For many years Northwest Coast cultures have exerted a magic appeal to layman and specialist alike. We have been swept off our feet by the potlatch, dazzled by dance and sculpture, lured into...
Introduction, 1977
For the past 20 years my home has been on the Pacific Northwest Coast, and over the years I have explored at leisure and with unending curiosity the islands and inlets, the bays and beaches of this...
Author’s Note, 1994
First published in 1977 by J. J. Douglas in Canada, and by the University of Washington Press in the United States, Indian Fishing: Early Methods on the Northwest Coast interested a wider range of...
Publisher’s Note, 2018
Douglas & McIntyre is proud to bring Hilary Stewart’s enduring classic, Indian Fishing, back into print in partnership with the University of Washington Press. Some years ago this classic study...
Reference Keys
Each specimen illustrated is accompanied by a measurement, together with a number-letter combination. The measurement, in centimetres, represents the maximum length or height of the item; the number...
Acknowledgments
It has taken a lot of energy and enthusiasm on the part of a great many people in libraries, archives, museums, universities and research institutes, and in Indian Band Councils and government...
How the Fish Came Into the Sea
A Tlingit Myth.“After Raven bring daylight to all the people he keep walkin’ north, lookin’ around, he keep going up, up north. And he see something big, big just like a scow way out on the...
The People of the Sea
At the mouth of a river a sleek canoe is being paddled by a thickset youth, his eyes watching the surface of the water, his spear at the ready. Seeing a salmon jump, he at once speaks to it in...
Hook, Line and Sinker
Of all fishing gear, the most familiar is the fish hook. Over thousands of years the Indian peoples of the Northwest Coast designed and perfected hooks and their accessories—baits, lures, sinkers,...
Spears and Harpoons
Thrusting his harpoon with just enough power to impale the fish, but not too much to break the gear if he should miss, a man learned to judge the depth of water and the speed of the swimming fish,...
Nets and Netting
Indians today still use fishing nets in many ways, but the spun nettle, cedar (and occasionally hemp) fibres of the coast have been replaced by nylon net, while the carved wooden netting needle is...
Traps and Weirs
Probably the most productive of any of the fishing devices, the traps and weirs allowed large quantities of fish to be taken at a time when the salmon runs were at their peak.Weirs—fences through...
Cooking and Preserving Fish
Without any knowledge of pottery, coast Indian peoples boiled, simmered, steamed, baked, toasted and roasted most of their food. Box, basket, earth pit, rock oven, hot ashes, and roasting tongs and...
Spiritual Realms
The Indians of the Northwest Coast showed much reverence and caring for the natural resources that were important to their cultures. They recognized that all living things—plant, animal, bird or...
Bibliography
Andrews, Ralph Warren. Indian Primitive. New York: Bonanza Books, 1960.Barnett, Homer G. The Coast Salish of British Columbia. University of Oregon Studies in Anthropology, No. 4. University of...
