Kinnikinnick
Kinnikinnick is a Native American smoking product, typically made of mixture of various leaves or barks with other plant materials.
Etymology
The term "kinnikinnick" derives from Unami Delaware /kələkːəˈnikːan/, "mixture" (c.f. Ojibwe giniginige "to mix together something animate with something inanimate"),[1] from Proto-Algonquian *kereken-, "mix (it) with something different by hand".[2]
By extension, the name was also applied by the European hunters, traders, and settlers to various shrubs in which the bark or leaves are employed in the mixture,[3] most often Bearberry (Arctostaphylos spp.)[4] and to lesser degree, Red Osier Dogwood (Cornus sericea) and Silky Cornel (Cornus amomum), and even to Canadian Bunchberry (Cornus canadensis), Evergreen Sumac (Rhus virens) and the Littleleaf Sumac (Rhus microphylla).
Preparation and use
The preparation varies by locality and by Native American tribes. Bartlett quotes Trumbull as saying: "I have smoked half a dozen varieties of kinnikinnick in the North-west,—all genuine; and have scraped and prepared the red willow-bark, which is not much worse than Suffield oak-leaf.[3][5]
Eastern tribes traditionally used Nicotiana rustica in their peace pipe but western tribes used kinnikinick.[4] Cutler cites Edward S. Rutsch study of the Iroquois, listing ingredients used by other Native American tribes: leaves or bark of red osier dogwood, arrowroot, red sumac, laurel, ironwood, wahoo, squaw huckleberry, Indian tobacco, Jamestown weed, black birch, cherry bark, corn, mullein; along with muskrat glands or oil, and other animal oil or rendered fat.[4]
Historical references
- "At thls moment the Indians were in deliberation. Seated in a large circle round a very small fire, the smoke from which ascended in a thin straight column, they each in turn puffed a huge cloud of smoke from three or four long cherry-stemmed pipes, which went the round of the party; each warrior touching the ground with the heel of the pipe bowl, and turning the stem upwards and away from him as "medicine" to the Great Spirit, before he himself inhaled the fragrant kinnik-kinnik." — N. Y. Spirit of the Times.[5]
- "I at this moment presented to the Duke the Indian pipe, through which he had smoked the day before, and also an Indian tobacco-pouch, filled with the k'nickk'neck (or Indian tobacco) with which he had been so much pleased." — Collin's Travels in Europe.[5]
- "There ore also certain creeks where the Indians resort to lay in a store of kinnikinik, the inner bark of the red willow, which they use as a substitute for tobacco, and which has an aromatic and very pungent flavor." — Ruxton, Life in the Far West, p. 116.[5]
- "While I am writing, I am smoking a pipe filled with kinnikinick, the dried leaves of the red sumac — a very good substitute for tobacco." — Carvalho, Adventures in the Far West, p. 36.[5]
- "The older hunter watched the sigular preparations of his silent son, and suspecting that he had discovered signs of an enemy, arose, and saying he would go and cut a few sticks of the red willow [Kinnikinnick] to smoke, he left the lodge to go and see with his own and more experienced eyes, what ere the signs of danger." — Warren, History of the Ojibway people[6]
- kinnikinic, n. caŋṡaṡa. — Williamson. An English-Dakota Dictionary[7]
- "Tobacco used in the early day consisted of the inner bark of red dogwood—Inidans on all reservations called it 'red willow.' An informant removed the outside bark of a twig with her thumbnail and noted that the remaining layer of bark when carefully shaven off served as tobacco, so-called kinnikinnick. Today kinnikinnick is a mixture of finely crushed inner bark of the red dogwood and shavings of plug tobacco. The mixture is worked with a mortar with pestle, both mortar and pestle being of wood. This mixture, too, is used today for ceremonial smoking." — Hilger, Chippewa Child Life[8]
Native names
- Algonquin: nasemà, "tobacco" (mitàkozigan, "unmixed tobacco"; apàkozigan, "mixed tobacco")
- Dakota: caŋṡaṡa, "tobacco"
- Lakota: cansasa, "tobacco"
- Menominee : ahpa͞esāwān, "kinnikinnick"
- Odaawaa: semaa, "tobacco" (mtaaḳzigan, "unmixed tobacco"; paaḳzigan, "mixed tobacco")
- Ojibwe: asemaa, "tobacco" (mitaakozigan, "unmixed tobacco"; apaakozigan, "mixed tobacco")
See also
References
- ^ "kiniginige" in Frederic Baraga A Dictionary of the Ojibway Language. Minnesota Historical Society Press (St. Paul, MN: 1992). ISBN 0-87351-281-2. Part II, page 189.
- ^ Flexner, Stuart Berg and Leonore Crary Hauck, eds.. The Random House Dictionary of the English Language, 2nd ed. (unabridged). Random House (New York: 1987). Page 1058.
- ^ a b "Kinnikinnick" in Frederick Webb Hodge (editor) Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico. Bureau of American Ethnology (Washington: 1911). Part 1, page 692.
- ^ a b c Charles L. Cutler. Tracks that speak: the legacy of Native American words in North American culture. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (Boston : 2002). Pages 174–176. ISBN 0618065105
- ^ a b c d e ""Kinnikinnick" in John Russell Bartlett. Dictionary of Americanisms, 4th Edition. Little, Brown, and Company (New York: 1877). Page 335.
- ^ William W. Warren. History of the Ojibway people. Minnesota Historical Society Press (St. Paul, MN : 1885; repr. 1984). Page 150 and page 411.
- ^ John P. Williamson. An English-Dakota Dictionary. Minnesota Historical Society Press (St. Paul, MN : 1902; repr. 1992). Page 95.
- ^ Inez Hilger. Chippewa Child Life and Its Cultural Background. Minnesota Historical Society Press (St. Paul, MN : 1951, repr. 1992). Page 63.
External links