Bears

Archaeological and Ethnohistorical Perspectives in Native Eastern North America

Heather A. Lapham, Gregory A. Waselkov

• Publisher: University of Florida Press
• Year: 2024
• Print ISBN: 9781683404354, 9781683401384
• eBook ISBN: 9781683404422
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Zoology
• Index: Social Sciences

Highlighting the role of bears in Indigenous societies of North America 

Although scholars have long recognized the mythic status of bears in Indigenous North American societies of the past, this is the first volume to synthesize the vast amount of archaeological and historical research on the topic. Bears charts the special relationship between the American black bear and humans in eastern Native American cultures across thousands of years. These essays draw on zooarchaeological, ethnohistorical, and ethnographic evidence from nearly 300 archaeological sites from Quebec to the Gulf of Mexico. Contributors explore the ways bears have been treated as something akin to another kind of human—in the words of anthropologist Irving Hallowell, “other than human persons”—in Algonquian, Cherokee, Iroquois, Meskwaki, Creek, and many other Native cultures. Case studies focus on bear imagery in Native art and artifacts; the religious and economic significance of bears and bear products such as meat, fat, oil, and pelts; bears in Native worldviews, kinship systems, and cosmologies; and the use of bears as commodities in transatlantic trade. The case studies in Bears demonstrate that bears were not only a source of food, but were also religious, economic, and political icons within Indigenous cultures. This volume convincingly portrays the black bear as one of the most socially significant species in Native eastern North America. 

Contributors:  Ralph Koziarski | Megan C. Kassabaum | Louis-Vincent Laperrière-Désorcy | J. Lynn Funkhouser | Heather A. Lapham | Hannah O’Regan | Christian St-Pierre | David Mather | DR Tanya M. Peres | Claire St-Germain | Barnet Pavao-Zuckerman | Heather Altman | Terrance Joseph Martin | Thomas Berres | J. Matthew Compton | Ashley Peles | Gregory A. Waselkov

 A volume in the Florida Museum of Natural History: Ripley P. Bullen Series

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• Introduction
• 1. Ethnohistorical and Ethnographic Sources on Bear-Human Relationships in Native Eastern North America
• 2. “Dear, Honored Guest”: Bear Ceremonialism in Minnesota
• 3. The Great White Bear in Cosmology, Myth, Imagery, and Ritual
• 4. The Multifaceted Bear: Spiritual and Economic Roles of Bears in Meskwaki Society
• 5. Use of Black Bears in the Western Great Lakes Region and the Riddle of the Perforated Bear Mandibles
• 6. Black Bears and the Iroquoians: Food, Stories, and Symbols
• 7. In Feast and Famine: New Perspectives on Black Bears in the Southern Appalachians and Piedmont, AD 1000–1800
• 8. Better than Butter: Yona Go’i, Bear Grease in Cherokee Culture
• 9. Bears, Bear Grounds, and Bovines in the Lower Southeast
• 10. Reexamining the Evidence for Bear Ceremonialism in the Lower Mississippi Valley
• 11. Menageries and Bearskin Caps: Experiencing North American Bears in Postmedieval Britain
• 12. Bear-Human Relationships in Native Eastern North America: An Overview of Archaeological and Ethnohistorical Evidence
• References Cited
• List of Contributors
• Index
• Ripley P. Bullen Series