hence they
are never in search of excuses to avoid giving, but freely supply
their neighbors' wants from the stock prepared for their own use.
They give and are hospitable to all without exception, and will
always share with each other and often with the stranger to the last
morsel. They rather would lie down themselves on an empty stomach
than have it laid to their charge that they had neglected their duty
by not satisfying the wants of the stranger, the sick, or the needy.
The stranger has a claim to their hospitality, partly on account of
his being at a distance from his family and friends, and partly
because he has honored them with his visit and ought to leave them
with a good impression on his mind; the sick and the poor because
they have a right to be helped out of the common stock, for if the
meat they have been served with was taken from the woods it was
common to all before the hunter took it; if corn or vegetables, it
had grown out of the common ground, yet not by the power of man, but
by that of the Great Spirit." [Footnote: Heckewelder, Indian Nations,
Philadelphia ed., 1876, p. 101]
This is a clear and definite statement of the principle of
hospitality as it was observed by the Indian tribes at the epoch of
their discovery, with the Indians' reasons on which the obligations
rested. We recognize in this law of hospitality a conspicuous virtue
of mankind in barbarism.
Lewis and Clarke refer to the usages of the tribes of the Missouri,
which were precisely the same as those of the Iroquois. "It is the
custom of all the nations on the Missouri," they remark, "to offer
every white man food and refreshments when he first enters their
tents". [Footnote: Travels, etc., London edition, 1814, p. 649.]
This was simply applying their rules of hospitality among themselves
to their white visitors.
About 1837-1838 George Catlin wintered at the Mandan Village, on the
Upper Missouri. He was an accurate and intelligent observer, and his
work on the "Manners and Customs of the North American Indians" is a
valuable contribution to American ethnography. The principal Mandan
village, which then contained fifty houses and fifteen hundred people,
was surrounded with a palisade. It was well situated for game, but
they did not depend exclusively upon this source of subsistence.
They cultivated maize, squashes, pumpkins, and tobacco in garden beds,
and gathered wild berries and a species of turnip on the prairies.
"Buffalo meat, however," says Mr. Catlin, "is the great staple and
staff of life in this country, and seldom, if ever, fails to afford
them an abundant means of subsistence."
* * * * *
"During the summer and fall months they use the meat fresh, and cook
it in a great variety of ways--by roasting, broiling, boiling,
stewing, smoking, &c., and, by boiling the ribs and joints with the
marrow in them, make a delicious soup, which is universally used and
in vast quantities. The Mandans, I find, have no regular or stated
times for their meals, but generally eat about twice in the
twenty-four hours. The pot is always boiling over the fire, and any
one who is hungry, either from the household or from any other part
of the village, has a right to order it taken off and to fall too,
eating as he pleases. Such is an unvarying custom among the North
American Indians, and I very much doubt whether the civilized world
have in their institutions any system which can properly be called
more humane and charitable. Every man, woman, or child in Indian
communities is allowed to enter any one's lodge, and even that of
the chief of the nation, and eat when they are hungry, provided
misfortune or necessity has drawn them to it. Even so can the
poorest and most worthless drone of the nation, if he is too lazy to
hunt or to supply himself; he can walk into any lodge, and every one
will share with him as long as there is anything to eat. He, however,
who thus begs when he is able to hunt, pays dear for his meat, for
he is stigmatized with the disgraceful epithet of poltroon and beggar."
[Footnote: Manners and Customs of the North American Indians,
Hazard's edition, 1857, i, 200.] Mr. Catlin puts the case rather
strongly when he turns the free hospitality of the household into a
right of the guest to entertainment independently of their consent.
It serves to show that the provisions of the household, which as he
elsewhere states, consisted of from twenty to forty persons, were
used in common, and that each household shared their provisions in
the exercise of hospitality with any inhabitant of the village who
came to the house hungry, and with strangers from other tribes as
well. Moreover, he speaks of this hospitality as universal amongst
the Indian tribes. It is an important statement, because few men in
the early period of intercourse with the western tribes have
traveled so extensively among them.
The tribes of the Columbia Valley lived upon fish, bread-roots, and
game. Food was abundant at certain seasons, but there were times of
scarcity even in this favored area. Whatever provisions they had
were shared freely with each other, with guests, and with strangers.
Lewis and Clarke, in 1804-1806, visited in their celebrated
expedition the tribes of the Missouri and of the Valley of the
Columbia. They experienced the same generous hospitality whenever
the Indians possessed any food to offer, and their account is the
first we have at all special of these numerous tribes. Frequent
references are made to their hospitality. The Nez Perces "set before
them a small piece of buffalo meat, some dried salmon, berries, and
several kinds of roots. Among these last is one which is round and
much like an onion in appearance and sweet to the taste. It is
called quamash, and is eaten either in its natural state or boiled
into a kind of soup or made into a cake, which is then called pasheco.
After the long abstinence, this was a sumptuous treat; and we
returned the kindness of the people by a few small presents, and
then went on in company with one of the chiefs to a second village,
in the same plain at a distance of two miles. Here the party was
treated with great kindness and passed the night." [Footnote: Travels,
etc., p. 330.]
Of another tribe they remark, "As we approached the village most of
the women, though apprised of our being expected, fled with their
children into the neighboring woods. The men, however, received us
without any apprehension, and gave us a plentiful supply of
provisions. The plains were now crowded with Indians who came to see
the persons of the whites, and the strange things they brought with
them; but as our guide was perfectly a stranger to their language we
could converse by signs only." [Footnote: Travels, etc., p. 334.]
The Indians of the Columbia, unlike the tribes previously named,
boiled their food in wooden vessels, or in ground cavities lined
with skins, by means of heated stones. They were ignorant of pottery.
"On entering one of their houses he [Captain Clarke] found it
crowded with men, women, and children, who immediately provided a
mat for him to sit on, and one of the party undertook to prepare
something to eat. He began by bringing in a piece of pine wood that
had drifted down the river, which he split into small pieces with a
wedge made of the elk's horn by means of a mallet of stone curiously
carved. The pieces were then laid on the fire, and several round
stones placed upon them. One of the squaws now brought a bucket of
water, in which was a large salmon about half dried, and as the
stones became heated they were put into the bucket till the salmon
was sufficiently boiled for use. It was then taken out, put on a
platter of rushes neatly made, and laid before Captain Clarke, and
another was boiled for each of his men." [Footnote: Travels, p. 353.]
One or two additional cases of which a large number are mentioned by
these authors will sufficiently illustrate the practice of
hospitality of these tribes and its universality. They went to a
village of seven houses of the Chilluckittequaw tube and to the
house of the chief. "He received us kindly," they remark, "and set
before us pounded fish, filberts, nuts, the berries of the sacacommis,
and white bread made of roots.... The village is a part of the same
nation with the village we passed above, the language of the two
being the same, and their houses of similar form and materials, and
calculated to contain about thirty souls. The inhabitants were
unusually hospitable and good humored." [Footnote: Travels, etc.,
p. 375-376.]
While among the Shoshones, and before arriving at the Columbia they
"reached an Indian lodge of brush inhabited by seven families of the
Shoshones. They behaved with great civility, and gave the whole
party as much boiled salmon as they could eat, and added a present
of several dried salmon and a considerable quantity of chokechinies;"
[Footnote: ib. p. 288.] and Captain Lewis remarks of the same people,
that "an Indian invited him into his bower, and gave him a small
morsel of boiled antelope, and a piece of fresh salmon roasted. This
was the first salmon he had seen, and perfectly satisfied him that
he was now on the waters of the Pacific." [Footnote: ib. p. 268.]
Thus far among the tribes we find a literal repetition of the rule
of hospitality as practiced by the Iroquois. Mr. Dall, speaking of
the Aleuts, says, "hospitality was one of their prominent traits,"
[Footnote: On the Remains of Later Prehistoric Man, Alaska Ter.
Smithsonian Cont., No. 318, p. 3. Travels, etc., Phila. ed., 1796,
p. 171.] and Powers, of the Pomo Indians of California remarks, that
"they would always divide the last morsel of dried salmon with
genuine savage thriftlessness," and of the Mi-oal'-a-wa-gun, that,
"like all California Indians they are very hospitable." [Footnote:
Powell's Contributions to North American Ethnology, Power's Tribes
of California, vol. iii. p. 153.]
Father Marquette and Lieutenant Joliet, who first discovered the
Upper Mississippi in 1673, had friendly intercourse with some of the
tribes on its eastern bank, and were hospitably entertained by them.
"The council being over, we were invited to a feast, which consisted
of four dishes. The first was a dish of sagamite--that is, some
Indian meal boiled in water and seasoned with grease--the master of
ceremonies holding a spoonful of it, which he put thrice into my
mouth and then did the like to M. Joliet. The second dish consisted
of three fish, whereof he took a piece, and having taken out the
bones and blown upon it to cool it, he put it into my mouth. The
third dish was a large dog, which they had killed on purpose, but
understanding that we did not eat this animal they sent it away. The
fourth was a piece of buffalo meat, of which they put the fattest
pieces into our mouths." [Footnote: Historical Collections of
Louisiana. part ii. An Account of the Discovery of some New
Countries and Nations of North America in 1673, by Pere Marquette
and Sieur Joliet, p. 287.]
Lower down the river, below the mouth of the Ohio, they fell in with
another tribe, of whom they speak as follows. "We therefore
disembarked and went to their village. They entertained us with
buffalo and bear's meat and white plums, which were excellent. We
observed they had guns, knives, axes, shovels, glass beads, and
bottles in which they put their powder. They wear their hair long as
the Iroquois, and their women are dressed as the Hurons."
[Footnote: ib,. p. 293]
In 1766 Jonathan Carver visited the Dakota tribes of the Mississippi,
the Sauks and Foxes, and Winnebagos of Wisconsin, and the Ojibwas of
Upper Michigan. He speaks generally of the hospitality of these
tribes as follows: "No people are more hospitable, kind, and free
than the Indians. They will readily share with any of their own
tribe the last part of their provisions, and even with those
of a different nation, if they chance to come in when they are
eating. Though they do not keep one common stock, yet that
community of goods which is so prevalent among them, and their
generous disposition, render it nearly of the same effect."
[Footnote: Carver's Travels, etc. Phila. ed. 1796, p. 171.]
The "community of goods, which is so prevalent among them," is
explained by their large households formed of related families, who
shared their provisions in common. The "seven families of Shoshones"
in one house, and also the houses "crowded with men, women, and
children," mentioned by Lewis and Clarke, are fair samples of Indian
households in the early period.
We turn again to the southern tribes of the United States, the
Cherokees, Choctas, Chickasas, and Confederated Creek tribes. James
Adair, whose work was published in 1775, remarks generally upon
their usages in the following language. "They are so hospitable,
kind-hearted, and free, that they would share with those of their
own tribe the last part of their own provisions, even to a single
ear of corn; and to others, if they called when they were eating;
for they have no stated meal time. An open generous temper is a
standing virtue among them; to be narrow-hearted, especially to
those in want, or to any of their own family, is accounted a great
crime, and to reflect scandal on the rest of the tribe. Such
wretched misers they brand with bad characters.... The Cherokee
Indians have a pointed proverbial expression to the same effect--
simtaweh ne wara, the great hawk is at home. However, it is a very
rare thing to find any of them of a narrow temper; and though they
do not keep one promiscuous common stock, yet it is to the very same
effect; for every one has his own family or tribe; and when one of
them is speaking, either of the individuals or habitations of any of
his tribe, he says, 'he is of my house,' or 'it is my house'....
When the Indians are traveling in their own country, they inquire
for a house of their own tribe [gens]; and if there be any, they go
to it, and are kindly received, though they never saw the persons
before--they eat, drink, and regale themselves with as much freedom
as at their own table, which is the solid ground covered with a
bear-skin.... Every town has a state-house or synedrion, as the
Jewish sanhedrim, where, almost every night, the head men convene
about public business; or the town's people to feast, sing, dance,
and rejoice in the divine presence, as will fully be described
hereafter. And if a stranger calls there, he is treated with the
greatest civility and hearty kindness--he is sure to find plenty of
their simple home fare, and a large cane-bed covered with the
softened skins of bears or buffaloes to sleep on. But, when his
lineage is known to the people (by a stated custom, they are slow in
greeting one another), his relations, if he has any there, address
him in a familiar way, invite him home, and treat him as a kinsman."
[Footnote: History of the American Indians, London ed., 1775, p. 17.]
All these tribes were organized in gentes or clans, and the gentes
of each tribe were usually reintegrated in two or more phratries. It
is the gens to which Mr. Adair refers when he speaks of the
"family," "relations," and "lineage." We find among them the same
rule of hospitality, substantially, as prevailed among the Iroquois.
It is a reasonable conclusion, therefore, that among all the tribes,
north of New Mexico, the law of hospitality, as practiced by the
Iroquois, was universally recognized; and that in all Indian
villages and encampments without distinction the hungry were fed
through the open hospitality of those who possessed a surplus.
Notwithstanding this generous custom, it is well known that the
Northern Indians were often fearfully pressed for the means of
subsistence during a portion of each year. A bad season for their
limited productions, and the absence of accumulated stores, not
unfrequently engendered famine over large districts. From the
severity of the struggle for subsistence, it is not surprising that
immense areas were entirely uninhabited, that other large areas were
thinly peopled, and that dense population nowhere existed.
Among the Village Indians of New Mexico the same hospitality is now
extended to Americans visiting their pueblos, and which
presumptively is simply a reflection of their usage among themselves
and toward other tribes. In 1852 Dr. Tenbroeck, assistant surgeon
United States Army, accompanied his command to the Moki pueblos. In
his journal he remarks: "Between eleven and twelve to-day we arrived
at the first towns of Moki. All the inhabitants turned out, crowding
the streets and house-tops to have a view of the white men. All the
old men pressed forward to shake hands with us, and we were most
hospitably received and conducted to the governor's house, where we
were at once feasted upon guavas and a leg of mutton broiled upon
the coals. After the feast we smoked with them, and they then said
that we should move our camp in, and that they would give us a room
and plenty of wood for the men, and sell us corn for the animals."
[Footnote: Schoolcraft's History, Condition, and Prospects of the
Indian Tribes, iv. 81.]
In 1858 Lieut. Joseph C. Ives was at the Moki Pueblo of Mooskahneh
[Mi-shong-i-ni-vi]. "The town is nearly square," he remarks,
"and surrounded by a stone wall fifteen feet high, the top of which
forms a landing extending around the whole. Flights of stone steps
lead from the first to a second landing, upon which the doors of the
houses open. Mounting the stairway opposite to the ladder, the chief
crossed to the nearest door and ushered us into a low apartment,
from which two or three others opened towards the interior of the
dwelling. Our host courteously asked us to be seated upon some skins
spread along the floor against the wall and presently his wife
brought in a vase of water and a tray filled with a singular
substance that looked more like sheets of thin blue wrapping paper
rolled up into bundles than anything else that I have ever seen. I
learned afterwards that it was made of corn meal, ground very fine,
made into a gruel, and poured over a heated stone to be baked. When
dry it has a surface slightly polished like paper. The sheets are
folded and rolled together, and form the staple article of food with
the Moki Indians. As the dish was intended for our entertainment,
and looked clean, we all partook of it. It had a delicate
fresh-bread flavor, and was not at all unpalatable, particularly
when eaten with salt." [Footnote: Report upon Colorado River of the
West, Lieut. Ives, p. 121.]
Lieutenant-Colonel (now General) Emory visited the Pima villages on
the Gila River in 1846. "I rode leisurely in the rear through the
thatched huts of the Pimas. Each abode consisted of a dome-shaped
wicker-work about six feet high, and from twenty to fifty feet in
diameter, thatched with straw or cornstalks. In front is usually a
large arbor, on top of which is piled the cotton on the pod for
drying. In the houses were stowed watermelons, pumpkins, beans, corn,
and wheat, the three last articles generally in large baskets.
Sometimes the corn was in baskets, covered with earth, and placed on
the tops of the domes. A few chickens and dogs were seen, but no
other domestic animals except horses, mules, and oxen.... Several
acquaintances formed in our camp yesterday, were recognized, and
they received me cordially, made signs to dismount, and when I did
so offered watermelons and pinole. Pinole is the heart of Indian corn,
baked, ground up, and mixed with sugar. When dissolved in water it
affords a delicious beverage; it quenches thirst, and is very
nutritious.... The population of the Pimas and Maricopas together is
estimated variously at from three to ten thousand. The first is
evidently too low. This peaceful and industrious race are in
possession of a beautiful and fertile basin. Living remote from the
civilized world they are seldom visited by whites, and then only by
those in distress, to whom they generously furnish horses and food."
[Footnote: Military Reconnaissance in New Mexico, pp. 85, 86.]
In this case and in those stated by Lieutenant Ives and Dr.
Tenbroeck we find a repetition of the Iroquois rule to set food
before the guest when he first enters the house.
With respect to the Village Indians of Mexico, Central and South
America, our information is, in the main, limited to the hospitality
extended to the Spaniards; but it is sufficient to show that it was
a part of their plan of life, and, as it must be supposed, a
repetition of their usages in respect to each other. In every part
of America that they visited, the Spaniards, although often in
numbers as a military force, were assigned quarters in Indian houses,
emptied of their inhabitants for that purpose, and freely supplied
with provisions. Thus at Zempoala "the lord came out, attended by
ancient men, two persons of note supporting him by the arms, because
it was the custom among them to come out in that manner when one
great man received another. This meeting was with much courtesy and
abundance of compliments, and people were already appointed to find
the Spaniards quarters and furnish provisions" [Footnote: Herrera's
History of America, ii, 212.]
When near Tlascala the Tlascallans "sent three hundred turkeys, two
hundred baskets of cakes of teutli, which they call tamales, being
about two hundred arrobas; that is, fifty hundred weight of bread,
which was an extraordinary supply for the Spaniards, considering the
distress they were in;" and when at Tlascala, Cortes and his men
"were generously treated, and supplied with all necessaries."
[Footnote: ib., ii. 261, 279.]
"They entered Cholula and went to a house where they lodged
altogether, and their Indians with them, although upon their guard,
being for the present plentifully supplied with provisions."
[Footnote: ib., ii, 311]
Although the Spaniards numbered about four hundred, and their allied
Indians about a thousand, they found accommodations in a single
joint tenement house of the Aboriginal American model. Attention is
called to this fact, because we shall find the Village Indians, as a
rule, living in large houses, each containing many apartments, and
accommodating five hundred or more persons. The household of several
families of the northern Indians reappears in the southern tribes in
a much greater household of a hundred or more families in a single
joint tenement house, but not unlikely broken up into several
household groups. The pueblo consisted sometimes of one, sometimes
of two or three, and sometimes of a greater number of such houses.
The plan of life within these houses is not well understood, but it
can still be seen in New Mexico, and it is to be hoped it will
attract investigation.
Speaking of the Maya Indians of Yucatan, Herrera remarks that
"they are still generous and free-hearted, so that they will make
everybody eat that comes into their houses, which is everywhere
practiced in traveling." [Footnote: Herrera's History of America,
iv, 117.]
This is a fair statement of the Iroquois law of hospitality found
among the Mayas, practiced among themselves and towards strangers
from other tribes. When Grijalva, about 1517, discovered the Tabasco
River, he held friendly intercourse with some of the tribes of
Yucatan. "They immediately sent thirty Indians loaded with roasted
fish, hens, several sorts of fruit, and bread made of Indian wheat."
[Footnote: ib., ii, 126]
When Cortes, in 1525, made his celebrated expedition to Honduras, he
passed near the pueblo of Palenque and near that of Copan without
being aware of either, and visited the shore of Lake Peten.
"Being well received in the city of Apoxpalan, Cortes and all the
Spaniards, with their horses, were quartered in one house, the
Mexicans being dispersed into others, and all of them plentifully
supplied with provisions during their stay." [Footnote: ib., iii, 359.]
They numbered one hundred and fifty Spanish horse and several
hundred Aztecs. It was at this place, according to Herrera, that
Quatemozin, who accompanied Cortes as a prisoner, was barbarously
executed by his command. [Footnote: ib., iii, 361.] Cortes next
visited an island in Lake Peten, where he was sumptuously
entertained by Canec, the chief of the tribe, where they "sat down
to dinner in stately manner, and Canec ordered fowls, fish cakes,
honey, and fruit." [Footnote: ib., iii, 362.]
In South America the same account of the hospitality of the Indian
tribes is given by the early explorers. About the year 1500
Christopher Guerra made a voyage to the coast of Venezuela:
"They came to an anchor before a town called Curiana, where the
Indians entreated them to go ashore, but the Spaniards being no more
than thirty-three in all durst not venture.... At length, being
convinced of their sincerity, the Spaniards went ashore, and being
courteously entertained, staid there twenty days. They plentifully
supplied them for food with venison, rabbits, geese, ducks, parrots,
fish, bread made of maize or Indian wheat, and other things, and
brought them all the game they would ask for.... They perceived
that they kept markets or fairs, and that they made use of jars,
pitchers, pots, dishes, and porringers, besides other vessels of
several shapes." [Footnote: Herrera's Hist. America, iv, 248.]
Pizarro found the same custom among the Peruvians and other tribes
of the coast. At the time of his first visit to the coast of Peru he
found a female chief by whom he was entertained. "The lady came out
to meet them with a great retinue, in good order, holding green
boughs and ears of Indian wheat, having made an arbor where were
seats for the Spaniards, and for the Indians at some distance. They
gave them to eat fish and flesh dressed in several ways, much fruit,
and such bread and liquor as the country afforded." [Footnote: ib.,
i, 229.]
When on the coast of Tumbez, and before landing, "ten or twelve
floats were immediately sent out with a plenty of provisions, fruits,
pots of water, and of chica, which is their liquor, as also a lamb."
[Footnote: ib., iv, 3.]
After entering Peru, on his second visit to the coast, "Atahuallpa's
messengers came and presented the governor with ten of their sheep
from the Inca, and some other things of small value, telling him
very courteously that Atahuallpa had commanded them to inquire what
day he intended to be at Caxamalca, that he might have provisions on
the way." [Footnote: ib., iii, 399.]
* * * * *
"The next day more messengers came from Atahuallpa with provisions,
which he received with thanks.". [Footnote: ib., iv, 244.]
The native historian, Garcilasso de la Viga, remarks: "Nor were the
Incas, among their other charities, forgetful of the conveniences
for travelers, but in all the great roads built houses or inns for
them, which they called corpahuaci, where they were provided with
victuals and other necessaries for their journeys out of the royal
stores; and in case any traveler fell sick on the way, he was there
attended and care taken of him in a better manner perhaps than at
his own home." [Footnote: Royal Commentaries of Peru, Lond. ed., 1688;
Recent Trans., p 145.]
These illustrations, which might be multiplied, are sufficient to
show the universality of the practice of hospitality among the
Indian tribes of America at the epoch of European discovery. Among
all these forms, as stated by different observers, the substance of
the Iroquois law of hospitality is plainly found, namely: If a man
entered an Indian house, whether a villager, a tribesman, or a
stranger, and at whatever hour of the day, it was the duty of the
women of the house to set food before him. An omission to do this
would have been a discourtesy amounting to an affront. If hungry, he
ate, if not hungry, courtesy required that he should taste the food
and thank the giver. It is seen to have been a usage running through
three ethnic conditions of the Indian race, becoming stronger as the
means of subsistence increased in variety and amount, and attaining
its highest development among the Village Indians in the Middle
Status of barbarism. It was an active, well-established custom of
Indian society, practiced among themselves and among strangers from
other tribes, and very naturally extended to Europeans when they
made their first appearance among them. Considering the number of
the Spaniards often in military companies, and another fact which
the aborigines were quick to notice, namely, that a white man
consumed and wasted five times as much as an Indian required, their
hospitality in many cases must have been grievously overtaxed.
[Footnote: "The appetite of the Spaniards appeared to the American
inhabitants voracious; and they affirmed that one Spaniard devoured
more food in a day than was sufficient for ten Americans."--
(Robertson's History of America, Lond. ed., 1856, i, p. 72.)]
Attention has been called to this law of hospitality, and to its
universality, for two reasons: firstly, because it implies the
existence of common stores, which supplied the means for its practice;
and secondly, because, wherever found, it implies communistic living
in large households. It must be evident that this hospitality could
not have been habitually practiced by the Iroquois and other
northern tribes, and much less by the Village Indians of Mexico,
Central and South America, with such uniformity, if the custom in
each case had depended upon the voluntary contributions of single
families. In that event it would have failed oftener than it would
have succeeded. The law of hospitality, as administered by the
American aborigines, indicates a plan of life among them which has
not been carefully studied, nor have its effects been fully
appreciated. Its explanation must be sought in the ownership of
lands in common, the distribution of their products to households
consisting of a number of families, and the practice of communism in
living in the household. Common stores for large households, and
possibly for the village, with which to maintain village hospitality,
are necessary to explain the custom. It could have been maintained
on such a basis, and it is difficult to see how it could have been
maintained on any other. The common and substantially universal
practice of this custom, among the American Indian Tribes, at the
period of their discovery, among whom the procurement of subsistence
was their vital need, must be regarded as evidence of a generous
disposition, and as exhibiting a trait of character highly
creditable to the race.
[Relocated Footnote: PROPOSED ETHNIC OR CULTURE PERIODS.
PERIOD OF SAVAGERY. PERIOD OF BARBARISM.
Subperiods. Conditions. Subperiods. Conditions.
Older Period ..... Lower Status Older Period .... Lower Status
Middle Period .... Middle Status Middle Period ... Middle Status
Later Period ..... Upper Status Later Period .... Upper Status.
PERIOD OF CIVILIZATION
RECAPITULATION
OLDER PERIOD OF SAVAGERY.--From the infancy of the human race
to the knowledge of fire and the acquisition of fish subsistence.
MIDDLE PERIOD.--From the acquisition of a fish subsistence to
the invention of the bow and arrow.
LATER PERIOD.--From the invention of the bow and arrow to the
invention of the art of pottery.
OLDER PERIOD OF BARBARISM.--From a knowledge of pottery to the
domestication of animals in the eastern hemisphere, and in the
western to the cultivation of maize and plants by irrigation.
MIDDLE PERIOD.--From the domestication of animals, &c., to the
invention of the process of smelting iron ore.
LATER PERIOD.--From the knowledge of iron to the invention of a
phonetic alphabet, or the use of hieroglyphs upon stone as an
equivalent.
CIVILIZATION.--From the invention of a phonetic alphabet and
the use of letters in literary composition to the present time.]