BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 9999 06317 610 9 SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 180 SYMPOSIUM ON CHEROKEE AND IROQUOIS CULTURE EDITED BY WILLIAM N. FENTON and JOHN GULICK ^*^w IPCRN :,«"» /ORB ^>, BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY Copley Square ""> ^ 3 1397 00031 8678 m M- m- ^ ^ -^ ^n^ * ± ^'W )i'§ SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY BULLETIN 180 SYMPOSIUM ON CHEROKEE AND ^ IROQUOIS CULTURE//^ ./u-^^'i^'^P^>^-^/ EDITED BY WILLIAM N. FENTON and JOHN GULICK U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE WASHINGTON : 1961 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing OflTice Washington 25, D.C. - Price $1.25 (paper) N0J?O B ?^ 5 If ;/)'/ niL LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, D.C., December 28, 1959. Sir: I have the honor to transmit herewith a manuscript entitled "Symposium on Cherokee and Iroquois Culture," edited by William N. Fenton and John Gulick, and to recommend that it be published as a bulletin of the Bureau of American Ethnology. Very respectfully yours, Frank H, H. Roberts, Jr. Dr. Leonard Carmichael, Director. Secretary, Smithsonian Institution. Ill / CONTENTS PAGE No. 1. Foreword by the editors 1 No. 2. Iroquois-Cherokee Linguistic Relations, by Floyd G. Lounsbury_. 9 No. 3. Comment on Floyd G. Lounsbury's "Iroquois-Cherokee Linguistic Relations," by Mary R. Haas 19 No. 4. Iroquois Archeology and Settlement Patterns, by William A. Ritchie 25 No. 5. First Comment on William A. Ritchie's "Iroquois Archeology and Settlement Patterns," by William H. Sears 39 No. 6. Second comment on William A. Ritchie's "Iroquois Archeology and Settlement Patterns," by Douglas S. Byers 45 No. 7. Cherokee Archeology, by Joffre L. Coe 51 No. 8. Comment on Joffre L. Coe's "Cherokee Archeology," by Charles H. Fairbanks 61 No. 9. Eastern Woodlands Community Typology and Acculturation, by John Witthoft 67 No. 10. Comment on John Witthoft's "Eastern Woodlands Community Typology and Acculturation," by John M. Goggin 77 No. 11. Cherokee Economic Cooperatives: the Gadugi, by Raymond D. Fogelson and Paul Kutsche 83 No. 12. The Rise of the Cherokee State as an Instance in a Class: The "Mesopotamian" Career to Statehood, by Fred 0. Gearing 125 No. 13. Comment on Fred O. Gearing's "The Rise of the Cherokee State as an Instance in a Class: The 'Mesopotamian Career' to Statehood," by Annemarie Shimony 135 No. 14. Cultural Composition of the Handsome Lake Religion, by Anthony F. C. Wallace 139 No. 15, Comment on Anthony F. C. Wallace's "Cultural Composition of the Handsome Lake Religion," by Wallace L. Chafe 153 No. 16. The Redbird Smith Movement, by Robert K. Thomas 159 No. 17. Comment on Robert K. Thomas's "The Redbird Smith Movement," by Fred W. Voget 167 No. 18. Effects of Environment on Cherokee-Iroquois Ceremonialism, Music, and Dance, by Gertrude P. Kurath 173 No. 19. Comment on Gertrude P. Kurath's "Effects of Environment on Cherokee-Iroquois Ceremonialism, Music, and Dance," by William C. Sturtevant 197 No. 20. The Iroquois Fortunetellers and Their Conservative Influence, by Annemarie Shimony 205 No. 21. Change, Persistence, and Accommodation in Cherokee Medico- Magical Beliefs, by Raymond D. Fogelson 213 No. 22. Some Observations on the Persistence of Aboriginal Cherokee Personahty Traits, by Charles H. Holzinger 227 No. 23. First Comment on Charles H. Holzinger's "Some Observations on the Persistence of Aboriginal Cherokee Personality Traits," by David Landy 239 V PAGE No. 24. Second Comment on Charles H. Holzinger's "Some Observations on the Persistence of Aboriginal Cherokee Personality Traits," by John Guhck 247 No. 25. Iroquoian Culture History: A General Evaluation, by William N. Fenton 253 Index 279 VI SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 180 Symposium on Cherokee and Iroquois Culture No. 1. Foreword by the Editors / — FOREWORD BY THE EDITORS This symposium is a link in a long chain of public and scholarly concern and effort which stretches back to the Colonial period of American history duiing which both the Cherokee and Iroquois cultures figured prominently. Scholarly interest has been continuous since the early work of Lewis H. Morgan among the Iroquois and James Mooney among the Cherokee. In more recent times, sustained interest in Iroquoian problems has received stimulation and support in the Conference on Iroquois Research, which met annually after 1945 at Red House, N.Y., under the leadership of William N. Fenton. The Proceedings of the first four Red House conferences are refer- enced in a footnote to a published symposium, which was held in New York City in November 1949 dm'ing the annual meetings of the American Anthropological Association (Fenton, ed., 1951, p. 4). By 1950, the conferences, having returned to Red House, were beginning to produce the results of substantive research in several disciplines. In pahed articles, called "Iroquois Anthropology at the Mid-century," Fenton wrote up history, ethnology, and linguistics; and Witthoft reviewed archeology at the sixth conference (Fenton, 1951 a; Witthoft, 1951). The seventh and eighth conferences held at Red House in 1951 and 1952 were noticed in Science (Fenton, 1951 b; Wallace, 1953). By now the group had returned to general sessions on a single theme "stability and change in culture history," which the following year prompted "ethnohistory," with a trend noticeable toward more formal papers on methodological problems. The conference did not convene at Red House in 1954 or 1955, but at the Detroit meetings of the American Anthropological Association, a group interested in the field met for lunch to formulate a program for regional studies involving American and Canadian scholars and institutions. A memorandum circulated after this meeting provided the basis for a conference which was called by the New York State Education Department and held at the New York State Museum in March 1955. A du-ect outcome of this conference was a proposal for a regional ethnohistorical study on cultural conservatism among the Iroquois, which failed to find foundation support. The focus of this proposal was the developing field of ethnohistory; the theoretical problem was the study of conservatism. This petition said in part: The groups of Iroquois in Canada and New York State are ideal subjects for such an approach, exhibiting after three hundred years of contact many features 3 4 CHEROKEE-IROQUOIS SYMPOSIUM [Bi.A.E. Bull. 180 of the aboriginal culture. For this entire period there is excellent documentation, and by "upstreaming" from the contemporary scene through the historical into the prehistoric period, it should be possible to obtain a detailed and thorough picture of the processes of culture and historical change which have occurred over a long time-span, which have the advantage of being shown in two countries, and relate directly to the forces of conservatism. The problem here outlined affords excellent opportunities for research by members of a variety of disciplines, and is perhaps uniquely integrating in that the prehistorian, historian, folklorist, musicologist, linguist, ethnologist, and social psychologist would find it possible to work closely on a single set of related problems. The program also lends itself well to the training of graduate students, for the accessibility of the group under study makes it possible to put a number of people into the field under direct supervision and at a modest expense. The value of such training for those students who will later undertake work in more distant areas without firsthand supervision cannot be overestimated. The problem of conservatism has several practical as well as basic theoretical applications. On the practical side, it seems that the United States today might profit from an examination of her past experience with attempts to "civilize" underdeveloped areas occupied by American Indians. There is knowledge to be gained from study of the success and failure of religious groups, federal and state agencies, schools, etc., in trying to change American Indian culture, and failing. The Iroquois are peculiarly suited to such type of study because their history is so well documented. The field of ethnohistory has received increasing attention within the past several years. Recent trends in American archeology show an increasing interest in tying prehistoric finds to historic groups, an endeavor which poses a number of major methodological problems. Similarly, work involving cooperation between historian and ethnologist has been increasingly emphasized, requiring the two to alter traditional views and procedures to their mutual benefit in order to give most meaning to the data. The six Iroquois reservations of New York and the four reserves in Canada can best be utilized as related but individuall}^ distinct laboratories. The similarities among them are striking; the variation from reservation to reservation offers a wide range of intriguing problems within the field of culture history. Contempo- rary problems are numerous, and some piecemeal research has been done, both on these, as well as on some of the historical problems. What we are proposing is an integrated program of study which would enable interested scholars to pursue lines of inquiry within the framework of a common problem. Though a basis for such research had been laid in the eight confer- ences on Iroquois research in the decade preceding 1955, it was all too clear that the lack of an integrated program severely limited the amount of cooperative research that could be undertaken by partici- pants in these conferences and by their institutions. Much individual work nevertheless had been stimulated. Undismayed, students of the Iroquois met for the ninth ' time at Red House in 1955, to explore ways of achieving cooperation in anthro- pological studies in the northeast. This theme provided a vehicle for discussing State and local relationships in archeology, professional and > Mimeographed copies of the full proceedings of the Ninth (1955) and Tenth (1956) Conferences are avail- able on request at the New York State Museum, Albany 1, N.Y.