Roots and Rootcraft
- Indians used roots for food, medicine, and dyes; for making baskets,
cloth, rope, and salt; and for chewing and flavoring.
Roots of species of the lily were used
widely as food, as was the camas, which was found from the Wasatch Mountains
in Utah, north to the Canadian border and west to the Pacific Coast.
The root of the kouse, a word derived from the Nez Percè
kowish,
also known as "biscuit root," was used by them to make thin cakes a foot
wide and three foot long.
The Plains Indians prized the pomme
blanche, Indian turnip or Indian potato, pounded and cooked with jerked
meat and corn. The Miami, Shawnee, and other tribes were fond of
Jerusalem artichokes.
The Hopi and Zuñi, as well as other
southern and eastern tribes, used wild potato; the Navajo were fond of
eating it with clay. The Seminole converted coonti, a starchy
root, into flour fro bread. This became popular with the whites and
at one time several Florida mills produced coonti flour.
Sweet roots were chewed and scores of roots
were used for medicinal purposes. Ginseng, later exported to China
by white men, was used by some Indian medicine men, who believed it gave
them power.
Dye was made from root bark by the California
Indians, from bloodroot by the northern and eastern tribes, and hair dye
was extracted from a small root by the Virginia Indians.
The Hopi Indians burned an incense root
during ceremonies. Fish were drugged with soaproot in gCalifornia,
and with a variety of poisonous roots by the Iroquois and other tribes
of the East.
Rope, cordage, and baskets were made from
the trailing roots of spruce, tamarack, hemlock, red cedar, and cottonwood.
Related Information
within this Site
[ Baskets
][ Camas ][ Fishing
][ Food ][ Medicine
]