Wooden sea lion (Moses’s account)

Overview

Moses’s Sea Lion Hunters introduces four hunters associated with different clans. The Bear-clan hunter repeatedly catches fewer sea lions and steals from the Wolf-clan hunter’s rock. Discovering the theft, the latter carves a sea lion from wood and tests it in the water. Four kinds of wood fail by rising and floating. A final hard, reddish wood, likened to sea-lion skin, produces a strong swimmer. He places this figure on his own hunting rock.

The thief returns by night and harpoons it. The carved animal dives and tows his canoe away. When he has paid out the line and tries to release it, it adheres to his hands. The sea lion keeps moving until the men have lost sight of the mountains, eventually taking them to a distant shore. The account mentions successive stretches of days and nights, emphasizing the long displacement rather than a mapped geographical route.

The arrival leads into another encounter: a small but powerful fisher kills one of the travelers for stealing halibut. His community later receives the three survivors, who help it fight visiting birds. Once the birds leave, the community sends those three home. Thus the complete story ends with a partial return after further theft and loss; it does not describe the animated sea lion being destroyed, becoming an ordinary animal or returning to its maker.

This is a specifically made object in a named narrator’s story. Its material, testing and punitive action distinguish it from ordinary sea lions and from an animal ancestor. Boas publishes Moses’s narrative on pages 108–115 of the 1902 Nass River collection, recorded at Kinkolith in 1894.

Origins & earliest records

Franz Boas, Tsimshian Texts, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 27 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1902). Recorded at Kinkolith, at the Nass River’s mouth, in November–December 1894. Boas’s introduction, dated June 1899, names Philip, Moses, Chief Mountain and Moody as the collection’s narrators. The volume prints the language it calls Nîsqa’E alongside English translation; individual story headings identify their tellers.

Records & interpretation

Complete English The Sea Lion Hunters, pp.108–115, named Moses heading and comparative footnote p.115 read with introduction p.5. Collector’s borrowing proposal kept distinct from the narrative.

Selected bibliography

Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.

1. 01

   Tsimshian Texts: Nass River Dialect

   Moses, teller; Franz Boas, recorder and translator · 1902

   The Sea Lion Hunters, complete pp.108–115; Moses heading, collector’s comparison p.115 and introduction p.5.

Family & connections

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References

Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.

1. Primary textBoas 1902 original Nass River collectionResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

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