INDIANS OF MANHATTAN ISLAND 

 AND VICINITY. 



By Alanson Skinner, 



Formerly of the 

 Department of Anthropolog^y. 



INTRODUCTION. 



THl^HK is no subjoct which makes a more forceful apjx'al to the 

 student, the historian, or even the general reader, than that of 

 the native inhai)itants of what is now Greater >sew York; yet 

 there is no subject ui:)on which it is more (Ufficult to ol)tain infoimation, 

 for our Colonial ancestors have left us but few accounts of their observa- 

 tions, and these are in tomes that are rare and difficult of access. 



The aborigines themselves have so nearly passed into oblivion, that 

 no help can be obtained from their scattered and degenerate remnants in 

 exile in the w^est, so that we must turn to two sources for our knowledge: 

 the writings of the first white settlers, already mentioned, and the 

 archaeological remains, the imperishable objects of stone, cla}', bone and 

 antler, which the vanished red men have left behind them on their 

 ancient dwelling places. 



The writings of the Colonists tell us that in appearance the ]\Ian- 

 hattan and their neighbors w^ere tall and well-built, with black hair and 

 eyes and not unpleasing faces. Their disposition is noted as mild, except 

 when aroused, when they are said to have been very greedy of vengeance. 



The men shaved their heads, or rather burned off their hair with hot 

 stones, leaving often a standing roach of stiff black hair tw^o or three 

 inches high and as many broad, running from the forehead to the nape of 

 the neck, and the lock which hung from the crow^n was generally allowed 

 to grow much longer. This w'as the famous scalplock, which the warrior 

 cultivated in defiance of the enemy, who might take it if he could. Some- 

 times they wore a roach of red dyed deer hair, exactly similar to those 

 w^orn by the Sauk, Fox, Menomini, and other tribes of the Central West 

 today. Our Indians did not w^ear the feather war-bonnet so characteristic 

 of the Sioux and other tribes of the Great Plains, and which is now always 

 placed upon the Indians in the conventional drawings picturing the sale 

 of Manhattan Island. 



