When first seeing photos of the Haida tattooing instruments, (collected by ethnologist James G. Swan in 1883) I was struck by the similarity to Japanese tattooing tools, in particular, the paint brushes. The Japanese used a stick at least a foot long with needles poking straight out, firmly attached to the end with thread. The stick would be grasped at the other end with the right hand, laid across the web of the thumb, and then using this as a fulcrum, jabbed into the skin. The paint brush would be held under the middle joint of the left hand, bristles hovering over the tattoo and offering a fresh supply of pigment for the tattooist to work from.

The sticks the North Coast Indians used appear much shorter though, perhaps half the length and the needles were in a looser grouping, not flattened out. I surmise the Haida would have held them in their right hand, much as we would hold a spoon, and simply pricked the skin repeatedly using wrist action. I have seen this method used in markets in the South Seas and Asia. The loose grouping of the needles would explain the extremely thick lines evident in the Swan photographs from the 1870’s.

I had assumed at first glance they would have used the paint brushes in the same manner as the Japanese but I remember reading passages in Swan’s writings where the pigment would be drawn on the skin and pricked in after, followed by more pigment rubbed in. This is where the brushes would most likely have been used. Now at first this may not sound feasible, but it certainly would work. If, for instance I tattooed a small yellow sun on the skin and then tried to tattoo in some blue background between the rays, simply smearing that blue as I wiped the tattoo would force enough pigment into the fresh wound to give the yellow a greenish hue. The particle size of black tends to be relatively smaller, particularly if it is carbon based, (contemporary blacks are in the one to three micron range), and would be even easier to force under the epidermis.

Thomas Lockhart
Vancouver, February 2002

Haida tattooing seemed to be quite rare by 1885. Traditionally, it was performed in conjunction with the potlatch commemorating the completion of a cedar-plank dwelling and its frontal pole. Potlatches entailed the distribution of personal property by the host (house chief) to those who had performed important functions in the actual construction of the house. Each gift elevated the status of the house chief and his family and especially benefited the house owner’s children. After the lengthy exchange of goods, each child of the house chief received a new potlatch name and costly tattoo that accorded them high-ranking status. Tattoos depicted the crests of the family and included, for example: land animals (Bear, Wolf, Beaver), sea animals (Killer Whale, Halibut, Shark), birds (Eagle, Hawk, Thunderbird, Owl) as well as geographical features (Mountain, Iceberg), celestial bodies (Sun, Stars, Moon) and natural materials (Copper, Clay, Yellow Cedar).

The possession of crests by a family, clan, or house derived from events that the Haida recount in their oral traditions, events that account for their unique identity as a group. Crests explain Haida existence in this world: linking them to creatures or objects in the natural environment and to other clans. Crests also chronicle the origin of supernatural and significant events in the history of the clan. They serve as title to the object on which they are placed and to the site and geographical region where these events occurred. Crests symbolize these special relationships and embody the spirit and being of and in themselves. Thus, the crest, and the right to use it in stories or in tattoo ritual, set the particular group and/or individual apart from other Haida groups while defining their position with respect to each. Therefore, the right to a crest, the right to use the emblem, was more valuable than any object, or human body, that represented it.

Traditional Haida tattoos covered the arms, chests, thighs, upper arms, feet, and sometimes an individual’s back. A typical kit consisted of a stone dish to mix magnetite (black) and hematite (red) pigments, cedar brushes with crests carved into each handle, and 4 or 5 cedar batons with various configurations of needles depending on the desired effect: shading, outlining, fill, etc. Thomas Lockhart of The Vanishing Tattoo and West Coast Tattoo in Vancouver recently demonstrated that the Haida kit closely resembles that of the Japanese hand-poker.

Our knowledge of Haida tattooing kits has been extremely limited until recently. As part of my many conversations with Vince Hemingson of The Vanishing Tattoo, I decided to investigate the possibility that a tattoo kit existed in a museum collection somewhere: dusty, unused, and lost to time. Luckily, with some persistence and investigative research, I uncovered at the Smithsonian what truly seems to represent the last authentic Haida tattoo kit remaining in the world. It was collected by ethnologist James G. Swan at Masset, Queen Charlotte Islands, July 1883. Swan authored several Haida tattoo articles for the U.S. National Museum in the late 19th century, including the illustrated “Tattoo Marks of the Haida Indians of Queen Charlotte Islands, B.C., and the Prince of Wales Archipelago, Alaska,” among others.

Although Haida tattooing practices are all but dead, the recent resurgence in traditional Haida arts may well foster and provide new life for the ancient custom. With the assistance of renowned Haida carver Robert Davidson and Vince Hemingson of The Vanishing Tattoo, it is our hope to complete the formal arrangements for a temporary loan of the kit from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History to the Haida people themselves. Duplicates could be made and later utilized by interested artists. This effort would offer a permanent and lasting solution to the common legacy and historical roots of Haida communities separated by decades of artificial isolation from their indelible past.