Tipatshimuna 
Description:
one pin with hole bored at base through which a rawhide thong (approximately 15 long) is knotted.Thong is slipped through 9 conical bone thimbles which fit over pin, and knotted at end. A tag bearing the no. 29 is tied to the thong.
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:
Oh, yes! I used to make this. But I can’t remember the name of it. But it’s a game called tapanake – pin game. Whoever pins the most wins the game. But if you miss one, you lose the game – Pinashue Benuen.
My grandfather used to make this. This is tapanikan. You try to put the spike through in the thimbles. It rattles too. The bones rattled – Matinen (Rich) Katshinak.
Yes, tapanike. This is made out of caribou bone. My late brother Napeu [Sam Napeu] used to make them. He made them very good. The end part is [made from] used by caribou tail. This game is counted to 100 points (whoever can spike one hundred times first). My brother made them – nice ones – Munik (Gregoire) Rich.
This is tapanike, for who can catch the most thimbles. Whoever knew how to play this, and we don’t know how, that person is the winner, because he caught the most thimbles. Some people were really good at this game – 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.”