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Tlingit men trained hard to become warriors

“The Battle of Old Sitka, June, 1802”, © Ray Troll, 2002.
By Mary Catharine Martin
No matter the season, every day from age six began the same way for a young K’inéix Kwáan man training to be a warrior in pre-contact Yakutat — by wading into the ocean and staying as long as he could without passing out. Read the rest of this entry
‘New salmon run:’ Planes now fly in fish as Yukon chinook decline

Chinook salmon.
‘It is funny, but it’s also sad,’ says Duane Aucoin of the Teslin Tlingit Council
The Canadian Press, August 2, 2016
Salmon no longer collect in the nets along the Teslin River where the Tlingit people have harvested them for
thousands of years. Now, they come from the sky.
“It’s the new salmon run,” Duane Aucoin, member of the Teslin Tlingit Council, said recently. Read the rest of this entry
Knives and Daggers of the Pacific Northwest Coast

Steel war dagger with abalone inlay, designed to represent a dogfish [although it appears to be a wolf]. Collected by A. Mackenzie, 1884, Haida, Masset, Queen Charlotte Islands (VII-B-948). Canadian Museum of History.
Prior to European colonization, Indigenous peoples on the Pacific Northwest Coast used a variety of knives and daggers. These were most commonly made from bone and, in the northern region, copper. When the first European colonizers encountered Indigenous peoples along the coast in the late 1700s, they already had terms for iron and steel and were familiar with their uses as well as basic forging techniques. It is speculated that iron and steel found their way to the coastal nations as a result of trade and ship wrecks. Read the rest of this entry
Tlingit attack on Russian Fort at Sitka, June 1802
“The Battle of Old Sitka, June, 1802”, © Ray Troll, 2002
This drawing was inspired by reading historical accounts of Russian and Tlingit conflicts in Southeast Alaska in the late 1700’s and early 1800s. It intended primarily as a study of the incredible carved wooden war helmets and intricate body armor that Tlingit warriors of high status wore into battle. Read the rest of this entry