As promised, i will propose a summary of my north america culture discoveries, particularily about the totem poles, with few drawings, explanations and serious comments.
When i say totem pole, i think that you have in mind this huge sculpted trunk with a sort of animlal stacking, so this is the totem pole and you allready saw one in a BD, book or maybe in real ! But do you have some idea how that works, what that means or how to read it ?
Totems, or "totem poles" can be found in a particular place in the canada west Coast called the « British Columbia » (Near Vancouver, where the 2010 olympic games will take place). The totems are called « chiefs » over there by the tribes members, and if you want to know more about theses after reading this near-to-reality article, you had to go over there? If it's a bit too far for you, i can suggest you the « musée du quai Branly » in Paris (tips if you go there : first sunday of the month, almost all museums are free in paris, except during summer), but if it's still too far i really can't say where you can find one in ireland !!!
A totem's life ?
The totem is made from Cedar (not the lebanese's one, but those wich come from canada, it's bigger and stronger than maple). It's carved with manual tool (not with bare hands) by experts of wood-carving. Once put in the ground and standing proudly in the landscape, no one is permitted to take care of it : no wood stain, neither stell cables for straighten it up.
It's like a man's life : the totem have a birth and death.
Life is about 80 years (clike the turtles), but it can be shorter (60-50 years, like jackO), if the trunk is exposed to rough weather, and 120 years if it's in a protected area, and finally an eternal life if it is put into a museum (Like Vladimir illitch oulianov), but this is not the true place of a totem
Different kind of totems ?
There are different types of totems. The most known are theses big poles of 15 meters high, but here the full list of totem's and their use :
- The Welcome totem pole. (Working like a «Welcome»doormat on the doorstep of your apartment).
- The House totem, wich is used to support the marquee of the tepee, they often goes by couple like for the big top of the circus tent.
- The totem in front of the house, in the garden, used for watching in the distance and see if troubles are on their way to the house. (nowadays, cctv camera are used for this task)
- The totem door : we go through the totem wich is carved in a very large tree. It is used for the main door of the tent.
- Mémorial totem. This is the famous one, wich require something like one year for the preparation. Some recent totems habe been crafted with mechanical process with several trunks stacked, reaching the 50 meters. They are huge but are not genuine totem in a sense that they had to be build with human forces.
- The mortuary totem. (To collect the ashes, working exactly the same way as a funeral urn).
-
The commercial pole(commissioned, for the museums.., this one has absloutely no meaning or signification).
- And the last one : the shame pole, used for ridiculized someone, or to denounce slavery or the past that amercian white did to the natives.
The 3 carvings tribes
3 sort of totems have been found in the northern amercia, with different styles due to the tools used. If you see a real pole, you will see the origin of the totem with the name of the tribe written on the little plate beside the pole.
- Haïda, these are really monumental, with a ratio between head and body of ½.
- Tsimshian. Theses are carved 360° and are painted qith colors like red and black. Ratio between head and body is 1/3.
- Tlingit. Ore colorfull with red black, blue and green.
Party totem
Erecting a totem is not something easy to do. This is done when there is a special event to celebrate such as a weeding, death ot birth. One year is required to prepare the totem pole, find the trunk, carve it, but you have also to prepare the big party and get enough food for the « potlatch", wich is a several days party where all the tribe come. Those who want to erect a totem have to be rich as well and they are on a general manner the tribe's chief or thoses who did well with the furs market during the 1800-1860, a golden age of the totems (but no one of this era is still standing)
So, doing a totem is not free and should be connected to a particular event.
Vertical Reading
We comonly start to read a totem from the ground to the top, but it's false : the most important character is a the top, generally represented by his totem animal, the people for whom the totem have been done stand at the top. Most of the times is there mystical bird, an eagle or thunderbird carved at the top, and rarely a frog or a rabbit....
What's the story about ?
So we have seen that there are several stacked animals, mammiferous, fish, insect , plant and natural phenomenom. Well the totem is a compilation of all theses character to tell a story, a real story or tales from the north american culture. I've put a list of the main characters found in a totem
- The Thunderbird. (wich makes the sound of thunder when it flaps his wings)
- The Kolus (the thunderbird cousin)
- The Hokw-Hokw (Terrific bird who like to eat brains)
- The sea snake (wich can bring good and evil)
- Dzoonokwa (this is a very tall hairy woman living in the forrests of canada. She do "Ooh Ooh" to scare the people, but showing herself is more frightening. She is also called bigfoot" and "sasquatch".
- The watchmen Ctheses little mens have very strong power and are most of the time on the top of the pole.They are the protector of the tribe and can see the danger coming from abroad. We can identify the strength of the chief with measurung the height of their hats.
- 2 birds i've forgot to write the name down. As the crow isn't in the list, i think theses are the crow, with a beak in different position : looking up and down. The crow is largely used in the totem poles
- The eagle. The beak is curved and there are two orifices on it.(we don't find theses orifices on the other birds).
- Falcon /Hawk . Well, ok if it's not obvious to see the difference between eagle and falcon, furthermore is the translation between hawk and falcon not so obvious as well. The classification of birds is slightly different between europe and america, and theses terms don't design a particular bird but a family of birds. Anyway, this one don't have orifices in the beak when carved, so this will help to make the difference.
- The bear we can recognize the bear thnaks to his teeth, the ears and the rounded muzzle wich show flattened nostrils.Don't trust the brown color of the totem. Brown like a bear, that sounds ok, but sometimes is the eagle brown, the fish and the wolf.
- The beaver. Easy ! The beaver has always something to chew in his hands. You can't miss the tow frontal teeth as well (or maybe confuse with the rabbit, but rabbits are not common on the poles and very few indians have « rabbit » for nickname. We can see also the beaver tails wich is ornated with lattice pattern. For the story, the beavers are really dreadfull lumberjack, they can put a 10 meters high tree in pieces in a one day work.
- The wolf. Well i allready mixed up the bear and the wolf. It sounds weird but they look similar on a pole So for finding a wolf, you had to look at the crawling posture. It get many many teeth as well and the ears wich are lying in wait.
- The frog. This is not a very impressive animal on a totem pole and is usually placed in the ears or nostrils of bigger animals.
- The whale killer. Theses mammiferousare quiet a pretty beast. The kind of fish wich is really hard to fish. This totem is usally given to the courageous fishermen who had the guts to fish barehand with the hrpoon on a cockleshell. We recognise the whale killer thnaks to his huge dorsal fin and the two spots near the eyes.The size on totem pole is generally the same as the other charachters even if this one is really bigger.
- The humpback whale. 15 meters long, more than 10 tons, and you don't want to stay close during the humpback (seen in ireland east coast this week !)? This is the kind of fish wich can provide one year of food for the whole tribe. Then you had to have in mind theses indians sailing the sea into fill the fridge up... it worth the totem name. To recognise it, you will see the hole behind the head the big fins and the tail of a big fish...
- The shark. Smaller than the two previous fish, we know it because his numerous appearrance in the hollywood's blockbusters. His pointed head and his teeth, lot of pointed teeth make him recognizable.
Few stories :
So you have seen the few animals describes, stacked on each other heads. Well it usually means something like a strory or a tale like the following wich are well known over there.
-
“Nanasquet and the whaleâ€Â
- "Why the crow is black ?"
-o-
Why the Raven is black
Long ago when the Earth was very young the Great Spirit was painting the birds along the banks of the river.
He had just finished with Raven's feathers, and Raven was looking at them in the river. But Raven was unpleased and he looked back to the Great Spirit, but he had already gone. He then looked at Eagle, whose feathers he admired very much. Then he noticed that The Great Spirit had left his paints by the river.
Raven asked Eagle to paint him as beautifully as The Great Spirit had painted him, but Eagle refused.
Raven begged Eagle until he finally agreed, Eagle painted Raven and when he was finished he was very pleased.. Raven went to look at his feathers in the river.. He was furious, his feathers where a mess compared to before.. He and Eagle fought, spilling the Great Spirits paints all over Raven, Raven leapt into the river and flapped against the current but the black color would not fade. Seconds later the Great Spirit returned. Raven begged the Great Spirit to paint him again, to fix his ugly feathers, but the Great Spirit refused, and said "Because of your sin of envy you shall learn to value what you have, from this day forward you will remain with Black beak, Black feet, Black breast, and Black eyes.
-o-
So here is my little experience about this culture. You may find 1000 more things on wikipaedia but waht i've told is real lived content. I'll make you a paper about the north indian american culture for the next time, to see how it was before christoph columbus and after
here are few pictures about totem poles and a try to tell what it means...
The beaver at the front
 
This one is a bit more complicated... So at the top is there a bird i can't recognise, it may be a toucan but i'm not quite sure.... maybe is the main character of this story very talky, Just under this bird, we can find a Kwak-kwak, bird wich like to eat the brains, overhanged by deafs watchmens. Maybe was the character deaf. Just beneath is there a human caring a baby (maybe a woman), wich is overhanged by watchemns. Maybe was she, the wife of the talky deaf guy wich was caring the baby and watching after his husband as well.
The last one : about a fishermen (can't you see the wahles at the bottom ?) So the guy at the top may be the famous fisherman, using a harpoon for fishing, with the help of a raven(on his head), raven is linked to the sun and is a guide for finding the way back. Just under the fisherman is there a huge frog (quiet unusual) then a Owl (or something like that) and then a big whale (well, as you see, reading a totem pole is not so obvious and i really don't know how to explain this frog and this Owl (wich looks like a fox sometimes), maybe with browsing the tales and indian story can we find more about this story...
