Songhees
The Songhees or Songish , officially Songhees First Nation , call themselves trucks or Lekwungen , are one of the Canadian First Nations in the province of British Columbia . They live on the southeast of Vancouver Island in the Victoria agglomeration .
Both culturally and linguistically, they belong to the coastal Salish of the northwest coast culture of the Pacific , whose residential area extends as far as Oregon . Together with the neighboring Esquimalt (Ess-whoy-malth) they speak Lək̓ʷəŋín̓əŋ / Lekwungen or Songhees / Songish , a dialect of the Northern Straits Salish , one of the largest dialect groups within the Central Coast Salish from the Salish language family .
Today (as of September 2013) the Songhees First Nation has 546 registered tribesmen, 331 of whom live in its own reservation , 38 in other reservations and the remaining 177 outside.
The tribe is part of the Te'mexw Treaty Association , which negotiates land claims and sovereignty rights with the province and federal government in Ottawa . In addition to the Beecher Bay, it includes the Malahat , Nanoose and T'sou-ke .
history
Early history
The Songhees (Lkwungen or Lekwungen) were - and are sometimes still today - often referred to together with the closely related Esquimalt as Lekwammen (or Lekwungen) - but this term is increasingly only related to the Songhees, as it is their own name. Further historically (and partly still today) Straits Salish -speaking groups of the coastal Salish are the Lummi (Xwlemi or Lhaq'temish) , Saanich (W̱SÁNEĆ) , Samish (sʔémǝš) , Semiahmoo , T'sou-ke (Sooke) and the Klallam (S'Klallam) .
In today's Portage Park in View Royal , a village dating from around 800 BC was established in 2006. Discovered. In addition to large quantities of local shells, obsidian blades , jade from the Fraser Valley and shells from the Nuu-chah-nulth area on the west coast of Vancouver Island were found. Between about 1200 BC BC to AD 400 are the so-called microblades , e.g. Sometimes extremely small blades, a constant feature of regional culture.
Between about 500 and 1000 AD, a hallmark of the South Salish groups around Victoria is a large number of cairns . Hence they are also called "burial mounds". There are around 400 of these Cairns in the Rocky Point Area west of Victoria alone . A large number of mounds can also be found around metchosin . Brian Thom was already able to show that at this time the class society of later epochs did not yet exist, but rather a society of rank or prestige prevailed. Only at the end of the Marpole phase, around 1000, did an elite monopolize not only the inherited and ascribed reputation, but also means of power and resources. Around 400 BC It is believed that a society developed that favored the individual acquisition of reputation.
At Finlayson Point there is evidence of a fortified Songhee village from before 1800, which consisted mainly of longhouses . Their settlements ranged from Songhees Point to what is now Johnsons Street Bridge.
Where the Delta Hotel now stands was Chief Cheetlam George's longhouse . Songhees Point, at the entrance to the Inner Harbor , was called Pallatsis , "cradle place", because there the children, who had learned to walk in the meantime, left their cradles, which should ensure them a long life. Burial places of the tribe can also be found on the heavily forested islands at this time.
Family groups
Today's Songhees and Esquimalt are descendants of the following family groups in the so-called Douglas Treaties (Vancouver Island Treaties or Fort Victoria Treaties) :
- the Teechamitsa (from Albert Head to Esquimalt Harbor - now members of the Esquimalt Nation)
- the Xwsepsum (Kosampsom) or Camossung (eastern part of Esquimalt Harbor, at Craigflower Creek ( Pulkwutsang - "the ghost place") in Portage Inlet, the Gorge Waters (Gorge waterway) in the harbor of today's Victoria to Halkett Island - Main group of today's Esquimalt Nation)
- the Whyomilth (northwest part of Esquimalt Harbor - now members of the Esquimalt Nation)
- the Chekonein (Che-ko-no) (between Gonzales Point and Mount Douglas - now members of the Songhees First Nation)
- the Chilcowitch (east of Ross Bay to Gonzales Point - now members of the Songhees First Nation)
- der Stsanges (in the area of today's Albert Head (Tleepet), a suburb of Metchosin, British Columbia - now members of the Songhees First Nation)
- the Swengwhung (Inner Harbor, James Bay ( Whosaykum - "sand, clay" or) "muddy, swampy place," Clover Point and Ross Bay area of Greater Victoria - now members of the Songhees First Nation)
First European
The first Spanish and British ships headed for Esquimalt in 1790 and 1792. Don Manuel Quimper anchored in the port of Esquimalt in 1790, and named the place “Puerto de Cordova” after the 46th Viceroy of New Spain . Even James Cook admired the landscape cultivated by the Indians around the later Victoria. The later head of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) saw the landscape of the region, with its park-like appearance, open grassy areas, etc., as an ideal settlement area, "a perfect Elysium in point of climate and scenery".
Founding of Victoria
When Victoria was founded in 1843, a Songhees village existed next to the newly built fort, but it was moved to the other side of the harbor in 1844. When the first fort was built, relations were evidently very friendly. So the Indians offered their help. 1,200 of them helped to set the piles, their total number is estimated at 1,600.
society
Like the other tribes on Vancouver Island, such as the Nuu-chah-nulth, society was divided into three strictly separated classes, an upper class ( siem ), a lower class ( stesem , sslyn or stšam) and slaves ( skeyes or sk ' w ys). The slaves lived mostly in the houses of the upper class, the lower class lived in separate houses. The upper class had exclusive access to certain resources, such as high-yield fish stocks, but were also required to give generously at large celebrations ( potlatches ). Thereby they differed little in principle from the European societies of the time, if one regards their prestige behavior more as ostentatious waste and less as compensation. The Lekwungen lived in two large villages, Esquimalt Harbor and Cadboro Bay. The land in between had been used earlier - for example, defenses at Finlayson Point (dated approx. 950 AD) and in front of Beacon Hill (there also a cemetery), plus at Holland Point and Clover Point - can be proven In 1842 it was only used sporadically by the leading class. The burial sites were first examined in 1858, but most of the stone circles of this type - with a mound in the middle - were destroyed.
Apparently, the Songhees also used the area around these sites as a playing field for a type of hockey , a game called Qoqwialls , which was played with spoon- shaped oak sticks, with gates at the ends of the field.
Food bases and cultural landscape
As everywhere on the Pacific coast, salmon was the main food of the coastal salish. Especially San Juan Island was popular with canoes. The fish was dried and smoked, but never salted. Other fish such as herring and halibut , but also birds and game were on the menu. However, not everyone was allowed to hunt everywhere, because certain families had their reef nets and certain collecting fields, such as the horse clam , a type of mussel ( Tresus nuttallii ). They were reserved for the nobility only. Similar rules applied to house building and hunting, but also to the collection of numerous plants, such as berries, grass, etc. So it could happen that family clans wandered according to the best harvest time of the plants in certain areas "belonging" to them.
However, the Songhees were not only hunters and gatherers, but also “half” farmers. They planted camas, an agave plant with blue flowers. Your onions taste like very sweet, baked tomatoes, some like pears too. It grew in two types, the common camas ( Camassia quamash ) and the large camas ( Camassia Leichtlinii ). This cultivation and the care of the soil in particular transformed the landscape over the centuries, and gave it the park-like character that was so attractive to the English. The landscape was by no means “natural”, as the romantic visitors to the region believed. In addition, the harvest was a good opportunity to socialize in the camps set up for this purpose in the fields and to consolidate society through rituals.
The Camas onions, which were 4–8 cm in diameter, but could also become larger (and weigh up to 100 g), were intensively traded, especially with the Nuu-chah-nulth. Because the majority of the coveted fruits grew around Victoria.
The tree-poor zones, which were equally necessary for the cultivation of camas and potatoes, were created through the targeted use of fire. This was the only way to preserve the open grasslands in the region, but the Europeans soon banned this practice.
Particularly important for the Songhees was a certain type of oak, which is now called Garry Oak ( Quercus garryana ). In addition to the grassland, they formed their own ecosystem , in addition to areas dominated by Douglas firs or swamps or areas near the coast. The Garry Oak is common between British Columbia and California , but grows best around Victoria. It is named after Nicholas Garry of HBC. They live to be over 400 years old. As long as the Songhees lit their fires regularly, the oak was almost the only tree, but since then other tree species have penetrated. This type of habitat , on which around 100 other plant species are attached, is practically only found in Beacon Hill Park , as only less than 5% of this ecosystem, which is so characteristic of the Songhee culture, still exists today. Around 1800 this system covered around 15 km² in the area of Victoria, today 21 ha are left of it.
trade
Intensive trade contacts existed between the Songhees and their neighbors, also beyond the Juan de Fuca Strait , not only with potatoes and camas. Part of the Klallam from the Olympic Peninsula in present-day Washington even lived permanently on Vancouver Island in the 1840s and 50s. They were related to the Songhees and had two villages near Victoria Harbor. Other tribes also brought otter and beaver skins , oil and fat to trade, such as from Puget Sound . Like the Indians on Vancouver Island, they provided the growing city of Victoria with building materials, labor and food. Their canoes carried urgent mail. In 1859 over 2,800 Indians camped near the city, including perhaps 600 Songhees. The rest were Haida (405), Tsimshian (574), Stikine River Tlingit (223), Duncan Cowichan (111), Heiltsuk (126), Pacheedaht (62) and Kwakwaka'wakw (44).
But trade played a role that was not entirely comparable to European trade. The trips also served to establish and consolidate relationships that could be used again, even after the relationship had been inactive for a long time. The Songhees had opportunities to stay practically everywhere in the huge residential area, which in turn made trade easier. However, this knowledge was "private" and only belonged to one family at a time. The lower class was much more restricted regionally and had no such knowledge.
Settlers
With the settlers who brought cattle and planted potatoes , the Camas trade collapsed, the rituals disappeared, and the ownership structure was completely transformed. The Lekwungen, like many peoples on the Pacific coast of North America, also planted potatoes, which the Europeans recognized as agriculture. The Indians probably took over this fruit from the European fur traders as early as 1800, so that at that time it became a valuable commodity. The fur traders also built gardens in the south, as in Astoria (1811) and Fort Vancouver (1825), but especially in Fort Langley (1827), east of Vancouver . The digging sticks for mussels could easily be used here.
Reserves and the smallpox
In 1853 the settlement area of the Songhees was converted to a reserve .
When gold was discovered on the Columbia River in 1858 , the population of Victoria multiplied within a few days from around 300 to over 5,000. The Indians became a minority in the face of more than 20,000 immigrants (most of whom moved on). The smallpox epidemic of 1862 , brought in from San Francisco , caused the authorities to panic. All Indians who were not employed by whites were expelled from the region. The returnees thus spread the disease over a wide area, because the incubation period is one to two and a half weeks - enough time to reach any point on Vancouver Island without becoming noticeably ill.
In contrast to the Europeans, for whom smallpox was a permanent threat, the Indians lacked almost any resistance. Few of them came back. Nevertheless, harvest workers soon came through again on the way to California, hundreds of participants met at the large potlatches. Canoe builders met in the Songhee area. Apparently, the efforts shown by the doctors in Victoria, especially John Sebastian Helmcken , to vaccinate the neighboring Indian tribes, ensured the tribe's survival. Even in 1894, Victoria's merchant fleet, 59 schooners, was still largely based on Indian labor. 518 of the 1,336 employees were Indians.
In 1911 the Songhee signed a contract with the government which on the one hand expected them to move to Esquimault, where a naval base had been located since 1865, but on the other hand was to grant them collecting, fishing and hunting rights there. It is still valid today. The old reservation was sold and an area at View Royal was added later.
McKenna-McBride Commission
When the McKenna-McBride Commission visited the reservations of British Columbia from 1913, it suggested that the reservations of the "Saanich Tribe", "No. 1-South Saanich, 483.00 acres ”,“ No. 2-East Saanich, 605.00 acres ”,“ No. 3-Discovery Island, Cowichan District, 90.00 acres, and No. 4-Chatham Islands, Cowichan District, two islands about 1/8 mile northwest of Reserve No. 3, 57.00 acres ”should remain, but no. 2 exactly 8.76 acres to be confiscated in favor of the Canadian Northern Pacific Railway and one road.
The Commission's proposals did not become legally binding until 1923.
Restoration
In 1971, the councilors of the Juan de Fuca College for Adult Education decided to take the name Camosun from Songhee for their college , which has since been particularly committed to the education of the First Nations. The institute is the eighth largest employer in the region with 1,250 employees (1997). The First Nations Community Studies Diploma Program there is dedicated to training Indian leaders. It has been working with Victoria's Native Friendship Center and the Songhees since 2005 . In 2006 500 Indians from 50 First Nations studied here. The Walking With Our Ancestors Celebration , formerly known as the First Peoples Festival , takes place every summer on the grounds of the Royal British Columbia Museum thanks to your support .
The traditional area is now predominantly in the Victoria agglomeration. Sir James Douglas , the governor of Vancouver Island, negotiated a first treaty with the Songhees in 1850. There was a year-long legal dispute over this contract until 2006, the end of which was announced in November of this year by Chief Robert Sam, the Minister for Indian Affairs and Northern Development Jim Prentice (until 2007) and Mike de Jong, the Minister of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation . Yet new conflicts are emerging right now.
The Songhees now live in three reservations, one around Esquimault Harbor (New Songhees 1a) and two more at the mouth of the Haro Strait on Discovery Island and on several islands around Chatham Island opposite Oak Bay. They cover a total of 137.8 hectares. In 2001, a total of 1870 members of the Songhees First Nation were counted, which illustrates the discrepancy between official numbers and those accepted by the tribes as tribal members.
In 2001, the City of Victoria sold Crown Land at the mouth of the Goldstream River, at the end of a long fjord known as Saanich Inlet . There was an old village and burial site here. The Goldstream River and Spaet-Berg (pronounced spa-eth) are part of the Goldstream River water protection area. In 1913 a full 12 acres were designated as Goldstream Indian Reserve No. 13 reported. Logging, as it is still often used in Canada, i.e. large-scale clear cutting, damaged the city's drinking water and energy supply. It was not until 1998 that this process could be stopped. The Goldstream Provincial Park was established after the closure of a hydroelectric power station. The five Songhee Nations still share a reserve here today.
In 2006 the program to save an extremely rare species of salmon was started, the Greater Georgia Basin Steelhead Recovery Program for the Chum Salmon ( ketal salmon ). In the meantime, however, road developments threaten the area, and there are golf courses, which the Bear Mountain Resort wants to promote in particular . In 2006 there were almost physical confrontations after the tombs and other holy sites were desecrated.
Compensations
With its 4 hectares, the Parliament building and its surroundings are certainly among the most valuable properties in the entire province. 2006 was estimated its value to 40,000,000 CAD . On November 25, 2006, an agreement was reached on a sum of 31.5 million dollars, which should be divided equally between Songhees and Esquimalt. In doing so, more than CAD 2,000 per tribe member should never be paid out from a fund. With a total of 700 state-recognized tribal members of the two tribes, this results in 1.4 million.
Another $ 8.5 million, also split, will be used to purchase replacement land from the state owned. They must be in Victoria or Esquimalt, Langford , Colwood or View Royal and cover no more than the same area as the old property. Finally, 3 million are to be raised to cover legal fees and to implement the contractual agreements.
The votes were held at the beginning of 2007. The contract includes the surrender of the two tribes to the named area, but does not mean that they surrender their other traditional areas.
literature
- Grant Keddie: Songhees Pictorial. A History of the Songhees People as Seen by Outsiders (1790-1912) , Victoria 2003, ISBN 978-0-7726-4964-5
- John Lutz: Relating to the Country: The Lekwammen and the Extension of Settlement . In: Beyond the City Limits: Rural History in British Columbia , Ruth Sandwell (Ed.), University of British Columbia Press 1999, 17–32
- Brian David Thom: The Dead and the Living: Burial Mounds & Cairns and the Development of Social Classes in the Gulf of Georgia Region , The University of British Columbia 1992
Web links
- Songhees Nation site
- Traditional Territories of the Lekwungen
- Songhees Taxation: The Making of the Pole. ( Memento from August 28, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Make a totem pole .
- First Nations: Land Rights and Environmentalism in British Columbia, Coast Salish
See also
Remarks
- ↑ According to the information from the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development , First Nation Profiles: Songhees ( memento of the original from April 15, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
- ^ See: Ancient village in British Columbia threatened , in: Archaeo News, July 5, 2006 .
- ↑ See Donald H. Mitchell: Microblades: A Long-Standing Gulf of Georgia Tradition , in: American Antiquity, 33/1 (Jan 1968) 11-15. Curator Alan Haldenby and the chief archaeologist Keddie want to protect the oldest excavation site in Greater Victoria with a small wall and natural vegetation. It is intended to show that the Songhee culture was by no means static, but also showed a high degree of adaptability in the event of severe climate changes, in wars, in changes in trade routes, eating habits, etc.
- ↑ The documentation of these numerous finds is not very far advanced. Here are some photos: First Nations Burial Cairns on Great Race Rock Island . Darcy Mathews has been researching these mounds since 2006.
- ^ Brian Thom: The Dead and the Living: Burial Mounds & Cairns and the Development of Social Classes in the Gulf of Georgia Region . ( Memento from November 15, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) MA thesis
- ↑ named after the indigenous name of a girl who, according to legend, turned to stone at the Gorge Waters in what is now the harbor of Victoria. There is a shell midden next to the south side of the Tillicum Bridge near Kinsmen Park, which dates back around 4,000 years.
- ↑ Janis Ringuette: Beacon Hill Park History ( Memento from August 20, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ After: Janis Ringuette: Beakon Hill Park History . ( Memento of the original from August 20, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ This and the following from: First Nations in the City ( Memento of the original from August 13, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
- ↑ The published text: Minutes of Decision - Cowichan Agency-Saanich Tribe and f. (P. 303) ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
- ↑ More on this: Cowichan River Watershed Details ( Memento of the original from February 25, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ See article . In: The Vancouver Sun , November 25, 2006, canada.com ( Memento of the original from February 16, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ istar.ca ( Memento of the original from June 9th, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
