BULL. 30] 



POISONS 



278 



no possibility of agriculture and no stream 

 nearer than the valley a mile away. Con- 

 sult Hewett in Bull. 32, B. A. E., 33, 

 1907. (e. l. h.) 



Poisons. Plant and animal poisons were 

 known generally among the Indians, this 

 knowledge growing out of the familiarity 

 with the environment characteristic of 

 American tribes. Plant poisons were 

 commonly employed as an aid in captur- 

 ing fish. The Cherokee pounded walnut 

 bark and threw it into small streams to 

 stupefy the fish so that they might be 

 easily dipped out in baskets as they 

 floated on the surface of the water 

 (Mooney). Among other Southeastern 

 Indians fishing was carried on by jjoison- 

 ing the streams with certain roots (a spe- 

 cies of Tephrosia was most commonly 

 used), so that the stujiefied fish could be 

 secured by means of bows and long-shafted 

 arrows (.Speck). Powers says of the Cali- 

 fornia Indians: " When the summer heat 

 dries up the streams to stagnant pools 

 they rub poisonous soap root in the water 

 until the fish are stupefied, when they 

 easily scoop them up, and the poison will 

 not affect the tough stomachs of the abor- 

 igines." The root is pounded fine and 

 mixed into the water; buckeyes were 

 used in the same manner by both western 

 and eastern Indians. Goddard states, 

 however, that the Hupa do not use fish 

 poisons. Heckewelder says that the Nan- 

 ticoke invented fish poison, and were re- 

 puted skilful in destroying human life by 

 means of poison. Obviously the use of 

 poison for taking human life is a subject 

 that yields little confirmatory evidence. 

 Powers states that he could not discover 

 that the Indians of California "ever used 

 poisons to any considerable extent to rid 

 themselves of their enemies; if they did, 

 it was the old shamans, and they kept 

 the matter a secret." He also says that 

 the Indians were very much afraid of 

 poison. According to Mooney, among 

 the Cherokee the poisonous wild parsnip 

 was used for conjuration and poisoning, 

 and individuals are said to have eaten it in 

 order tocommitsuicide. Pope(q. v.), the 

 leader of the Pueblo Indians in the insur- 

 rection of 1680, is said to have been killed 

 by poison, but the character of the poison 

 is not stated. Gushing says the Zuni 

 poisoned certain springs at the entrance 

 of their valley with yucca juice and cac- 

 tus spines, which caused suffering and 

 death among the forces of Diego de Var- 

 gas, as recorded by the narrators of his 

 expedition in 1692. Priests among the 

 Yokuts of California drank a decoction of 

 roots of Datura metaloides to produce re- 

 ligious frenzy, and this poisonous drink 

 sometimes caused death from overdose 

 (Powers ) . The Hopi, Navaho, and other 



3456— Bull. 30, pt 2—07 18 



tribes of the S. W. are acquainted with 

 the poisonous properties of the L»atura, 

 which the Hopi say was used by their 

 sorcerers. Arrow poison of vegetal and 

 animal origin was generally known. The 

 Lipan Apache dipped their arrows into 

 the sap of Yucca angusiifolia, which they 

 say is poisonous (Hoffman), and the Ka- 

 niagmiut Eskimo and the Aleut poisoned 

 their arrows and lance-points with a prep- 

 aration of aconite, by drying and pulver- 

 izing the root, mixing the powder with 

 water, and, when it fermented, applying 

 it to their weapons (Mason). The Rudo 

 Ensayo {ca. 1763) describes a i^lant, called 

 mago by the Opata of Sonora, the milk of 

 which was used by these Indians for ar- 

 row poison. The character indicates a 

 euphorbia. Castaneda relates that a 

 member of Coronado's expedition of 1540 

 was wounded by a poisoned arrow; "the 

 skin rotted and fell off until it left the 

 bones and sinews bare, with a horrible 

 smell. The wound was in the wrist, and 

 the poison had reached as far as the 

 shoulder when he was cured. The skin 

 on all this fell off." The antidote used 

 was the juice of the quince. The expe- 

 dition lost 17 men from arrow wounds 

 during a punitive raid in Sonora. ' ' They 

 would die in agony from only a small 

 wound, the bodies breaking out Avith an 

 insupportable pestilential stink." Hoff- 

 man says the Jova, Seri, Apache, Black- 

 feet, Kainah, Piegan, and Teton Sioux 

 employ rattlesnake venom. "The Sho- 

 shoni and Bannock Indians state that the 

 proper way to poison arrows, as formerly 

 practised by them, is to secure a deer and 

 cause it to be bitten by a rattlesnake, im- 

 mediately after which the victim is killed, 

 the meat removed and placed in a hole in 

 the ground. After the mass has become 

 putrid the arrowpoints are dipped into 

 it. By this method the serpent venom is 

 supposed to be the most essential in the 

 operation; but it is extremely doubtful if 

 the venom has time to fully enter into the 

 circulation in the short interval between 

 the time that the victim is bitten and 

 then killed. If the method was actually 

 practised by these Indians, as they affirm 

 it was, and onl}^ for the destruction of 

 noxious beasts, the poison of the putres- 

 cent matter may have caused death by 

 septicemia." Hoffman cites many other 

 instances of the use of arrow poison and 

 concludes that some of the Indian tribes 

 applied to their arrows harmful substances 

 which from observation they knew were 

 deadly. McGee asserts that the Seri did 

 not use arrow poison as such, but rather 

 as a substance which by magic power pro- 

 duced death and that this power was 

 given the substance through conjuration 

 employed in its preparation, though he 



