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[sjc <indexer AT fairpoint.net>]

> Perhaps, Susan Jane, the Saami were also part of those who did not
> resist, just moved on, split up, or died off? Maybe that is wishful
> thinking, I just don't know.
>
> B
>   
I don't recall ever hearing about them 'fighting back', or setting off 
to war, either.  I wish I had the notes I took years ago, my Norwegian 
friend Britt spends part of the year in the US and part in Norway, and 
she at one time brought me a lot of books to use over the winter; they 
were actually books belonging to a library/museum on Bergen, most quite 
old with very fuzzy photos in some of them and of course mostly in 
Norwegian, although there were a couple of Swedish and a couple in some 
language Britt didn't recognize, although they were bot published in Oslo.

One of my keen interests has always been native clothing, and that's 
what I had my mind on at the time (don't I always? :-) ), but the period 
of time covered in those books was from roughly the end of the 1700s 
thru to just after WWII.  The main thing I remember is how they were 
pushed around, by the Russians on skis, by the Swedish, the Finns, the 
Danish for whatever reason, and the Norwegians, although the Norwegians, 
in a compilation of material existent in those books, seemed to be 
somewhat less interested in brutalizing them; in cases they seemed to 
demonstrate some 'responsiblity' for them.  But they were pushed back 
and forth, lines made and remade, communications apparently didn't 
happen (people carted off because they were in the wrong "country" even 
though they were where they'd been living for 30 yrs kind of thing), in 
many cases there were attempts to get them to look less distinctively 
Saami, including apparent attempts by Saami themselves at times, as a 
device for looking less different.  Starvation techniques and much of 
the usual sort of abuse we've seen heaped on our aboriginals were all 
part of the picture.  I don't remember seeing anything that would really 
look like aggression originating with them, but I've no clue anymore, 
what I might have skipped in the interest of figuring out how some sort 
of decorative band was woven or some boot was stitched.  One track 
brain, I'm afraid.

I do know that most arctic groups in the east of the continent were very 
similar in behaviors to our own far northerners.  I'd guess they 
wouldn't have been too far off that track.  In North America most 
northern aboriginals were very mild mannered, when we were at Hudson Bay 
it was a fascination to me to watch mothers deal with children so 
silently, everything is very quiet, and it is considered the worst 
possible behavior to even show temper by facial expression in the older 
people, I was told.  Certainly a group of folks I met,  (hmm, can one 
"meet" people to whom one can't communicate?) had these silly-looking 
grins (to us silly looking, pretty much pasted with a 5 second refresh 
kind of grin) on their ever-bobbing heads.  All through their speech to 
the translator they never stopped with the grins.  Later, when we were 
talking to friends who'd been there some years, and worked closely with 
these bands, was talking about how historically they've lost so many; he 
was there working on northern depression/light deprivation/related 
mental health issues....but as he got it, these people were part of one 
of the older groups, had no written history but huge numbers of 
storysongs, lived communally in the winter unless they had to move, then 
were split for the winter, had no history whatsoever of aggression that 
he could find, about average occurence of mental illness, shared all 
large food catches (seals, mostly), shared skin and oil supplies, he 
thought were more attentive to infants/toddlers and less attentive to 
older kids than many groups, that's about all I can remember.  They took 
2 of my kids out in hide boats, not really what we'd call a kayak, but 
sort of a cross between canoe and kayak, sealing, and let David kill 
one, laughed (pointing, laughing, nudging one another, recounting, 
laughing,)almost uncontrollably when he tasted it.  Somehow they manage 
to keep it up for probably 6-7 minutes.  Three or four times a day they 
went through that, and sometimes I couldn't decide what was funny.  
Quite a bit of the time it was when some kid playing with a dog (dogs 
inside and out, 27/7, big, hairy dogs) got knocked over when, say, the 
dog jumped up suddenly.  Vrrrrryyy funny for 5, or more, minutes, much 
backslapping, bending over, very, very funny....!!!

Made me think of the theory of very ill people renting tons of funny 
movies as a cure (which now we know is an explainable 'phenomenon' but 
then it was still just an idea).  And those crazy smiles were catching, 
soon we all caught each other doing it, first to sort of not stick out, 
but in less than a day it started to grow into its own thing..... Didn't 
seem to have a sense of embarrassment about anything that I could see 
but we were only there 2 days.  They accumulate almost nothing but 
boats, weapons, hides, tiny amount of household utensils (could put them 
all in a cubic foot, probably).  Keep food caches, still.  Clothes were 
all of hides, no underclothing, like we think of it.  Fur side in for 
inside clothes, in or out on outer layers, everpresent baby, or 2,  in 
there somewhere in a huge sort of hood/pocket and maybe a toddler 
sitting/hanging onto a belt sort of rig around the waist under the outer 
coat.  Cotton 'dress' over all, similar in cut to the print 'parkas' we 
saw at Yellowknife and Coppermine, commericially made (had a tag in 
it).  The reason for those is that they shed snow very easily, so one 
doesn't become loaded down when traveling; they obviously are a new 
development.  They are very similar in shape and general detail to an 
anorak, that is, an actual anorak, not what they sell in stores as one.

So there's a snatchily-remembered snapshot of one group (estimated to be 
about 8-10,000 at one time).  This was a group with only about 50 years' 
contact with Caucasians, except for occasional contacts in the past.  
Oh, that reminds me.  They have very old storysong about apparent 
Causcasians who came to 'visit' them in the past, which they somehow 
marked by when a certain island appeared..  Norm was at the time trying 
to figure that out, both as to people and timing, but he didn't doubt it 
and said that storysong in that region had proved to be very accurate. 

Anyway, so many of the northern groups have very similar/parallel 
histories, that I should think that some part of that would apply just 
about around the top of the world.  Most of it would apply to the 
northern groups in the center part of North America's far north 
(Coppermine, etc, area).  Most of the groups have not one but several or 
many storysongs about others and other groups,  and some of them are 
really old (and long.....) so there must have been a lot of contact 
between groups through the years.  But while most of the Inuits, in 
particular are quick to smile (for instance, if you say something they 
don't understand, a smile and sometime vigorous nodding are all you'll 
get, no query.), this was the first time I'd seen the wide, practically 
everpresent, grin, on the bobbing head.   It was a cool trip, especially 
for the boys, who hadn't been before.

But how they would (or wouldn't) compare to the Saami, don't know.

Maybe I'll see if I can find Norm, now I'm curious to talk to him.

Well, I cleaned up where I keep my wood downstairs as those trees that 
came down the storm a couple of weeks ago are going under the splitting 
maul beginning at 6 in the morning, so I'm off to bed.

Night, all

SJ