Ceremonial Baton Or Wand
date: label: Accession Date
content: 30 Dec 1927
name: label: Collector
content: Herbert W. Krieger
label: Donor Name
content: Herbert W. Krieger
notes: label: Notes
content: From card: Illus. Hndbk. N. Amer. Indians, Vol. 6 Subarctic. Fig. 7, pg. 608." A drawing of the object is also on the card, with a notation indicating the feathers are tufts of owl down feathers.
label: Notes
content: Source of the information below: Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center Alaska Native Collections: Sharing Knowledge website, by Aron Crowell, entry on this artifact http://alaska.si.edu/record.asp?id=342, retrieved 8-13-2012: Ceremonial baton, Deg Hit'an Athabascan. This is one of a pair of ceremonial batons used to direct singers during preparations for the Deg Hit'an Partner's Potlatch.(1) The carving on this baton represents a wolf. Elders identified the feathers as swan. The other baton of the pair (# E339811) depicts a caribou. Mr. Phillip Arrow of Shageluk remembered seeing these batons in use long ago, but was not really familiar with their meaning. He noted that the caribou and wolf are similar to images carved on sticks for the Deg Hit'an Stick Dance (or Animals' Ceremony), each of which is associated with its own song. The Partner's Potlatch, as described by Cornelius Osgood from his studies in the village of Anvik during 1934 and 1937, was very similar to Messenger Feasts that were practiced by neighboring Yup'ik and Iñupiaq peoples. Edward Nelson, who visited Anvik in 1880, called this event the Messenger or Barter Festival.(2) Men of one village hosted the potlatch for their individual "parka partners" from another nearby settlement, but nearly everyone who lived in both places participated.(3) Messengers carrying marked "memory sticks" traveled between the host and guest villages, requesting gifts (such as food, snowshoes, clothing) that would be exchanged by the partners. The potlatch itself, which took place over the course of several days in the host's kashim [ceremonial house], was a spiritual occasion for sacred songs, dances, gift giving, feasting, and ceremonies to honor the dead. Before the messengers were sent, men of the host village divided into two groups to practice "asking songs" that would be directed to their guests at the potlatch. A man holding the caribou baton led one group (the "askers") and while a man holding the wolf baton led another ("the chorus"). They made slow, vertical motions with the batons to mark the end of each song. A different style of wooden potlatch baton (gunho), similar to the Tlingit type, is used by people at Tanacross and historically at other villages in the Upper Tanana region.(4) 1. Osgood 1958:73-74; Snow 1981:608 2. VanStone 1978:17-18 3. Osgood 1958:73-81 4. Simeone and VanStone 1986:28
label: Notes
content: This object is on loan to the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center, from 2010 through 2027.
label: Record Last Modified
content: 15 Feb 2022
label: Specimen Count
content: 1
place: label: Place
content: Anvik, Yukon River, Alaska, United States, North America
topic: label: Topic
content: Ethnology
culture: label: Culture
content: Ingalik (Deg Xitʼan, Degexitʼan, Deg Hit'an)
setName: label: See more items in
content: Anthropology
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: NMNH - Anthropology Dept.
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 097209
label: USNM Number
content: E339812-0
objectType: label: Object Type
content: Baton
physicalDescription: label: Length - Object
content: 38 cm