Beothuk - WikiHQ

thumb|[[Newfoundland (island)|Newfoundland, the historic home of the Beothuk]]The Beothuk ( or ; also spelled Beothuck) were a group of Indigenous who lived on the island of Newfoundland.

The Beothuk culture formed around AD 1500. This may have been the most recent cultural manifestation of peoples who first migrated from Labrador to present-day Newfoundland around AD 1. The ancestors of this group had three earlier cultural phases, each lasting approximately 500 years.

Description

The Beothuk lived throughout the island of Newfoundland, mostly in the Notre Dame and Bonavista Bay areas. Estimates of the Beothuk population at the time of contact with Europeans vary. Historian of the Beothuk Ingeborg Marshall argued that European historical records of Beothuk history are clouded by ethnocentrism and unreliable. Scholars from the 19th and early 20th century estimated about 2,000 Beothuk individuals lived at the time of European contact in the 15th century; however, there may have been no more than 500 to 700 people. Based on the carrying capacity of the ecosystem at the time of contact the population is estimated to have been between 1,000 and 1,500. They lived in independent, self-sufficient, extended family groups of 30 to 55 people.

Like many other hunter-gatherers, they appear to have had band leaders but probably not more formal chiefs, in the anthropological definition of the word. They lived in conical dwellings known as mamateeks, which were fortified for the winter season. These were constructed by arranging poles in a circle, tying them at the top, and covering them with birch bark. The floors were dug with hollows used for sleeping. A fireplace was made at the centre.

During spring, the Beothuk used red ochre to paint not only their bodies but also their houses, canoes, weapons, household appliances, and musical instruments. This practice led Europeans to refer to them as "Red Indians". The use of ochre had great cultural significance. The decorating was done during an annual multi-day spring celebration. It designated tribal identity; for example, decorating newborn children was a way to welcome them into the tribe. Forbidding a person to wear ochre was a form of punishment.

Their main food were caribou, salmon, and seals, augmented by harvesting other animal and plant species.

The Beothuk are also known to have made a pudding out of tree sap and the dried yolk of the eggs of the great auk. They preserved surplus food for use during winter, trapped various fur-bearing animals, and worked their skins for warm clothing. The fur side was worn next to the skin, to trap air against a person's body.

Beothuk canoes were made of caribou or seal skin, and the bows of canoes were stiffened with spruce bark. Canoes resembled kayaks and were said to be in length and in width with enough room to carry children, dogs, and property.

The Beothuk followed elaborate burial practices. After wrapping the bodies in birch bark, they buried the dead in isolated locations, often in caves or under rock overhangs on smaller islands. In one form, a shallow grave was covered with a rock pile. At other times they laid the body on a scaffold, or placed it in a burial box, with the knees folded. Beginning in 1497, with the arrival of the Italian explorer John Cabot, sailing under the auspices of King Henry VII, waves of European explorers and settlers had more contacts.

Unlike some other Indigenous groups, the Beothuk tried to avoid contact with Europeans; they moved inland as European settlements grew. The Beothuk visited their former camps only to pick up metal objects. They would also collect any tools, shelters, and building materials left by the European fishermen who had dried and cured their catch before taking it to Europe at the end of the season. Contact between Europeans and the Beothuk was usually negative for one side, with a few exceptions like John Guy's party in 1612. Settlers and the Beothuk competed for natural resources, such as salmon, seals, and birds. In the interior, fur trappers established traplines, disrupted the caribou hunts, and ransacked Beothuk stores, camps, and supplies. The Beothuk would steal traps to reuse the metals, and steal from the homes and shelters of European settlers and sometimes ambush them. These encounters led to enmity and mutual violence. With superior arms technology, the settlers generally had the upper hand in hunting and warfare. (Unlike other Native American peoples, the Beothuk appeared to have had no interest in adopting firearms.)

Intermittently, Europeans attempted to improve relations with the Beothuk. Examples included expeditions by army officer George Cartwright and his brother naval officer John Cartwright in 1768, and naval lieutenant David Buchan in 1811. Cartwright's 1768 expedition was commissioned by Governor Hugh Palliser; he found no Beothuk, but brought back important cultural information. Governor John Duckworth commissioned Buchan's 1811 expedition. Although undertaken for information gathering, the expedition ended in violence. Buchan's party encountered several Beothuk near Beothuk Lake. After an initially friendly reception, Buchan left two of his men behind with the Beothuk. The next day, he found them murdered and mutilated. According to the Beothuk Shanawdithit's later account, the marines were killed when one refused to give up his jacket and both ran away.

Causes of starvation

The Beothuks avoided Europeans in Newfoundland by moving inland from their traditional settlements. First, they emigrated to different coastal areas of Newfoundland, places the Europeans did not have fish-camps, but they were over-run. Then, they emigrated to inland Newfoundland. The Beothuks' main food sources were caribou, fish, and seals; their forced displacement deprived them of two of these. This led to the over-hunting of caribou, leading to a decrease in the caribou population in Newfoundland. The Beothuks emigrated from their traditional land and lifestyle into ecosystems unable to support them, causing under-nourishment and, eventually, starvation.

Extinction

Population estimates of Beothuks remaining at the end of the first decade of the 19th century vary widely, from about 150 up to 3,000. Information about the Beothuk was based on accounts by the woman Shanawdithit, who told about the people who "wintered on the Exploits River or at Red Indian Lake and resorted to the coast in Notre Dame Bay". References in records also noted some survivors on the Northern Peninsula in the early 19th century.

During the colonial period, the Beothuk people allegedly endured territorial pressure from other Indigenous groups: Mi'kmaq migrants from Cape Breton Island,

Beothuk numbers dwindled rapidly due to a combination of factors, including:

loss of access to important food sources, from the competition with and displacement by European settlers;
infectious diseases to which they had no immunity, such as smallpox, introduced by European contact;
endemic tuberculosis (TB), which weakened tribal members;
violent encounters with trappers and settlers.

By 1829, with the death of Shanawdithit, the people were declared extinct.

Since Santu Toney was born about 1835, this may be evidence some Beothuk people survived beyond the death of Shanawdithit in 1829. Contemporary researchers tried to transcribe the song, as well as improve the recording by current methods. Native groups learned the song to use in celebrations of tradition.

Claims of genocide

Scholars disagree in their definition of "genocide" in relation to the Beothuk. While some scholars believe that the Beothuk died out as an unintended consequence of European colonization, others argue that Europeans conducted a sustained campaign of genocide against them. Historian Mohamed Adhikari argued there was an intentional nature of destructive violence from colonizers, and that this is part of the evidence that makes this a case of genocide. Legal historian Sydney Harring argued there are parallels between the violence inflicted upon the Beothuk and the genocidal violence inflicted upon the Aboriginal Tasmanians, and that the government's knowledge of such violence while not actively and successfully preventing and stopping it implies a tacit approval of the violence.

Writing in 1766, Governor Hugh Palliser reported to the British Secretary of State for the Northern Department, Augustus FitzRoy, 3rd Duke of Grafton, that "the barbarous system of killing prevails amongst our people towards the Native Indians — whom our People always kill, when they can meet them".

If such a campaign did occur, it was explicitly without official sanction after 1769, any such action thereafter being in violation of Governor John Byron's proclamation that "I do strictly enjoin and require all His Majesty's subjects to live in amity and brotherly kindness with the native savages [Beothuk] of the said island of Newfoundland", as well as the subsequent Proclamation issued by Governor John Holloway on July 30, 1807, which prohibited mistreatment of the Beothuk and offered a reward for any information on such mistreatment.

There are various accounts of violence by Europeans directed against the Beothuk. In 1792, British navy Lieutenant George Pulling collected numerous accounts of the interactions between settlers and the Beothuk, many of which ended violently. One significant example was a raid which occurred in the winter of 1781, in which John Peyton Sr., who was involved in multiple acts of violence against the Beothuk, led two other men in an expedition up the Exploits River, to recover fishing gear and other material believed taken by the Beothuk. Pulling noted two accounts of this event, one directly from one of the participants and another second-hand from Peyton Sr. himself. After three days, they came upon a Beothuk encampment (of likely 30 to 50 people); Peyton Sr. and his men fired on the Beothuk, killing some and wounding others, with the exact number of victims unknown. There was at least one uninjured survivor, and Peyton Sr. is recorded as having beaten an injured Beothuk to death with an animal trap. The surviving Beothuk who were able fled, and Peyton and his men collected what furs, skins and gear they could carry and left. Pulling believed both versions of the story left out significant details of what had occurred.

Notable Beothuk captives

Several Beothuk were captured by settlers from the Newfoundland Colony during the early 19th century.

Demasduit

thumb|upright|Demasduit, 1819

Demasduit was a Beothuk woman, about 23 years old at the time she was captured by a party led by the fisherman John Peyton Jr. near Beothuk Lake in March 1819.

The governor of the Newfoundland colony was seeking to encourage trade and end hostilities with the Beothuk. He approved an expedition, to be led by the Scottish explorer David Buchan, to recover a boat and other fishing gear foraged by the Beothuk. Buchan was accompanied by two soldiers; the Beothuk mistakenly thought Buchan had hostile intentions and killed and decapitated the soldiers accompanying him.

In 1819, an armed party led by Peyton Jr, totaling about nine men (including John Peyton Sr.), came upon a Beothuk camp looking for stolen fishing gear. The Beothuk scattered, although Demasduit was unable to escape and begged for mercy, exposing her breasts to show she was a nursing mother with child. Her husband, Nonosabasut, confronted Peyton Jr. and his party, attempting to negotiate for the release of his wife. A fight occurred between Peyton Sr. and Nonosabasut, resulting in the death of the latter. He drew funds from his institute to pay for her support.

Shanawdithit made ten drawings for Cormack. Some of the drawings showed parts of the island, while others illustrated Beothuk implements and dwellings, along with Beothuk notions and myths. Many sites consist of the same elements because they are all former occupational sites. These sites show a variety of material culture based on what period they are from; however, most contain the remains of animals, remainders of permanent and semipermanent structures such as remains of fire pits and sleeping hollows. Several sites, such as Sampson's Head Cove, had wooden and bone tools as well as stone arrowheads. Additionally, many cases of Beothuk remains may have been true at one point but because of mishandling the remains are now lost and unable to be verified. However, a 2011 analysis showed although the two Beothuk and living Mi'kmaq occur in the same haplogroups, SNP differences between Beothuk and Mi'kmaq individuals indicate they were dissimilar within those groups, and a 'close-relationship' theory was not supported.

References

Works cited

External links

The Beothuks, Newfoundland and Labrador Heritage.
Beothuk, Native Languages.
Ideas on CBC program about Demasduwit