Alaska Native Collections – Sharing Knowledge

2001

Estelle Oozevaseuk: This is a ceremonial headdress, a qaghpa. The men wore these. Even if the ceremony is not too important, they use it. We have nothing but a little strip for women with beads dangling, nasqughiitaq [head band]. The women always wore this when their husbands had killed a whale, when they took that ceremonial pail down to the beach filled with water. And while their husband is hollering, he’ll put his paddle down there and the women her pail up here. This [one holding pail] and this [one holding paddle], once in awhile they switch. And that “oh-ho-ho-ho-ho” the men holler, they told us not to abuse that, because this is only for the creator.

And also they used it for gift exchange time, with the people from Siberia or other tribes. They always use that when they dance. That’s reindeer mane hair. They got it from Siberia and made it into that. I’ve seen them wearing that. The bottom part is made with dyed skin.

They make a pattern, sometimes animal figures, on the edge according to their own art, on the bottom part. And that’s the only one they use when they dance in the gift exchange time. They kept it for a long time. This one is good.

Aron Crowell: Could you tell us a little bit more about the gift exchange dancing?

Estelle Oozevaseuk: That started with singing. That’s a kind of long. They used to tell us about that. I think before they do it, they make arrangements. Who to go and where, to whom they give their gifts. And they make beautiful things, the women do. For the men who are going to gift exchange, the women makes the beautiful things like fancy mukluks, mittens, all kinds of things, even a very nice parka, like fawn skin and intestines with fancy things for men. They have to give those [gut parkas] with auklet tufts and dyed baby seal hair for men’s trimming. They make some for women through the husbands. I don’t know what to call that, second time? Uwingwaaq [exchange husband].

It’s a kind of pretending. They called the woman when they exchanged nulighwaaq [exchange wife]. Especially the cousins did that or good friends. Nangsasaq [two men who exchanged their wives] is the men that are doing that.(1)

Aron Crowell: So at the dance, the wife would give gifts to the husband?

Estelle Oozevaseuk: This man’s wife dance with that uwingwaaq. They dance together, and they have something to give, mostly handmade. Handmade is the thing that even now is very important to give as a gift to the person that we have to give to. And I think it shows the good sewing of the women, just like comparing to see who is a good sewer. They try to make good things that have to be exchanged, like the ones that came from different parts, like Siberia.

[From discussion with Jacob Ahwinona, Estelle Oozevaseuk, Marie Saclamana and Branson Tungiyan (Kawerak, Inc.) at the National Museum of Natural History and National Museum of the American Indian, 5/07/2001-5/11/2001. Also participating: Aron Crowell and Bill Fitzhugh (NMNH) and Suzi Jones (AMHA).]

1. According to St. Lawrence Island Yupik Elder Vera Kaneshiro, husband and wife exchanges came to St. Lawrence Island with Chukchi immigrants. The terms are words of Chukchi origin. It was done when couples were childless with the hope of enabling the woman to become pregnant.

The taking of a bowhead whale during the annual spring hunt is one of the most important events of the year on St. Lawrence Island. Beyond the value of the whale as food, its death is rich with spiritual and social meaning. Today people offer Christian prayers of thanksgiving and treat the animal with great respect. They feel that the whale gives itself to the hunters and allows itself to be killed.(1) In former times (before about 1930) the whale was honored with three days of song and ritual.(2) People wore special clothing, like this reindeer hair headdress for a whaling captain’s wife.

When a whale was killed, the hunters circled the animal as the captain raised his paddle and shouted out to thank God (Apa, “Grandfather”) that the animal had been captured. The tips of the tail and flukes were cut away and given to the sea as a sacrifice.

When the whale had been towed back to the village, the boat captain’s wife came down to the edge of the ice.

She wore a reindeer hair headdress on the side of her head unless her husband had killed ten whales or more; then she wore it on top.(3) Lincoln Blassi said that she twisted reindeer hair into her braid as “as a symbol of the whale taken.”(4) The whaler’s wife wore a man’s style of fancy intestine snowshirt or a one-piece reindeer coverall, called a qallevak. In this and other aspects of the ceremony there were variations between the practices of different clans.

The boat captain’s wife carried a wooden bucket that contained water, small pieces of whale blubber, or roseroot, a plant gathered in summer.(5) In the greeting ceremony, she raised and lowered the bucket while her husband and the striker (harpooner) did the same with their paddles. The men rocked the boat and again gave the whale-catch cry. They shared the food and drink that the captain’s wife had brought, and then the striker threw his harpoon into the snow between her feet.

All of the captain’s clan participated in distribution of the whale meat and the singing, story telling, and ceremonies that followed.

One important act was the “feeding” of the whale by the captain’s wife. The animal’s eyes and nose, and parts of its flukes and flippers, were laid out to make an image of its body, and a fire was built in front of the nose. The captain’s wife offered water, roseroot and whale blubber to this image from her pail, and put bits of meat in the fire to feed the ancestors.(6)

1. Jolles 2002:291-98

2. Blassi 1985:217-223; Hughes 1984:274-275; Silook 1976:18-20

3. Silook 1976:19

4. Blassi 1985:217

5. Blassi 1985-87:217; Silook 1976:19

6. Silook 1976:19; Hughes 1984:275