Photo Gallery

Tsimshian Raven Rattle – State of Alaska Museum - Juneau

Harold Jacobs, a young crafts apprentice at the Southeast Alaska Indian Cultural Center in Sitka, poses in ceremonial clothing. He is wearing a wooden wolf hat, a thunderbird Chilkat blanket, and a silver nose ring. The wolf rattle he is holding, carved by Reggie B. Peterson, tells us that Harold Jacobs is a member of the wolf moiety.

Rattles also belonged to the insignia of a chief. This old raven rattle has two special features: First, a human face is carved onto the upright tail feathers and, second, the tiny human figure is holding two large mountain goat horns. (35 cm; MOA; A5254)
MOA = Museum of Anthropology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver

The Tsimshian may have been the first to make raven dance rattles. This example represents a widely disseminated model: On the back of a raven sits a man whose tongue is being pulled out by a frog, which is, in turn, being seized by a kingfisher. The underside of the rattle shows a hawk. "Underside" is incorrect insofar as this was the side which was on top when a chief held the rattle in his hand. (28 cm, ASM)
ASM = Alaska State Museum, Juneau

This raven dance rattle, on which a kingfisher is pulling a man's tongue, was collected in 1878 on the Queen Charlotte Islands. Given the style of the rattle, however, it may have been made by the Tlingit and came into the possession of a Haida family through trade, an exchange of gifts on the occasion of a marriage or as spoils of war. (34 cm; MM)
MM = McCord Museum, McGill University, Montreal

The rattle of a Niska shaman from Gitlakdamix on the Nass River. Both sides are decorated with relief carvings. The reclining figure in the middle is surrounded by fur figures with spread arms and legs. (30 cm: NMM)
NMM = National Museum of Man, Ottawa

In 1976, on the occasion of the Bicentennial celebration in the United States, the artist Duane Pasco of Seattle won a competition in Sitka that resulted in a commission to create a "Bicentennial totem pole." This totem pole now stands in front of the Visitors' Center in Sitka National Historical Park. The base figure holding the halibut hook and the rattle represents the Northwest Coast Indian, who had a rich material culture and a magnificent ceremonial life before the arrival of white men.