Talk:Native American long house
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[edit] Scope and history
As I'm studying the "What links here" list of this article and from the more central Long house article I come to the conclusion that although the Iroquois longhouse may be by far the most well known and to some the only one of interest there have been a lot more tribes that know this building type. So far the Lenni Lenape/Delaware seem the oldest group in the east coast region. Are there any excavations of old longhouses? Did the east coast longhouse originate with them and others like the Iroquois to the north, that seem to have migrated here a lot later than the Lenape, the Erie and Wyandot to the west and the Powhattan, that may be related to the Lenape, to the south learned from them? Is there any Information on how old this building tradition is? The oldest longhouses in Europe seem to origin around 5000 BC. Longhouses excavated in Daepyeong in Korea may be from 1000 BC. What about America? Was the idea maybe brought to America during the Na-Dene migration? --T.woelk 12:31, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
PS this is not tru because is all liar —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.236.17.35 (talk) 23:46, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Move/rename because of US-centric title
"Native American" is inappropriate in articles covering both sides of the border; and to me, in fact, there's a big difference between Iroquoian longhouses and the timber-and-beam halls of the Pacific Northwest; this should almost be at least two separate articles; but either one would need a better title; Native American and First Nations long house is too unwieldy - Aboriginal longhouses in North America maybe? SuggestionsSkookum1 (talk) 18:55, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
- Agreed that need to be better name. But I personally can't think of a better one right now. I think those might be a bit too wordy. Even between Coast Salish and the northern Wakashan language groups, there is a clear difference in architectural design of each households. So even on the west coast, there is a clear distinction just like between Haudenosaunee (sp?) and west coaster longhouses. I was thinking bighouse because that's what their referred to up north, but that's go to prison, so that's a no. Could make them language specific? But that's casting just a odd a net as Native American and First Nations longhouses or Aboriginal longhouses in North America. I'll keep thinking about it. OldManRivers (talk) 08:07, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah, I thought of bighouse too, as that's used by the coastal peoples; it could always be disambiguated - "Big House" is the "proper" way to "spell" the prison meaning anyway, not as one word but two. Another option for each type of building is to use the aboriginal name in each case; whatever the Kwakwaka'wakw term would be as an article on Kwakwaka'wakw long/bighouses (more than one type, too, right?), the Nuu-chah-nulth term for Nuu-chah-nulth houses, and so on. Also in some cases, particularly Coast Salish, isn't there something more like a lean-to rather than a gabled building, as with the more northerly/outer coastal peoples. BTW did you ever seen Dead Man Walking, sometimes titled Dead Man, by Jim Jarmusch? The last scene is in the Makah Illahee, and there's a huge complex of bighouses in the scene; not sure if these are actual Makah buildings or built for the film, but it was an impressive set; not sure how accurate at all, but.....anyway back to the lean-to concept, I know that's how Xa:ytem's ancient longhouse was built, and also how today's museum has been built. Post-and-beam but of a different kind than the usual vision of a coastal longhouse. Also there were seasonal structures on the fishing grounds that were open on the one side; in Hauka's McGowan's War he quotes from someone's journal of a journey from Victoria to the goldfields where the shores of the South Arm of the Fraser are lined for miles by such lean-tos, all abandoned at that time of year but apparently very impressive n scale. Anyway, back to the idea of how to cover all these diverse types of buildings; one article is not right, I'd say, and the idea I gave above for disambiguating both longhouse and bighouse with specific aboriginal names/types of buildings is the way to go; remember, such terms also occure in Polynesia, Indonesia, Micronesia, Melanesia and perhaps elsewhere. There's also the longhouse religion which was in the news in BC so much a couple of decades ago because of beatings suffered in the induction or other ceremonies; the "Indian shaker" movement, I think it was also called. One last thought - the resemblance in structure/design between coastal longhouses and old Norse/Scandinavian houses is striking; I'm not saying there's a connection (although someone tried, I think it was Frank Ney that theorized the "Vikings" had made it to the Northwest Coast via the Northwest Passage....yeah, uh-huh), but still the similarities are very striking; I'll have to dig you up some images sometime....but there need be no more similarity than a consequence of similar building materials (large trees) and a climate where large interior spaces are neede. It's like the infamous comparison between tiki and totem poles that some try to draw a connection between (not that Kanaka carvers might have been among those who visited/intermarried with coastal peoples), ditto with Ainu "totem poles", although they're more similar in concept to PacNW ones....Skookum1 (talk) 16:32, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- haha, I didn't know the longhouse winter ceremonies got into the news. I'm not surprised. There is a Indian Shaker Church article already. Coast Salish longhouses are different from northern, but they also have difference styles. There are some that have similarities to northern bighouses and there are some that have none. Within my language, we have names for all kinds of houses. Dance-Houses, Home-Houses, Community-Houses, Out-Houses, Sweatlodge-Houses, etc. Up north there is also a diversity in architectural style. I do intend to put them on the articles page about the architecture. I have diagrams that I'm going to re-create with photoshop then upload to commons. But as for an article in just longhouses and bighouses, I'll have to keep thinking of a name. OldManRivers (talk) 18:32, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah, I thought of bighouse too, as that's used by the coastal peoples; it could always be disambiguated - "Big House" is the "proper" way to "spell" the prison meaning anyway, not as one word but two. Another option for each type of building is to use the aboriginal name in each case; whatever the Kwakwaka'wakw term would be as an article on Kwakwaka'wakw long/bighouses (more than one type, too, right?), the Nuu-chah-nulth term for Nuu-chah-nulth houses, and so on. Also in some cases, particularly Coast Salish, isn't there something more like a lean-to rather than a gabled building, as with the more northerly/outer coastal peoples. BTW did you ever seen Dead Man Walking, sometimes titled Dead Man, by Jim Jarmusch? The last scene is in the Makah Illahee, and there's a huge complex of bighouses in the scene; not sure if these are actual Makah buildings or built for the film, but it was an impressive set; not sure how accurate at all, but.....anyway back to the lean-to concept, I know that's how Xa:ytem's ancient longhouse was built, and also how today's museum has been built. Post-and-beam but of a different kind than the usual vision of a coastal longhouse. Also there were seasonal structures on the fishing grounds that were open on the one side; in Hauka's McGowan's War he quotes from someone's journal of a journey from Victoria to the goldfields where the shores of the South Arm of the Fraser are lined for miles by such lean-tos, all abandoned at that time of year but apparently very impressive n scale. Anyway, back to the idea of how to cover all these diverse types of buildings; one article is not right, I'd say, and the idea I gave above for disambiguating both longhouse and bighouse with specific aboriginal names/types of buildings is the way to go; remember, such terms also occure in Polynesia, Indonesia, Micronesia, Melanesia and perhaps elsewhere. There's also the longhouse religion which was in the news in BC so much a couple of decades ago because of beatings suffered in the induction or other ceremonies; the "Indian shaker" movement, I think it was also called. One last thought - the resemblance in structure/design between coastal longhouses and old Norse/Scandinavian houses is striking; I'm not saying there's a connection (although someone tried, I think it was Frank Ney that theorized the "Vikings" had made it to the Northwest Coast via the Northwest Passage....yeah, uh-huh), but still the similarities are very striking; I'll have to dig you up some images sometime....but there need be no more similarity than a consequence of similar building materials (large trees) and a climate where large interior spaces are neede. It's like the infamous comparison between tiki and totem poles that some try to draw a connection between (not that Kanaka carvers might have been among those who visited/intermarried with coastal peoples), ditto with Ainu "totem poles", although they're more similar in concept to PacNW ones....Skookum1 (talk) 16:32, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- Unless you're going to specify by culture, how about just North American longhouse? - TheMightyQuill (talk) 01:19, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
