20 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 190 



DEESS 



Tlie Indians wore little apparel and often painted, oiled, and 

 greased their bodies and hair (JR 15: 155; S 228). For clothing, 

 the Huron used dressed and well-prepared deer and beaver skins which 

 they obtained from the animals they took or from trade with other 

 Indians (C 53, 85, 131-132). The basic garment was a single 

 beaver skin worn over the shoulders or back as a mantle and, 

 in winter, "shoes" and leggings of skin (JR 15:155; 17:39). A 

 tobacco pouch hung behind the back (JR 15: 155). Their breeches 

 [breechclout] were made of a moderately large deer skin and their 

 leggings, which reached as high as the waist and had many folds, 

 were made of another piece of skin. Moccasins were made of the 

 skins of deer, bear, and beaver. A robe was worn as a cloak and 

 sleeves were attached with a cord behind. Wlien they went into the 

 fields, they girded up their robes about their bodies; when in the 

 village, their robes were ungirded and they left off the sleeves (C 131- 

 132). This rather simple dress had its advantages: when a canoe 

 containing two Indians overturned, a Huron convert dressed in the 

 conventional French manner drowned, whereas his Algonquin com- 

 panion threw off his robe and saved himself by swimming to safety 

 (JR 16: 177-179). 



The trimmings for their clothes consisted of pale bands made of 

 glue and the scrapings of skins alternating with bands of red and 

 brown paint (C 132-133). On their robes they [it is not clear if the 

 Huron are being referred to here] put bands of porcupine quills dyed a 

 fine scarlet color. These bands were highly valued and might be de- 

 tached and put on other robes, or used to decorate the face (C 133). 

 Some of the men put feathers in their hair and some made little ruffs 

 of down to wear around their necks (S 145) . Some had frontlets made 

 of the longest snake skins, the tails of which hung behind as long as 

 two French ells or a yard or more (S 145, 235), 



The women dressed as the men, except that they always bound up 

 their robes, which extended to the knee (C 134). A small piece of 

 leather was girded around their loins and hung down to mid-thigh 

 (S 66). Women were not ashamed to expose their bodies from the 

 waist up and from the mid-thigh down (C 134).-^ 



Around their necks and arms, the Huron wore bead necklaces and 

 bracelets of wampum. Beads were also worn from their ears and in 

 their hair (JR 15: 155). Some wampum was strung to make neck- 



25 Iroquois ornamentation, dress, and liair styles were similar to those of the Huron 

 and remained so for at least two centuries after European contact. The major changes 

 during this period were the substitution of cloth for skins, the addition of a shirt to the 

 men's usual costume and an overblouse to the women's, and the addition of new types of 

 ornaments, most notably, silverwork, to the costume (see Jackson 1830 b : 14-15 ; Morgan 

 1850: 69-70, 87-94; 1852: 88-97, 110-111; 1901(1) : 252-257; 1901(2) : 11-13, 38-39, 

 46-56 ; Shimony 1961 a : 160). 



