314 



COAHUILTECAN 



[b. a. e. 



clubs by the Iroquois and the Indians of 

 North Carohna, forming a weapon Uke 

 the Aztec maquahuitl (Morgan, League of 

 Iroquois, 359, 1851). 



A series of interesting paddle-shaped 

 clubs, ancient and modern, often with 

 carved handles, are found in the culture 

 area of the Salishan tribes. They are 

 from 18 to 24 in. long, made of bone, stone, 

 wood, and, rarely, copper. Shorter clubs, 

 that could be concealed about the person, 

 were also used. Le Moyne figures paddle- 

 shaped clubs that were employed by Flo- 

 ridian tribes which in structure and 

 function suggest a transition toward the 

 sword. 



Outside the Pueblos few missile clubs 

 are found. Most Indian clubs are fur- 

 nished with a thong for the wrist, and 

 others have pendants, often a cow's tail, a 

 bunch of hawk or owl feathers, or a single 

 eagle feather. 



The stone-headed clubs were usually 

 made by paring thin the up{)er end of a 

 wooden staff, bending it round the stone 

 in the groove, and covering 

 the withe part and the rest 

 of the staff with wet raw- 

 hide, which shrank in drying 

 and held all fast. In many 

 cases, especially on the plains, 

 the handle was 

 inserted in a 

 socket bored in 

 the stone head, 

 but this, it 

 would seem, is 

 a modern ]>roc- 

 ess. The head 

 of the slung- 

 shot club was a 

 round or oval 

 stone, entirely 

 inclosed in 

 rawhide, and 

 the handle was 

 so attached as 

 to leave a plia- 

 ble neck, 2 or 

 3 ill. long, between the head and the up- 

 per end of the handle, also inclosed in 

 rawhide. 



The heads of the rigid clubs were of 

 hard stone, grooved and otherwise worked 

 into shape, in modern times often double- 

 pointed and polished, catlinite being 

 sometimes the material. The pemmican 

 maul had only one working face, tlie 

 other end of the stone being capped with 

 rawhide. The hide-working maul fol- 

 lowed the form of the typical club, but 

 was usually much smaller. 



The trilies of British Columbia and s. 

 E. Alaska made a variety of clubs for 

 killing slaves, enemies, salmon, seal, etc., 

 and for ceremony. These clubs were 



TSIMSHIAN WAR 

 CLUB OF WOOD 

 1-12. (nib 



Stone ; 1-7. 

 lack) 



usually handsomely carved, inlaid, and 

 painted. The Eskimo did not make clubs 

 for war, but a few club-like mallets of 

 ivory and deer-horn in theirdomestic arts. 



Mauls resembling clubs, and which 

 could be used as such on occasion, were 

 found among most tribes, the common 

 form being a stone set on a short handle 

 by means of rawhide, employed by women 

 for driving stakes, beating bark and hide, 

 and pounding pemmican. 



Ceremonial clubs and batons (q. v.) 

 were used, though few specimens of these 

 now exist. The chief man of the M ohave 

 carried a potato-masher-shaped club in 

 battle, and clubs of similar shape have 

 been found in caves in s. Arizona. The 

 Zuiii employ in certain ceremonies huge 

 batons made of agave flower stalks, 

 as well as some of their ordinary club 

 weapons, and in the New-lire ceremony 

 of the Hopi a 

 priest carries an 

 agave-stalk club 

 in the form of a 

 plumed serpent 

 (Fewkes). Bat- 

 ons were often 

 carried as badges 

 of office by cer- 

 tain officers of 

 the Plains tribes 

 and those of the 

 N. W. coast. 

 Ca])tain John 

 Smith describes 

 clubs 3 ells long. 

 The coup stick 

 was often a cere- 

 monial club. It 

 is noteworthy 

 that the parry- 

 ing club was not 



known in America. See Batont^, 

 mers, Rabbit-sticks, Tomahawks. 



Consult Boas in Rep. Nat. Mus. 1895, 

 1897; Knight, Savage Weapons at the 

 Centennial, Smithson. Rep. 1879, 1880; 

 Moorehead, Prehist. Impls., 1900; Mor- 

 gan, Leagueof the Iroquois, 1904; Niblack 

 in Rep. Nat. Mus. 1888, 1890; Nelson in 

 18th Rep. B. A. E., 1899; Smith in Mem. 

 Am. INIus. Nat. Hist., 1903. (w. h.) 



Coahuiltecan. A name adopted by 

 Powell from the tribal name Coahuilteco 

 used by I'imentel and Orozco y Berra to 

 include a group of small, supposedly cog- 

 nate tribes on both sides of the lower 

 Rio Grande in Texas and Coahuila. The 

 family is founded on a slender basis, and 

 the name isgeographicrather than ethnic, 

 as it is not applied to any tribe of the 

 group, while most of the tribes included 

 therein are extinct, only meager remnants 

 of some two or three dialects being pre- 

 served. Pimentel ( Lenguas, ii, 409, 1865 ) 



R Killing Slaves; 

 (niblack) 



Ham- 



