Pipe

Description:

Narrow wooden stem tapers for insertion into base of bowl, grooved approximately 2.5″ from stem. Bone bowl conically shaped with rectangular base to hold stem and a pierced keel-shaped bottom through a rawhide thong is passed and knotted around the top of the bowl there is a circle of orange paint made from natural rock. The base of the bowl is also painted orange.

References:

Frank Speck. 1977[1935]. Naskapi. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Lucien M. Turner. 1979[1894]. Indians and Eskimos in the Quebec-Labrador Peninsula. Quebec: Presses COMEDITEX. Roland Tremblay (personal communication, March 18, 2004). Lynn Drapeau. 1999. Dictionnaire Montagnais-français. Sainte-Foy: Presses de l’Université du Québec.

Innu Narrative:

“I used a willow, and what they called soapstone [for the bowl]. I just screwed this little pipe part into this. We call this “ussin.” Pinashue Benuen

“This is a pipe. The beads are hanging from the bottom. I used to make one like it. My father, Shushepish (late Joseph Rich) made pipes too. He made one before, and I decorated it for him with beadwork. I hung the beads on the bottom. This one does not have beadwork. He smoked it (Shushepish). There is a certain type of tobacco that is used for smoking this pipe. Only the elders smoked with the pipe. Stone was used to make pipes. It’s called ashiniu-ushpuakan (stone pipe or soapstone). I heard these were sold to Mr. White and decorated with beads too. But this one on this picture had no beadwork on it, and maybe this one was made a long time ago.  The stone was used too. There is a lot ushpuakan ashini (pipe stone or soapstone) around Davis Inlet. It’s around the shoreline by the ocean. There are pieces everywhere that people gathered. Your grandfathers, Katshinak (late Uniam Katshinak) and Shushepish made ushpuakan ashini (soapstone pipes) and I decorated them with beads [photos available of these men smoking pipes taken by Ray Webber]. They were asked to make the pipes, and they sold them. And they made a lot of pipes.” Matinen (Rich) Katshinak

“This is a real ushpuake (pipe), and the other one is ashiniushpuake (stone pipe).” Munik (Gregoire) Rich

“Yes, it must be a bone. The stem is called uessin.” Pinamen (Rich) Katshinak

This is ushpuke ashinin (soapstone pipe). [ushpuakan – pipe; ashini – rock].”  Uniam Katshinak

Other Info:

MacKenzie lists uapekaikan-ashini and unapishkanikanashini as “soapstone”. She lists ussimashku as “stem of a pipe.”

“Like all other Indians, these people are inordinately fond of tobacco for smoking, chewing, and snuff; the latter, however, is used only by aged individuals, especially the females… The men consider a supply of tobacco of as much importance as the supply of ammunition for the prosecution of the chase. The first request upon meeting an Indian is that you furnish him with a chew or a pipe full… The first thing that an Indian receives when arriving at the trading post is a clay pipe and a plug of tobacco.” Turner (1979[1894]:138)

“The pipes used for smoking are made of stone obtained from river pebbles, usually a fine-grained compact sandstone… Other pipes are of hard slate and very dark without markings… The stem is of spruce wood and is prepared by boring a small hole through the stick lengthwise and whittling it down to the required size. It is from 4 to 8 inches long and is often ornamented with a band of many colored beads. The rough stone for a pipe is selected and chipped into crude form. The successive operations of wearing it down to the desired size are accomplished by means of a course file or a harder stone. The amount of labor bestowed upon a pipe consumes several days’ time before the final polish is given. The value set upon these pipes is according to the color of the stone, as much as the amount of labor expended in making them.” Turner (1979[1894]:139)

“The ornamentations consist of cruciform and quadrate figures on the handle. The tobacco used for smoking is the commonest black plug of very inferior quality, soaked with molasses and licorice. This moist tobacco is cut into pieces and a coal of fire placed upon it. They prefer this quality, and purchase the lighter and drier kinds only to serve as kindling for the darker sort.” Turner (1979[1894]:140)

“That the smoking of tobacco is an instrumentality of magic among the Montagnais-Naskapi is apparent from several sources. And yet tobacco smoking has come into their life only since the advent of Europeans into the north. No tobacco was raised by them nor was the fashioning of stone pipes possible without metal tools. The Hudson’s Bay Company in the eighteenth century may be logically regarded as the source of introduction, this being apparently the only avenue of barter through which the weed could have reached their hands in the quantities demanded. Tobacco now forms one of the most important materials with which the hunters throughout the peninsula supply themselves from the trader’s stock.” Speck (1977[1935]:225-226)

“While we cannot readily conclude what were the forms of the original smoking pipes supplied to these Indians, it seems apparent that among the different bands of the peninsula distinctive shapes and proportions came into vogue when they began to make them for themselves.” Speck (1977[1935]:226)

“In the various dialects of the peninsula to smoke is termed pi’tua’n, the pipe is (u)cpwa’gan, when of stone specifically designated as acini’ucpwa’gan, ‘stone pipe’, and tobacco, tc’stema’u.” Speck (1977[1935]:226)

“The beaded ornaments appearing in some form on practically all ceremonial pipes attaching the stem to the bowl, are an illustration of the mantu’s power in beads reinforcing the power of the act of smoking.” Speck (1977[1935]:226)

“Smoking is substantially a means for gratifying the soul-spirit…Its results, namely, the dizziness experienced by inhalation, the narcotic effects in general, are to them the proofs of its influence upon the heart, the Great Man, or soul-spirit…During the intervals given to meditation concerning the problems of gaining material subsistence, the hunter indulges in smoking his stone pipe. For, despite the almost universal adoption of the wooden pipes sold them by the traders, some of the more conservative individuals possess the native-made stone pipes which to them represent the proper means for inducing the sensations from smoking that they associate with spiritualism…apart from its psychic aspects smoking has become a common habit, a profanity indeed, among the northern Indians of all ages and both sexes. It is chiefly in connection with the stone pipes that the practice holds to its religious foundations.” Speck (1977[1935]:227)