Pigwacket
The Pigwacket were an Algonquin- speaking Indian tribe in northeastern North America who linguistically and culturally belonged to the Eastern Abenaki . They were members of the Abenaki - confederation , but lost in the 18th century their identity because they were not mentioned after 1750 in historical reports and documents. Their descendants can be found today in the Indian reservations of Wôlinak and Odanak in the Canadian province of Québec .
residential area
The residential area of Pigwacket lay on the upper Saco River and its tributaries in southern Maine and southeastern New Hampshire with the main village of Pequawket .
Surname
Pigwacket is preferable to the other main form, Pequawket, because this name is closer to the original pronunciation. The Pigwacket could be the residents of Shawakotoc on the list published by Samuel Purchas . The Pigwacket are not clearly separated from other tribes in English documents until the treaty of 1690; French sources give references to them a short time later. Pigwacket comes from the Eastern Abenaki word Apik-ahki and means land of caves .
Culture
Historians suggest that the Native Americans settled northern New England at least 10,000 years ago . However, there is no evidence that these indigenous people are the ancestors of the later Abenaki. The cultural characteristics described below apply in one way or another to all tribes of the Eastern Abenaki. This culture was similar to the way of life of the neighboring Algonquin in southern New England. Because they lived largely on crops such as maize, beans and pumpkins, their villages were usually on the fertile river banks. The area of cultivation depended on the size and location of the villages. The proportion of fish and seafood changed with the location of the villages. The diet was supplemented by game, fish and wild plants. In sterile areas, fish was often used as fertilizer to get better corn yields.
If there were also local differences in the cycle due to the changing supply of local food sources, one can reconstruct a generally applicable annual course. The first activity in the spring was tapping maple trees to make syrup and presumably sugar. This was followed by catching fish from schools of spring in the rivers, both for immediate consumption and for smoking. Spring plants, the bulbs of the earth pear (Helianthus tuberous) and wild potatoes were collected . Later in May the fields were tilled with corn, beans, and pumpkins while tobacco was planted in small separate gardens. A long stay on one of the larger lakes to fish and escape the insect plague in the forests was interrupted by traveling back to the village to weed the cultivated fields. In the fall, the abundant waterfowl was shot or caught in nets, and flocks of wild pigeons were killed when they gathered to fly south. Eels were caught and smoked for the winter. Deer and elk were hunted in autumn by shouts during the rutting season and in winter by drifting on snowshoes and in their pastures. In the cold season muskrats, beavers, otters and other fur-bearers were hunted for the meat and later especially for the furs.
trade
The pigwacket's material culture changed quickly when, around 1620, first French and later English goods came into the country. Iron axes, needles, rifles, knives, glass beads and woolen fabrics were exchanged for skins in the trade and the self-made objects of the indigenous people were soon gone.
By 1626, English colonists from Plymouth traded regularly with the Pigwacket. The English had access to goods such as corn and wampum from southern New England and could trade these goods for hides. Wampum, which was increasingly produced after the introduction of metal drills, became both an important means of payment in the exchange of goods and an important symbol in the political and social sphere.
The Pigwacket had their advantage in trading reliably with the Europeans. There were fewer villages now as the surviving residents of older communities banded together. The plight of the entire inland population in winter was a thing of the past; the aim now was to obtain furs for trade rather than hunting for livelihood and survival until spring. Those of the tribe who were not directly involved in trapping and hunting for fur were able to stay in the main villages and make a living from food that came from supplies or from trade with the English. The supply of corn from New England through English middlemen and the year-round presence of part of the population in the main villages allowed the increasing dependence on local horticulture that the Pigwacket could not previously risk. The livelihood no longer required the move to the coast and thus one could freely choose where to stay in summer.
history
Like the other Eastern Abenaki, the Pigwacket were also severely decimated by epidemics and wars. At the end of the colonial wars, peace was not achieved until all treaties between 1770 and 1776 were concluded. The few surviving Pigwacket were probably dispersed into small groups. Between 1761 and 1774 more and more settlers invaded their former country and in 1763 the Pontiac uprising occurred , in which Abenaki also took part. Pontiac , Ottawa war chief , took advantage of the general discontent among the Indians to organize attacks on British forts in May 1763. In response, the British government issued the 1763 proclamation forbidding the colonists from advancing further west into Indian territory, but this decree was ignored by the settlers and severely worsened their relationship with the government.
The British Indian agent for North America stated that the British government's proclamation would not apply to the area claimed by the Abenaki. Suddenly the Pigwacket no longer had any right to their own land. After many years moving from New England to Canada and back, she considered Québec a New England Indian, while New England considered them to be a part of Canada. During the war, many Abenaki had found refuge on the St. Regis River , but now the Mohawk asked them to leave. But where should they go? Some stayed as unwelcome guests and others mingled with Saint Francis Indians.
swell
literature
- Bruce G. Trigger (Ed.): Handbook of North American Indians . Volume 15: Northeast . Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington DC 1978, ISBN 0-16004-575-4 .