Chapter XXV

BIRTH AND BABIES

The natural function of birth obviously varied only in details of handling the situation, delivery assistance, disposition of the afterbirth, and methods of cutting and treating the child’s umbilical cord. The baby was born in a separate hut which contained a trench heated with coals. These were covered with grass and pine needles or fir boughs. On this warm green bed the woman lay at least a part of the time during labor and also after delivery.

Children were desired and a barren woman was looked down on socially. Inability to produce children was grounds for divorce. The behavior of both parents during pregnancy was believed to closely affect personality and health of the child.

After giving birth, the mother remained in isolation for from nearly a week to a month or more. Many taboos were imposed upon her. Bathing in streams and sweat baths, eating fresh or dried meat or fish, grease, and often salt were forbidden to her. Most tribes of the Lassen area also prohibited combing of the mother’s hair by herself during the period of isolation. Also taboo was scratching herself with her hands, making baskets, preparing food, or traveling.

There were restrictions on the father of the newly born child too. Among Atsugewi and Yana he stayed with the mother, but mountain Maidu fathers stayed away for periods of a week or less. Immediately after the birth had taken place, the father ran to the woods to break up and bring home quantities of fire-wood. Hunting and fishing of all kinds and traveling were taboo for several weeks in most cases. Atsugewi and mountain Maidu new fathers were also forbidden to smoke and gamble, and like their wives, were denied eating fresh or dried fish, meat, and grease for varying periods up to a month. Release from taboos occurred with sweating and bathing among Atsugewi and mountain Maidu. Fathers in these tribes also gave away the first kill when they resumed hunting.

The mother generally massaged the infant to improve the shape and proportion of nose, face, limbs, and torso. Shedding of the baby’s umbilical cord was an important event which the Indians wished to occur as soon as possible. A variety of odd practices to this end were employed. The occurrence of the event relieved the parents of some, or in other cases of all, the post birth taboos. Among most of our tribes the dried cord was saved until the child reached manhood or womanhood. It was customarily secured to the cradle basket, but frequently was subsequently lost. Earlobes might be pierced in early infancy especially if the child were prone to cry much.

Two cradle baskets were used. Mountain Maidu made two of similar oval shape, but the first and smaller one was without a hood. Atsugewi and Yana tribes made two different types, but both with rounded carrying handles and sunshades on top. These were constructed of willow ribs, pine root, and buckskin. The first small basket was called tseh-nay-gow by Atsugewi and was used for several months. It was short and with a distinctly rounded basketry shelf or lip at its lower end. The larger baby basket was called yah-bih-dee and was practically identical to that of the mountain Maidu. This was made of the usual twined basketry materials, but was of different construction. Willow ribs were lashed onto a sturdy one-piece forked branch frame, the joint being at the bottom. The base or stem of this Y-piece stuck out below for several inches being sharpened so that it could be stuck into the ground near the mother in camp or when she was out digging roots in the fields. Boo-noo-koo-ee-menorra tells of an interesting modification of the yah-bih-dee today. Its frame is now simply rounded at the bottom instead of having the pointed end described above. “Most people have cars now a days” she says, “and that point poked a hole through the seat of the car. So now we make the round kind.” Our visitors to Lassen Volcanic National Park are always interested in names of the “papoose basket”. This term and the words moccasin, wampum, and so on are no doubt of Indian origin being the actual words or reasonable facsimiles thereof used by some eastern tribe for the objects concerned. English speaking Americans have adopted these names as meaning those particular articles for all Indian tribes. It may be recalled that earlier in this book, it was pointed out that each tribe had its own distinct language and so, obviously, each tribe would have had its own distinct names for these objects. Hence there is no all inclusive “Indian name” for the cradle basket or anything else.

The baby was wrapped in tanned buckskin or soft furs, normally wildcat by the Atsugewi. A pad of grass or padded bark was placed on the cradle board or basket and then the child was lashed into the tshe-nay-gow with buckskin straps in a sitting position on the sill with its feet hanging down. Most tribes used dry grass, pounded until soft, for diapers, but mountain Maidu used skin material for the purpose. Babies were kept in the cradle baskets until they were able to walk. The cradle frame was carried on the mother’s back with a tump-line passing over her forehead or chest. A series of larger cradle baskets were made as the child grew, usually three before the child was allowed to crawl or walk.

The newborn infant was never fed the colostrum from its mother. The baby was either let go without food or given a cooked meat gruel for nourishment for the first two days or so until bonafide milk was produced in the mother’s breasts. Children were nursed as often as they wished and until they were quite large: even three or four years old.

Names were given to children usually at the age of about a year. Yana waited even longer, however, until ages of four to six years before giving real names which for this tribe were habitually of a hereditary nature. In the meantime, temporary descriptive nicknames were given. Many real Atsugewi names had meanings, while those of mountain Maidu and Yana normally did not. Nevertheless, Yana and to a certain extent other Indians too, might acquire additional nicknames and descriptive names later in life, even in adulthood.

Twins were unwanted among all local tribes, probably because of the double care and feeding responsibilities involved. Mountain Maidu thought that twins were bad luck and actually feared them. It was generally believed that twins were caused by the mother having eaten twinned nutmeats. These, therefore, were carefully avoided.

Killing newborn babies whether illegitimate, twins, crippled, or when the mother died in childbirth, was practiced only on very rare occasions. Certainly infanticide was not the rule among any of the local tribes, but of course was practiced in certain other areas.