Hunting Hat Or Visor
date: label: Accession Date
content: 16 Mar 1897
name: label: Collector
content: Edward W. Nelson
label: Donor Name
content: U.S. Department of Agriculture
notes: label: Notes
content: FROM CARD: "HUNTING HAT. 1/83 SITES INUA LOAN. SIMILAR TO SPECIMEN DESCRIBED NELSON LXIV(18) P. 168, BROKEN FEATHERS, MISSING IVORY. INVENTORIED 1975. LOAN: CROSSROADS SEP 22 1988. ILLUS.: CROSSROADS OF CONTINENTS CATALOGUE; FIG. 47, P.48. LOAN RETURNED: JAN 21 1993."
label: Notes
content: This object is on loan to the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center, from 2010 through 2027.
label: Notes
content: Illustrated in Fitzhugh, William W., Julie Hollowell, and Aron L. Crowell. 2009. Gifts from the Ancient Ancestors: Ancient Ivories of Bering Strait. Yale University Press, New Haven and London, CT. Fig. 10, p 169. Fig. 9 on same page shows National Anthropological Archives Edward Nelson photo of a hunter in a kayak wearing this hat. Identified there as a Yup'ik hunting hat. "This bentwood visor ... protects the eyes of the hunter from glare. It is decorated with ivory gull and walrus-head effigies, ... [Long-tailed Duck (Clangula hyemalis)] feathers, and red-painted border grooves."
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 https://alaska.si.edu/record.asp?id=275 , retrieved 10-21-2021; see web page for additional information: Hunting visor, Yup'ik. Hunters of the Bering Sea coast wore wooden visors to protect their eyes from glare and to spiritually assist with the hunt; Chuna McIntyre said that the visors were "beautified to attract and honor the animals." To make a visor a craftsman used hot water to soften the wood, then bent it around and stitched the ends together with sinew, baleen, or split root. Animal carvings were added as hunting charms, such as the walrus and seagull heads on this visor. Feathers may have been added to assist the transformation of hunters into birds, as described in oral tradition. The Yupiit and other Alaska Native hunters of the Bering Sea coast wore open-topped wooden visors to protect their eyes from the glare of sun on water. Visors could also be worn on land, to lessen reflections from snow. They were made from a thin plank of wood that was softened with steam or hot water and then bent into a circle. The narrow ends wrapped around the head and overlapped at the back, where they were sewn together with sinew, baleen, spruce or willow root. Ivory carvings -like the walrus and seagull heads attached to this visor- were added as hunting charms. Speaking of a hunting helmet in the Jacobsen collection at Ethnologisches Museum in Berlin, Yup'ik Elder Wassilie Berlin said, "Obviously this was owned by a man from the coast since it is decorated with walrus designs. When shamans performed rituals wearing these helmets, they did it to help hunters who would be going out on the ocean in the coming season. These carved walrus on it were what they wanted the hunters to get while hunting on the ocean." Bird carvings and feathers, like the fan of .. [Long-tailed Duck (Clangula hyemalis)] feathers on this visor, suggest a spiritual identity between humans and birds that is described in traditional tales.
label: Record Last Modified
content: 15 Feb 2022
label: Specimen Count
content: 1
place: label: Place
content: Pastolik, Yukon River, Mouth, Alaska, United States, North America
topic: label: Topic
content: Ethnology
culture: label: Culture
content: Eskimo, Yup'ik
setName: label: See more items in
content: Anthropology
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: NMNH - Anthropology Dept.
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 031796
label: USNM Number
content: E176207-0
objectType: label: Object Type
content: Hat
physicalDescription: label: Length - Object
content: 51 cm