nrLL. 30] 



YUROK 



1013 



Most of the so-called wars of the Yurok 

 were private feuds, participated in by vil- 

 lages. These took place as frequently 

 between Yurok villages as against alien 

 tribes. In all cases payment for the 

 dead and for all property destroyed was 

 made at the conclusion of peace. Apart 

 from a few vessels that touched at Trini- 

 dad in the 18th century, and a few trap- 

 pers that visited Klamath r., whites did 

 not come into contact with them and were 

 utterly unknown to them before 1850. 

 After the coming of the Americans the 

 Yurok never engaged in war with them as 

 a body, though certain villages became 

 involved in conflicts with the miners and 

 early settlers. The lower 20 m. of Kla- 

 math r. were constituted into a reservation 

 as early as 1855. Of recent years this 

 has been discontinued, the few surviving 

 Indians having allotments in severalty. 

 The river above this former reservation, 

 up to the mouth of the Trinity, forms at 

 present a nominal part of the Hupa res. 

 Actually the Government has interfered 

 very little with the Yurok, who have al- 

 ways been entirely self-supporting. They 

 now number 500 or 600 along Klamath r., 

 those on the coast being very few. In 

 1870 the number on the river was said to 

 be 2,700. 



The Yurok are fairly tall for Pacific 

 Coast Indians (168 cm. ) and considerably 

 above the average Californian in stature. 

 Their cephalic index is 83, being the 

 highest known from California. It is 

 probable that they do not belong to the 

 Californian type physically, but are a 

 mixture of this with an Athapascan type. 

 Their facial expression is different from 

 that of their neighbors, the Karok and 

 the Hupa, but they do not appear to differ 

 much in their measured proportions from 

 the Hupa. The men are less inclined to 

 be stout than in the interior and in cen- 

 tral California. Deformation of the head 

 is not practised, but the women tattoo 

 the chin. 



The Yurok, together with several other 

 tribes of n. w. California, especially the 

 Karok and Hupa, formed a distinct ethno- 

 graphic group, characterized among other 

 things by the considerable influence 

 which ideas of property exerted on social 

 conditions and modes of life. There was 

 no chieftainship, prominence depending 

 altogether on the possession of wealth, 

 to the acquisition of which all efforts 

 were directed. The iiotlatch of the n. 

 Pacific coast did not exist among them. 

 Marriage was distinctly a property trans- 

 action. The medium of exchange con- 

 sisted chiefly of dentalium shells, though 

 woodpecker scalps and large worked 

 pieces of obsidian were also regarded as 

 valuables. The men wore no regular 

 clothing, using skins as occasion required. 



The women wore skirts of dressed skins 

 or sometimes of l)ark, basketry caps, and, 

 as there was need, cloaks of furs. Along 

 the river acorns were much eaten, but 

 salmon and lampreys made up a very 

 large part of the food. Along the coast 

 products of the sea were more important 

 as food. The Yurok houses were from 

 18 to 25 ft square, built of split and 

 dressed planks about a square or octago- 

 nal pit, with a gabled rouf. Their canoes 

 were less than 20 ft in length, square at 

 both ends, made of redwood. They were 

 particularly adapted for use on the rapid 

 river, but were also used for going out to 

 sea. The Yurok and neighboring tribes 

 developed a number of specialized cere- 

 monies, especially the Deerskin and the 

 Jumping or Woodpecker dances. These 

 were held only at certain localities and 

 differed somewhat in each place. 



The mythology of the Yurok is char- 

 acterized by a well-developed conception 

 of the Wage, a race largely responsible 

 for the present condition of the world, 

 who disappeared before the coming of 

 men, and by myths centering about 

 " Widower-across-the-.«ea " and other cre- 

 ators or culture-heroes. All the myths 

 of the Yurok refer to the country which 

 they now^ inhabit, most of them being 

 very specifically localized. Historical 

 traditions are lacking except for the most 

 recent generations. Like all the tribes 

 of N. w. California they were essentially 

 unwarlike, engaging in war only for pur- 

 poses of revenge. The most important 

 contest that they remember took place in 

 the first third of the 19th century between 

 the village of Rekwoi and one of the Hupa 

 villages, in the course of which both set- 

 tlements were destroyed. 



The Yurok were altogether without 

 tribes or political divisions, other than 

 the purely local ones of villages, and 

 lacked totems. Their principal villages 

 on the Klamath, in their order, from 

 Bluff cr. down, were as follows: Atsepar, 

 Loolego, the three villages Pekwuteu, 

 Weitspus, and Ertlerger at the confluence 

 of the Trinity with the Klamath, Wakh- 

 shek, Atsep, Kenek, INIerip, Kepel, Shaa, 

 Murek, Meta, Nakhtskum, Shregegon, 

 Yokhter. Pekwan, Kootep, Wakhtek, 

 Wakhker, Tekta, Serper, Enipeu, Aj'otl, 

 Erner, Turip, Wakhkel, Hoopeu, and 

 Wetlko and Rekwoi on opposite sides of 

 the mouth of the river at Requa. On the 

 coast, 6 m. n. of the mouth, was Amen; 

 to the s. successively were Ashegen, 

 Eshpeu, Arekw, Tsahpekw, Oketo and 

 other villages on Big lagoon, and Tsurau 

 (Trinidad). 



Al-i-kwa. — Crooks vocab. in Cont. N. A. Ethnol.. 

 Ill, 461, 1877. AUequas. — Meyer, Nach dem Sacra- 

 mento, 21.5, 1855. Eurocs. — Powers in Overland 

 Mo., IX, 157, 1872. Kiruhikwak.— .\. L. Kroeber, 

 inf 'n, 1904 (name given by the Shasta of Salmon r. ). 



