ABORIGINAL USE OF WOOD IN NEW YORK 12J 



implement derived from the whites. Father Bruyas has but one 

 allusion to it in his Mohawk words : " Wahannakunnniont. He made 

 a pike or spear enter." It was little used in war, but found an 

 appropriate place in fishing. At a much earlier day it must have 

 been frequent, judging from the abundance of large stone points. 



A shield was part of a warrior's full equipment when he had 

 only arrows to face, but it was soon disused when found not bullet- 

 proof. Other defensive armor went with it. When Champlain met 

 the Mohawks in 1609, he said: "The Iroquois were greatly aston- 

 ished seeing two men killed so instantaneously, notwithstanding they 

 were provided with arrow proof armor, woven of cotton thread and 

 wood." 



Van Curler saw a sham fight in the fourth Mohawk castle, Dec. 

 23, 1634, which he thought rough. " Some of them wore armor 

 and helmets that they make themselves of thin reeds and strings 

 so well that no arrow or ax can pass through to wound them." 

 Wilson, p.91 



A missionary in Lower Canada in 1633 was surprised at a shield 

 he saw: 



He bore with him a very large buckler, very long and very wide ; 

 it covered all my body easily, and went from my feet up to my chest. 

 They raise it and cover themselves entirely with it. It was made 

 of a single piece of very. light cedar; I do not know how they can 

 smooth so large and wide a board with their knives ; it was a little 

 bent or curved in order the better to cover the body, and in order 

 that the strokes of arrows or of blows coming to split it should not 

 carry away the piece, he had sewed it above and below with cord 

 of skin : they do not carry these shields on the arm ; they pass the 

 cord which sustains them over the right shoulder, protecting the 

 left side ; and when they have aimed their blow they have only to 

 draw back the right side to cover themselves. Relation, 1633 



Daniel Gookin, an early New England writer, mentioned Indian 

 shields. " Their weapons heretofore were bows and arrows, clubs 

 and tomahawks, made of wood like a pole-axe, with a sharpened 

 stone fastened therein ; and for defence, they had targets, made of 

 barks of trees." Gookin, 1:152 



In New York, Van der Donck said, " their weapons were formerly 

 bows and arrows, with a war-club hung to the arm, and a square 



