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Boaz argues that much may be learned of contemporary tribal culture by a study of the mythology of a given people, since so much of the setting of the ancient tale reflects the tribal life of the time of the recording. He has made a test of the idea in his study of the Tsimshian Indians.
They and their almost equally advanced Tlingit and Tsimshian neighbors on the mainland displayed much mechanical skill, especially in canoe-building, woodcarving, and the working of stone and copper, as well as in making blankets and baskets. To this day they earn a considerable amount of money by selling their carved objects of wood and slate to traders and tourists.
Sometimes both types are used in the same language, as in Yana, where "beef" is "bitter-venison" but "deer-liver" is expressed by "liver-deer." The compounded object of a verb precedes the verbal element in Paiute, Nahuatl, and Iroquois, follows it in Yana, Tsimshian, and the Algonkin languages. Of all grammatical processes affixing is incomparably the most frequently employed.
Thus the Tsimshian Indians of British Columbia believe that twins control the weather; therefore they pray to wind and rain, "Calm down, breath of the twins." Further, they think that the wishes of twins are always fulfilled; hence twins are feared, because they can harm the man they hate.
The rule not to lie down is observed also during their seclusion at puberty by Tsimshian girls, who always sit propped up between boxes and mats; their heads are covered with small mats, and they may not look at men nor at fresh salmon and olachen. Some divine kings are not allowed to lie down. See Taboo and the Perils of the Soul, p. 5.
Not until the eighteenth century, when Russian traders began to frequent the Pacific coast and the Spanish and English pushed their voyages into the North Pacific, the Tlingit of the far north, the Salish, Tsimshian, Haida, Kwakiutl-Nootka and Kutenai. It is thought, however, that nearly all the Pacific Indians belong to one kindred stock.
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