The Native Americans

When the first European explorers arrived in North American in the sixteenth century, there was about 1.3 million people already living there. There was more that two hundred different languages. The Native Americans had no systems of writing or hieroglyphics, so they relied on strop oral tradition of storytelling and rituals to pass on their legends, history, spiritual beliefs, and cultural traditions to their descendants. So a lot of what we know now about how the Native Americans lived and dress comes from accounts by the Europeans who first met them. Verbal language was so central to the Native American cultures, so many native groups that shared a similar language, had similar types of housing, farming, foods, and clothing. Algonquian tribes of North American is an example, because they all spoke similar language, so did the Iroquois. The Native Americans different clothing styles by climate, natural resources, and geography of the region where they lived. There is so many different types of native North American cultures, so I will be concentrating on important groups that met the first European settlers: the Iroquois and the Algonquian tribes of the north and northeast, and the Choctaw and Chicasaw tribes of the southeast.

The Algonquians clothes were made from animals they killed while hunting. Deerskin from white-tailed deer was the most common material used. Sinew from deer, moose, and elk was used to sew the hides together to create garments. When it is cold, the Algonquians wore furs from whichever animals were in their local environment such as; raccoons, bears, foxes, beavers, muskrats, squirrels, and harbor seals. Their decoration was made with porcupine quills, shell beads, feathers, bones, and stones. The leaders and chief warriors wore long robes decorated with feathers from wild turkeys or Canada geese. Men and women wore jewelry such as earrings, necklaces, armbands, and headbands made from antlers, stones, shells, bones, and copper. They decorated their bodies with tattoos and body paint. Algonquians were keen hunters, so they wore cords around their necks that held knives in sheaths. They carried tools and supplies in deerskin pouches tied to their waists or around their necks.

Loincloth was a basic garment for Algonquian men, they wore it between their legs, tucked up under a belt tied at the waist with the ends hanging down in front and back. Women wore loincloths too, but they were longer garments. The cold north regions, men and women wore mantles that wrapped around their shoulders or shirts. They were secured at the waist by a belt made from plant fibers. Algonquian women wore skirts, or dresses with deerskin leggings underneath that tied just above the knee. Men wore long leggings that tied to their loincloths with plant fibers or sinew at the waist. Algonquians used wampum as a ritual offering and a prestigious garment like the Iroquois. The children didn't wear any clothing until there were ten years old. Leggings were called "stockings" by English observers of the 1600s. They were made from deerskin, but the European's came then they were sometimes made out of wool or other cloth.