Tooker] ETHNOGRAPHY OF THE HURON 7*1 



Squashes (pumpkins) were prepared by cooking them under the 

 ashes (JR 10: 103; 15: 163; S 72; C 131) or by boiling them (S 72; 

 Cl31).i^ 



No salt was used (S 80, 112) .^^ 



SEASONAL CYCLE 



The various economic activities of the Huron took them away from 

 the village for much of the year. In the spring, the people left the 

 village to engage in various summer occupations; trading, hunting, 

 fishing, warfare, and agriculture ( JR 8 : 143 ; 10 : 51-53 ; 14 : 57 ; 16 : 

 249; 17: 99, 103, 115). The men spent the spring and summer trad- 

 ing; the women spent these months in the fields (JR 13: 11) and at 

 least some of them lived in houses near these fields ( JR 8 : 143 ; 14 : 49 ; 

 20 :39 ; cf . JR 20 : 45 — house occupied when snowing) . Fishing, most 

 important in the fall, was followed by a hunting season. The people 

 returned to the village about December (JR 8 : 143; cf. JR 15 : 113 — 

 return from fishing in December; JR 19: 125 — about All Saints' 

 the people returned from trading expeditions to live in the houses 

 until spring) .^^ [There is an example in the Jesuit Relations of a man 

 going to trade in the fall ( JR 17 : 79-81) .] Perhaps it was this sea- 

 sonal movement that led the Jesuits to say that the Huron regulated 

 "the seasons of the year by the wild beasts, the fish, the birds, and the 

 vegetation." Years, days, and months were counted by the moon 

 (JR 15: 157) .20 



The dispersal of the Huron from spring until summer hampered 

 the work of the Jesuit missionaries. In the summer, they could not 

 do their proselytizing, as the people were not in the villages ( JR 8 : 

 143 ; 10 : 53 ; 13 : 11) and so spent their time in spiritual exercises and 

 in compiling a dictionary and grammar of the Huron language ( JR 

 10 : 55 ; cf . JR 14 : 9 — from the 20th of February to Passion week of 

 1638 the chief occupation of the Jesuits was the study of the Huron 

 language). In the winter, the missionaries' difficulties were of a 

 different type. There were many people in the villages, but with 

 supplies for the winter gathered in and with much leisure, the Huron 



"The Iroquois also prepared squashes by boiling or baking them (Jackson 1830 b: 

 18 ; Parker 1910 b : 92 ; Waugh 1916 : 114). 



"Beauchamp (1895: 214) says that it is well known that the Iroquois did not orig- 

 inally use salt. Even today, at least at Tonawanda, dishes made according to old Iroquois 

 recipes do not contain salt, although the Indians liberally salt them before eating (see also 

 Speck 1949 : 41 ; Waugh 1916 : 150 ; Shimony 1961 a : 188 says that food now Is salted 

 on the Six Nations Reserve). Waugh (1916: 152) suggests the ashes added to boiled 

 corn by the Huron was a substitute for salt. 



1* The seasonal cycle of the Iroquois was probably similar. From harvest to Midwinter, 

 the Iroquois participated in the fall hunt, returning to the village in time for Midwinter. 

 They stayed in the village until early spring. Then they left to go to sugar-brush sites, 

 for a longer period in March and April to hunt pigeon at pigeon roosts, and to fish at 

 nearby fishing sites (Fenton 1951 b : 42 ; see notes 98, p. 62, and 99, p. 65). 



20 The Iroquois count months by the moon (Waugh 1916 : 32-36). 



