Imagining Head-Smashed-In: Aboriginal Buffalo Hunting on the Northern Plains

by Jack W. Brink

Overview

For millennia, Aboriginal hunters on the North American Plains used their knowledge of the land and of buffalo behaviour to drive their quarry over cliffs. Archaeologist Jack Brink has written a major study of the mass buffalo hunts and the culture they supported before and after European contact. By way of example, he draws on his 25 years excavating at Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump in southwestern Alberta, Canada – a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781897425046
Publisher:	University of British Columbia Press
Publication date:	02/01/2008
Series:	Athabasca University Press Series
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	360
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 9.20(h) x 0.90(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

Table of Contents

Foreward by Eldon Yellowhorn

Preface

Acknowledgements

1. The Buffalo Jump

Communal Buffalo Hunting

Not Just Any Cliff

The Site

The Cliff

How Long Have Buffalo Jumped?

Blood on the Rocks: The Story of Head-Smashed-In

2. The Buffalo

Is it Bison or Buffalo?

In Numbers, Numberless

Tricks of the Trade

The Fats of Life

3. A Year in the Life

Calves

Mothers

Fathers

The Big Picture

Science and the Historic Record

The Seasonal Round

Summer

Fall and Winter

Spring

The Season of Buffalo Jumping

4. The Killing Fields

Finding Bison

Drive Lanes

Points in Time

Ancient Knowledge

Back to the Drive Lanes

Deadmen

In Small Things Forgotten

5. Rounding Up

The Spirit Sings

The Nose of the Buffalo

Fire this Time

Luring the Buffalo

Buffalo Runners

Lost Calves

Billy’s Stories

The End of the Drive

Of Illusions, Pickup Trucks, and Curves in the Road

6. The Great Kill

Leap of Faith

Overkill?

Drop of Death

Bones on Fire

Let the Butchering Begin

Bison Hide as Insulator

Back to the Assembly Line

7. Cooking up the Spoils

The Processing Site

Day Fades to Night

Dried Goods

Grease is the Word

High Plains Cooking

Hazel Gets Slimed

Buffalo Chips

Hot Rocks

Time for a Roast

Where are the Skulls?

Packing Up, Among the Bears

8. Going Home

Buffalo Hides

Pemmican

Snow Falling on Cottonwoods

9. The End of the Buffalo Hunt

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"When I want Blackfoot students to know about the great buffalo jumps of our ancestors, I call on Jack Brink (Siipistoto'tokaan). He knows the real stories, and he tells them with respect. This is the book I have been waiting for, by the person I was hoping would write it."—Narcisse Blood, Red Crow College, Kainai Nation

"How could ancient hunters, lacking horses and firearms, persuade entire herds of bison to gallop to a particular spot on the edge of a cliff and plunge to their deaths? Working from eyewitness accounts by early European explorers, thousands of years of archaeological evidence, and ancient stories passed down over generations, Brink puts flesh on the bones of history in this epic, real—life tale of courage, ingenuity, and the struggle to survive."—Christopher Morse

Narcisse Blood

When I want Blackfoot students to know about the great buffalo jumps of our ancestors, I call on Jack Brink (Siipistoto'tokaan). He knows the real stories, and he tells them with respect. This is the book I have been waiting for, by the person I was hoping would write it.

Christopher Morse

How could ancient hunters, lacking horses and firearms, persuade entire herds of bison to gallop to a particular spot on the edge of a cliff and plunge to their deaths? Working from eyewitness accounts by early European explorers, thousands of years of archaeological evidence, and ancient stories passed down over generations, Brink puts flesh on the bones of history in this epic, real—life tale of courage, ingenuity, and the struggle to survive.