Photo Gallery

Morning at Sedgwick Bay experienced during a helicopter ride to the most important cultural monument of the Haida, the ruins of Ninstints on Anthony Island, at the southern tip of the Queen Charlotte Islands.

Up to the turn of the century, Ninstints was the main village of the Kunghit-Haida. Only a few decaying totem poles bear witness to the past importance of the community. It is still possible to see the hollows at the top of these five mortuary poles where the deceased person was placed behind a vertical plank (see photo 55). Thanks to old photographs, the figures on the poles are identifiable. On the first pole (moving from left to right) the wings of an eagle are visible, although the head has lost its beak. The fearsome jaws of a killer whale can be discerned on the second pole, and the third and fifth poles each has a bear carved on it.

These corner posts and roof beams of one of the 20 houses once standing in Ninstints have been reclaimed by nature.

On this detail of a fallen totem pole in Ninstints, a frog peers playfully from under the mighty tail fin of a killer whale. Forty years ago the delicately carved details on the frog's head-the large eyes and small nostrils-were still clearly visible.

Depicted on another mortuary pole in Ninstints is a bear protecting a small child and lovingly licking the child's head.

It is only possible to guess what the heraldic animal on this badly weathered totem pole at the edge of the forest might be. The two upper incisors tell us that it must be a beaver. A frog sits between his front legs. Barely recognizable between its hind legs with their clawed feet are the flat tail with typical crosshatching and a face.