potlatch
verbEtymology The noun is borrowed from Chinook Jargon potlatch, pátlač (“to give; gift; gift-giving ceremony, potlatch”), from Nootka Jargon pa'chatle, pa'chēētle, pah-chilt (“to give, give me”), from Nootka p̕ačiƛ (“to give a gift during a potlatch ceremony”). Sense 1 of the verb (“to give; especially, to give a gift during a potlatch ceremony”) is borrowed from Chinook Jargon potlatch, pátlač (see above); sense 2 (“to carry out or take part in a potlatch ceremony”) is derived from the noun.
1
To give; especially, to give as a gift during a potlatch ceremony.
- He was a Chilkaht chief, and it being New Year's day, he had been to General Davis's house and "potlatched" (treated) to a bottle of whiskey.[1869 November 10, “[Accompanying Papers. Alaska.] Appendix M. Letter from William S. Dodge, Ex-mayor of Sitka, on Affairs in Alaska Generally.”, in Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Made to the Secretary of the Interior, for the Year 1869, Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, published 1870, →OCLC, page 589:
- I came to see if you can potlatch any old sword, and hi-yu buttons [plenty buttons].1871 September, “About the Shores of Puget Sound”, in The Overland Monthly: Devoted to the Development of the Country, volume VII, number 3, San Francisco, Calif.: John H. Carmany & Company, →OCLC, page 282, column 2:
4 more examples
- The chief was permitted to meet his many creditors and return the goods he had received at previous feasts on the distinct understanding, however, that no gifts were to be "potlached" i.e., donated with the usual custom of having them returned.1885 November 2, I[srael] W[ood] Powell, “[Report on Indian Affairs in the Province of British Columbia]”, in Dominion of Canada: Annual Report of the Department of Indian Affairs for the Year Ended 31st December, 1885. […], Ottawa: […] Maclean, Roger & Co., […], published 1886, →OCLC, page 120:
- After giving them a feed and potlaching some grub for their back trip, we paid the Indians off, after making arrangements with them to return at a certain date.1908 February, F. M. Kelly, “Over the Backbone of Vancouver Island”, in Frank H. Mayer, editor, Western Field: The Sportsman’s Magazine of the West, volume 12, number 1, San Francisco, Calif.: The Western Field Company, →OCLC, page 37, column 1:
- Then he gave out half dollars to all the Huupachas men and women because Kwalats (Gaillic's oldest boy) had stumbled against the saw he was going to potlatch. Charly Ross finished potlatching. The Tishaa were agog over the potlatching for the child who had stumbled.1955, Edward Sapir, Morris Swadesh, Native Accounts of Nootka Ethnography, Bloomington, Ind.: Center in Anthropology, Folklore and Linguistics, Indiana University, →OCLC, page 263:
- When Big Chilligan died in 1931, the shirt was potlatched to Simeon Chickalusion, the chief at Tyonek. Upon Chickalusion's death in 1957, the shirt was potlatched to Shem Pete.2003, James Kari, “Alexander Creek. [Ghuliy—Potlatch Wealth.]”, in James Kari, James A. Fall, Shem Pete, Shem Pete’s Alaska: The Territory of the Upper Cook Inlet Dena’ina, 2nd edition, Fairbanks, Ak.: University of Alaska Press, →ISBN, page 116, column 1:
2
To carry out or take part in a potlatch ceremony.
- [page 85] In Oregon, Washington, British Columbia and Alaska, a native who has acquired a large share of this world's goods becomes at times stricken with a sort of ecstasy, when he feels it incumbent on himself to organize a sort of conscience fund on his own hook. He calls his neighbors together, has a big feast and distributes to his guest all his earthly belongings. [...] [page 86] [T]here is no instance on record of any of the leading capitalists of America ever having held a potlatch, though the records of the Conscience Fund at Washington do show that many Americans have potlatched with the Government according to the extent of their misdoings, some with and some without legal interest.1890, Alexander Badlam, “Totems and Shamans”, in The Wonders of Alaska, San Francisco, Calif.: The Bancroft Company, →OCLC, pages 85–86:
- Natives did not get their wheels into the water until the [salmon] run was nearly over; were all potlaching until the latter part of July.1920 May 4, John Evans (witness), To Prohibit Fishing for Salmon in the Yukon River. Part 2: Hearings before the United States House Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries, Subcommittee on Fish and Fish Hatcheries, Sixty-Sixth Congress, Second Session, on May 4, 1920, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 20:
4 more examples
- While girls are married as soon as they mature, the men marry much later, for custom dictates that a man to be eligible for marriage must have potlached at least once and preferably three times. This rule is gradually breaking down, but even now public opinion frowns on early marriage by young men.1959, Robert A. McKennan, The Upper Tanana Indians (Yale Publications in Anthropology; no. 55), New Haven, Conn.: Department of Anthropology, Yale University, →OCLC, page 118; quoted in Marie-Françoise Guédon, “Life Cycle”, in People of Tetlin, Why are You Singing? (Mercury Series, Ethnology Division Paper; no. 9), Ottawa: National Museum of Man, National Museums of Canada, 1974, →OCLC, page 186:
- The misconception so often encountered in anthropological literature that an Indian gained social status by potlatching, or potlatched to gain social status, comes in part from the Indians themselves; it is thus one of the categories of ethnographic fact mentioned in earlier pages, what people say they do. [...] Close analysis reveals that the reverse was actually true: So-and-so gave many (read "several major") potlatches because he was a great ("highly ranked") chief. [...] The only exceptions to this rule, and they were few indeed, were those who in relatively recent times, by potlatching and by otherwise establishing good personal relationships with the chiefs, were able to persuade the chiefs to create eagle places for them.1967, Philip Drucker, Robert F[leming] Heizer, “The Verbalization of Conflict in the Potlatch”, in To Make My Name Good: A Reexamination of the Southern Kwakiutl Potlatch, Berkeley; Los Angeles, Calif.; London: University of California Press, →OCLC, page 134:
- When they describe, for example, payment of cattle for a bride in East Africa, offering a gift in India to earn spiritual merit, exchanging favors between compadres in Middle America, giving a ceremonial necklace in return for an arm shell in the Trobriand kula ring, and potlaching each other by Kwakiutl chiefs, ethnographers are assuming the operation of some reciprocal principle.1980, Harumi Befu, “Structural and Motivational Approaches to Social Exchange”, in Kenneth J. Gergen, Martin S. Greenberg, Richard H. Willis, editors, Social Exchange: Advances in Theory and Research, New York, N.Y.: Plenum Press, Springer Science+Business Media, published 2012, →DOI, →ISBN:
- My boys and I put up a totem pole to my father inside the museum. [...] When you raise a pole you have to potlatch. I potlatched for all the tribes when they gathered here for the museum opening.1989, Harry Assu, with Joy Inglis, Assu of Cape Mudge: Recollections of a Coastal Indian Chief, Vancouver, B.C.: University of British Columbia Press, →ISBN, page 107:
- Derived terms
- potlatching