Tipatshimuna 
Description:
Cone-shaped bundle of fir twigs bound with commercial twine to a 5.5″ wooden spike. Twine is knotted to the top of the pin which is grooved and painted red. The twigs were used for tinder.
References:
Eleanor Leacock and Nan Rothschild (eds). 1994. Labrador Winter: the Ethnographic Journals of William Duncan Strong, 1927-1928. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press. Lucien M. Turner. 1979[1894]. Indians and Eskimos in the Quebec-Labrador Peninsula. Quebec: Presses COMEDITEX. James W. VanStone. 1985. Material Culture of the Davis Inlet and Barren Ground Naskapi: the William Duncan Strong Collection. Chicago: Field Museum of Natural History. Fieldiana, Anthropology New Series No.7. Frank Speck. 1977[1935]. Naskapi. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.
Innu Narrative:
“It’s the same game called tapanike but it is made out of boughs. These were always made too. You can only pick the boughs and tie them together.” Munik (Gregoire) Rich
“This is tapanikan (spike game) also, but it is made out of boughs. These boughs are tied together. I heard these were also sold to Mr. White. See these tree branches are tied together. This is similar to the one we looked at, but it’s made out of boughs. I heard that Mr. White was laughing at it when that was given to him. I heard that he was saying the boughs will get dried up and will not last. The boughs are dried up in this picture. I heard these were sold to him too. Maybe he just wanted to show it to the other places.” Matinen (Rich) Katshinak
“It is the same kind that we were looking at. The one Mishta-Penashue [Pinashue Benuen] made. The game where whoever can catch it the most is the winner. This one is dried up, when the boughs are dry. This is the one that my father, Tshishennish Pasteen uncle sold to Mr. White. I heard Mr. White tell him that it would get dry, and there would only be twigs left on it.” Uniam Katshinak
Other Info:
“They also have a game corresponding to ‘cup and ball’, but it is played with different implements from what the Eskimo use… The hollow cones are made from the terminal phalanges of the reindeer’s foot. The tail tied to the end of the thong is that of a marten or a mink. The player holds the peg in one hand, and tossing up the bones tries to catch the nearest bone on the point of the peg. The object of the game is to catch the bone the greatest possible number of times. It is in no sense a gambling game.” Turner (1979[1894]:159-160)
“Men playing cup and ball game most of the afternoon – four on a side – if they miss with one hand, use the other – miss with that, lose turn (pass on to the next one), side whose player runs up highest score wins. Sol ran up to two hundred – five straight my highest!” William Duncan Strong diary notes (quoted in Leacock and Rothschild, 1994:100)
“The Strong collection contains six examples of the widely distributed cup and pin game, three having cups made from a varying number of caribou phalanges cut to form cones which fit into one another. There is a hole through the point of each phalange. The point of the last one fits into the proximal end of a phalange which retains an articular surface. The cups are strung on a strip of caribou skin, to one end of which is fastened the tip of a caribou tail; a bone pin is tied to the other end… Two of these games consist of four phalanges, while one has six. The object of the game is to catch various parts of the phalanges on the end of the bone pin, with points being assigned to each part. The game was played either by individual players or by teams.” VanStone (1985:34-35)
See Speck (1977[1935]:201-202) for a lengthy discussion of the ring-and-pin divining game. “The Naskapi possess a form of the almost ubiquitous cup-and-ball game. This game is the perfection of the scheme by which the play performance of killing animals becomes influential in the real act. By constantly playing at killing, one will say, the killing is finally accomplished through sympathetic magic… It symbolizes the spearing of game, particularly the caribou, though among the Indians one would hardly suspect this seriousness of purpose amid the hilarity with which it is enjoyed. And I imagine that to many of the younger generation it has lost its significance. At Seven Islands it has the influence of ‘calling the caribou’. Wagering also goes with it. Among the different bands there is no variation in the manner of playing, but some irregularity in the counting values.”