4
Smoke Signals
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Once it was Jackrabbit's custom to go out and
cut down bushes which he regarded as trees, so
it is said. Pleased with his work, he would say to
himself, "had it been anyone else he would have
had it fall on top of him." One day Coyote over
heard the busy rabbit and began spreading ru
mors about him.
"He says about you, I've been killing people,"'
Coyote told the people. "In the water it is that I
always throw them."
Now the warriors assembled for war and Coy
ote showed them where Jackrabbit felled trees.
As they searched, one warrior found him first and
Coyote shouted "that one it is! That one it is!"
But the warrior said "it is not that one. This is a
play thing for my child."
He picked up Jackrabbit and put him in his
quiver but he later escaped. This same thing
happened over and over when each warrior
found Jackrabbit. They would not believe Coy
ote but only tried to take Jackrabbit home for
their children but he always escaped.
But after all the warriors went home Jackrab
bit donned war feathers and let out a battle cry.
First he killed Coyote for lying. Then he annihi
lated all the people. Indeed, Coyote got himself
and all the people in trouble.
So says an old Rogue River Takelma story. Per
haps it is a story that offers insight into a people
who, for better or for worse, are best known for
their attitude about warfare and their historic role
in the Rogue River Wars.
A people said to be as rough as the southwest
Oregon environment they lived in.
Independent bands of these Upper Rogue
Takelma consisted of about 80 to 100 members
each. They occupied the rugged interior between
Table Rock and the Cascades in the neighbor
hood of present day Jacksonville.
(Other Takelma communities clustered around
the northern banks of the Rogue River centered
in the Siskiyou National Forest; Cow Creek near
Canyonville; and within the southwestern val
ley towards California.)
Tying back their hair and donning white face
paint was the traditional Takelma sign for battle.
This practice was such a
part of Takelma culture
that instead of saying T am
ready to fight' a warrior
was more likely to make the
statement by tightly
synching back his hair.
Even Takelma women
played a part in warfare.
They not only joined in war dances but also ac
companied warriors into battle to mind slaves and
cook meals.
Takelma warriors wore frontal armor made of
sticks, layered with undressed elk or deer hide
and bedecked with symbols.
The flint tipped arrows they used were some
times dipped in rattlesnake blood and, unlike any
of their neighbors, they held their bows horizon
tally when shooting, often with the next arrow to
be fired clenched between their teeth.
Their tenacity in battle and tactics in warfare
were so advanced that seasoned U.S. military com
manders known as "Indian fighters" who fought
in the Rogue Wars found themselves ill-prepared
for Takelma warfare.
"The campaign did tell us a great deal," wrote
one military author about an early 1851 battle.
"The Rogue River Indians were skillful campaign
ers and good fighters, and that Major (Philip)
Kearney gained no superiority over them."
TAKELMA (D "GELMA N):
THOSE LIVING ALONGSIDE THE RIVER'
Takelma culture also put a high value on wealth
and beauty.
The village chief was determined mostly by
wealth except in times of war when another leader
might rise up for the occasion.
In addition to pride in an abundance of denta
lium shells (used by many northwest tribes for
money) and the high price a man might pay for
his wife, attire was also a popular way to display
prosperity.
Bright red woodpecker scalps with beak in
place were attached to buckskin and often worn
as head pieces. They were sometimes decorated
with dentalium shells.
Takelma men wore buckskin shirts and pants or
leggings and hats made of bear skin or deer scalp.
Deer skin blankets were also occasionally worn.
Knee-length buckskin dresses with white grass
tassels and Chasta-made basket hats were worn
by the women.
Facial charcoal tattoos in the form of two down
ward stripes on the chin were common for the
women. Men used tattoo markings on their left
arms to measure dentalium and display wealth.
Takelma men and women frequently used red
face paint. Black face paint was also used but
white paint was reserved only for times of war.
Shamans, the only Takelmas said to posses
Spirit Powers, adorned themselves in otter skins,
eagle and yellow hammer feathers with occasional
grass or porcupine quills attached.
Salmon and acorns were perhaps the most im
portant foods for Takelma people of the Cascade
foothills.
Seasonal fishing trips to favored rocks or banks
on nearby rivers were important both for gather
ing food and Takelma tradition.
The event usually involved the entire band,
including women and children. Grass line and
bone hooks were used to catch the fish.
Women and children gathered acorns and it was
customary for men to hold a ceremonial obser
vance before the bounty could be enjoyed by all.
Women used stone pestle and mortars to pound
dry acorns into flour. It was cooked by boiling
away the bitter tannic acid in woven basket pots.
It was either eaten as mush or baked on coals
into sand bread. " ! ! i
In addition to digging for camas bulbs for food,
women also collected hazel shoots, spruce roots,
grasses and ferns to weave cradle boards, storage
baskets and boiling pots.
Grass seeds, pine nuts, deer and elk were also
regular food staples while grasshoppers, caterpil
lars, yellow jacket larvae and snails were a
supplement to the Takelma diet.
Takelma made dugout canoes from split logs
that could carry up to 10 men while bands to the
far east of Rogue Country used log rafts.
Winter villages consisted of rectangular slab
houses made from split sugar pine with stamped
earthen floors.
A similarly shaped sweat-house with a covered
'fire hole' for passing through hot stones was used
by up to six men at a time for traditional over
night sweats.
Shinny, a game still popular in the early days
of the Grand Ronde Reservation, was a favorite
Table Rock stands in the
heart of Rogue Country
just north off present day
Medford. It served as a
temporary reservation
during the Rogue River
War era and is the site
where Toquahear and
other chiefs negotiated
treaties with U.S. officials.
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