Bones (15)
date: label: Accession Date
content: 17 Apr 1894
name: label: Collector
content: Lt. George T. Emmons
label: Donor Name
content: U. S. Department of the Navy
notes: label: Notes
content: FROM CARD: "CARVED. WORN BY MEDICINE-MAN. ILLUS. IN USNM REPT, 1896; FIGS. 195-200; PP. 885-8. LOAN: CROSSROADS SEP 22 1988. ILLUS.: CROSSROADS OF CONTINENTS CATALOGUE; FIG. 373, P. 272. LOAN RETURNED: JAN 21 1993." Photo caption in Crossroads of Continents catalogue identifies necklace amulets as having engraved designs of possible Athabaskan origin and notes "Tlingit shamans considered foreign materials, styles, and artifacts to make powerful amulets."
label: Notes
content: List in accession file identifies #s 34 (E168370), 35 (E168371), and 36 (E168372) as "Bone necklaces worn by medicine men when practicing about the sick." The heading above the listing for #33 (E168369) in the accession file says: "These three pieces [which is presumed to apply to #33, 34, and 35] were brought by the Chilkaht Indian traders + packers from the Gunannao? [word hard to read] people who live about the headwaters of the Yukon River." The museum cataloguer has interpreted Gunannao to be Gonaho, i.e. Gunahoo/Gunaaxoo or the Dry Bay Tlingit, and has listed that designation for E168369 - E168373. It may be instead that this is a version of the word Gunana, i.e. Athabaskan (including Tutchone, Tagish ...), as the Chilkat traded with them. The Yukon River location seems to support this, as that would apply to the Athabaskans, not the Gunaaxoo Tlingit. (See p. 57 in Emmons, George Thornton, and Frederica De Laguna. 1991. The Tlingit Indians. Anthropological papers of the American Museum of Natural History, v. 70. Seattle: University of Washington Press.) Though the museum cataloguer presumed that E168372 had the same provenance as E168369 - E168371, examination of the original list in the accession file calls that into question, though E168372 has been attributed as Athabaskan style.
label: Record Last Modified
content: 14 Apr 2020
label: Specimen Count
content: 15
place: label: Place
content: Alaska, United States, North America
topic: label: Topic
content: Ethnology
culture: label: Culture
content: Tlingit
label: Culture
content: Athabascan (Athabaskan) (?)
setName: label: See more items in
content: Anthropology
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: NMNH - Anthropology Dept.
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 028072
label: USNM Number
content: E168372-0
objectType: label: Object Type
content: Necklace