North American Bows, Arrows, and Quivers |
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Common terms and phrases
25 inches Alaska angular antler Arctic type arrow shaft arrow-heads arrow-maker Athapascan attached bandolier barb piece bows and arrows BOWS OF ESKIMO bowstring buckskin cable California chalcedony chipping Collected by Dr Collected by E. W. compound bow cylindrical diagonal lashing edges end with sinew EXPLANATION OF PLATE fastened Feathers feet flakes flint foreshaft glue glued grip half hitches hard wood held in place horn Hupa inches long inserted ivory length of shaft material Murdoch nock NORTH AMERICAN BOWS notch obsidian ornamented painted piece of bone Point Barrow quiver rawhide reed seized with sinew shaft and seized SHAFT GROOVES shaftment shape Shoshonean Shoshonean stock side sinew cord sinew thread SINEW-BACKED BOWS SINEW-LINED BOW Siouan skin specimens spruce strips tang tapering thumb tool Total length tribes twisted sinew U-shaped U. S. Army U. S. N. M. Eskimo U. S. N. M. Sioux Indians weapon wrapped
Popular passages
Page 671 - C or 7 inches in length and 1 inch in diameter, with one rounded side and two plane sides; therefore presenting one acute and two obtuse angles to suit the points to be broken. "This operation is very curious, both the holder and the striker singing, and the strokes of the mallet given exactly in time with the music, and with a sharp and rebounding blow, in which, the Indians tell us, is the great medicine (or mystery of the operation).
Page 670 - Erratic boulders of flint are collected (and sometimes brought an immense distance), and broken with a sort of sledgehammer made of a rounded pebble of horn-stone, set in a twisted withe, holding the stone, and forming a handle. The flint, at the indiscriminate blows of the sledge, is broken into a hundred pieces, and such flakes selected as, from the angles of their fracture and thickness, will answer as the basis of an arrow-head...
Page 676 - The flakes for the stone heads are knocked off by means of a pitching tool of a deer antler. The stone heads are made with a chipper composed of a crooked handle to which is lashed a short piece of antler precisely similar to those which I collected at Point Barrow. The work is held in the left hand on a pad and flaked off by pressure with a tool in the right hand in exactly the same manncr as I found the Innuits doing in northern Alaska.
Page 668 - Their bow forms two demi-circles, with a shoulder in the middle ; the back of it is entirely covered with sinews, which are laid on in so nice a manner, by the use of some glutinous substance, as to be almost imperceptible ; this gives great elasticity to the weapon. Their arrow is more than the
Page 643 - Twas form'd of horn, and smooth'd with artful toil : A mountain goat resign'd the shining spoil Who pierced long since beneath his arrows bled ; The stately quarry on the cliffs lay dead, And sixteen palms his brow's large honours spread : The workmen join'd, and shaped the bended horns, And beaten gold each taper point adorns.
Page 671 - ... on the upper end, flaking the flint off on the under side, below each projecting point that is struck. The flint is then turned and chipped in the same manner from the opposite side ; and so turned and chipped until the required shape and dimensions are obtained, all fractures being made on the palm of the hand...
Page 677 - The arrow-heads of the Kutchin are of bone for wild fowl, or bone tipped with iron for moose or deer; the bow is about 5 feet long, and that of the Hong-Kutchin is furnished with a small piece of wood 3 inches long by 1£ broad, and nearly 2 thick, which projects close to the part grasped by the hand. This piece catches the string and prevents it from striking the hand, for the bow is not bent much. There are no individuals whose trade is to make spears, bows, or arrows.
Page 671 - ... that the string will vibrate in a direction coinciding directly with the thicker edge of the bow. The bow is fully 5£ feet long. The string was made of deer's sinew. "Beothuc arrows were made of pine (white) or sycamore, and were slender, light, and straight. The head was a...
Page 645 - North American Bows, Arrows and Quivers,' in the Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution, 1893. 645: 'The strip of gristle extending from the head along the back and serving to support the former, and those from the lower part of the legs of deer and other ruminants were selected. These were hung up to dry. For making bowstrings the gristle was shredded with the fingers in fibers as fine as silk in some tribes, but coarse in others. These fibers were twisted into yarn on the thigh by means of...
Page 676 - The arrows were about 2J feet long, were made of cedar, with feathered shafts, and points of stone, and of nails, after they obtained them; and the quiver of wolf skin. Arrow-heads are sometimes made of brass or iron, 2 or 3 inches long, half an inch wide, and very thin, and also of very hard wood, 5 inches long, and round.