ETHNOLOGY OF THE COAST INDIAN TRIBES OF ALASKA. 

 BY l NSIGN A. P. NIBLACK, U. S. N. 



The strip of coasl territory extending from Puget Sound to Cape 

 Saint Eliasand bordered on the east by the Cascade range of mountains, 

 known in general as the Northwest Coast, is a continuous archipelago 



about 1,000 miles .Ion-' and 150 miles broad. Through its narrow chan- 

 nels winds the steamer route to Sitka, and dotted along- its shores are 

 the picturesque winter villages of the Coast Indian tribes, an ethnic 

 group, corresponding to one of Bastian's geographical areas, materially 

 (littering not only from the hunting Indians of the interior, but in them- 

 selves presenting some of the most interesting problems in anthropology. 

 The northern Indians of this region, comprising the Tlingit, Ilaida, and 

 Tsiiiishiaii, may be called the wood carving group; and the southern 

 Indians, the Kwakiutl, Wakashan, and Coast Salish, the cedar-bark 

 -roup, sud) designations being based on the peculiarities of each in the 

 use of wood and cedar bark, respectively, for industrial, ceremonial, and 

 other purposes. 



There have been three semi-official estimates of the Tlingit tribes of 

 Alaska. The earliest is that in the archives of the Hudson Bay Com- 

 pany under Sir dames Douglas (1839), made by Mr. John Work, a fac- 

 tor of the company. The total as given, including the Kaigani tribes 

 of the Haidan stock, and adding on the Sitka and Hoonyah, which were 

 omitted, is 8,975. In 1861 Lieutenant Welirman, of the Russian Navy, in 

 the employ of the Russian- American Company, compiled a census, of 

 Tlingit and Kaigani, giving the total population of free and slaves as 

 8,597. The third estimate appears in the Census Report of 1880, and 

 places the Tlingit and Kaigani population at 7,225. That the enum- 

 eration is faulty goes without saying, when no real attempt was made 

 to actually count them. What is needed is a census takeu in the wiuter 

 when the Indians are gathered in the villages, and it should include the 

 enumeration of the different sub-totems and totems composing the great 

 phratries of these tribes. This should be supplemented by an accurate 

 plotting of the Indian hunting and fishing grounds which have been 

 held in the different families and handed down for generations. A col- 

 lection of the various myths and traditions, with all the local variations, 

 and a stay of the significance of the carved wooden columns in the vil- 

 lages is also needed to throw light upon their intricate totemic system. 

 The semi religious sects and the elaborate ceremonials and dances 

 would in themselves constitute a special branch of study. In the U. S. 

 National Museum is a magnificent collection of ethnological material 

 from this region. What is needed is a systematic governmental super- 

 vision of the collection of anthropological data, and a comparison of re- 

 of results with those obtained in the southern portion of this region 

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