Mi'kmaq women were homemakers in the truest sense of the word, since they were also responsible for constructing and moving their wigwams; following precisely-timed schedules. According to Father Biard, in January they hunted seals on the coasts and off-shore islands; while from February to the middle of March they spent inland hunting moose, caribou, beaver and bear.
Toward the end of March, she packed up again, moving out to the coasts and estuaries to catch smelt, and later herring, migratory sea birds and salmon. From May to the middle of September they fished and gathered shellfish, then moved to the tributaries of the larger rivers for eel. In October and November they once again moved inland for the moose, caribou and beaver and in December, young cod were taken under the ice. Careful planning was necessary to ensure that they be on the coast in the warmer months in order to meet European fishing vessels where they could trade furs for European goods.
Most clothing was made from the hides of deer and moose, which were fashioned into leggings, sleeves, breechclouts and moccasins; and in winter, fur robes would be added. The clothing was often beautifully decorated with dyed porcupine quills and later glass beads obtained in trade. By the nineteenth century, most clothing was made from European trade cloth, though they long retained a style of dress that distinguished them from their Euro-Canadian neighbours. Skin robes were replaced by wool blankets, and men adopted the military-style greatcoats and even top hats. Women also began to wear woolen jackets and skirts, with their highly ornamented peak hats (as in photo above right).
They had their own shamans, or priests, who lived among them. Also known as puoin, or Medicine Men, they had the power to cure ills and were relied upon to interpret the spiritual world to the people. Although
Christian missionaries tried to discredit the puoin and the world-view that they represented, many traditional beliefs and practices persist.
However, a father would not give his daughter to a man unless he had some means by his industry to nourish and maintain both the daughter and his future grandchildren. Dièreville disclosed how the young male Indian would have to seek out the father of the maiden and prove to him that he was going to be a good hunter. Also, Dièreville goes into how the couple themselves might know what it is that each would find acceptable in the other (by accepting gifts). Once the maiden's family was won over, then there was not much ceremony, the girl would follow her new husband into the woods so that they might go on a hunting trip; they would come back with the game they caught and a marriage banquet would then take place. Lescarbot also comments on the traditon:
kettle, was considered a highly accomplished lady. The courtship was extremely simple and short. The lover, after advising with his relations as to the girl he should choose, went to the wigwam where she was, and if he liked her looks, tossed a chip or stick into her lap, which she would take, and, after looking at it with well-feigned wonder, if she liked her lover's looks, would toss it back to him with a sweet smile. That was the signal that was accepted. But if she desired to reject him, she threw the chip aside with a frown."
"I have seen some who have come from a great distance in order to receive this Sacrament from the Curé of Port Royal, & I have even seen those who had been married in the Indian fashion renew their vows before our Altars. Although it is one of the most sacred rites, I could not help laughing. The Curé, who did not
understand the Indian language, & was no better able to speak it, had as Interpreter one of his Parishioners who understood & spoke it very well; he would say to him, in French, all the beautiful things he could about the excellence & duties of matrimony; the Interpreter repeated the same in the Indian tongue to the prospective Husband & Wife, who, by their demonstrations, appeared to be charmed by them; then, repeating after the Curé, he asked whether they would follow from point to point all the instructions he had given them; they, in their own language, promised to do so, which was interpreted into good French & testified to the Curé, who proceeded in this fashion until the couple had been united." (Dièreville.)
Before this time, it was not considered unusual for a man to have more than one wife. Again, Lescarbot:
"Sometimes our savages having many wives will give one of them to their friend ..." Men were generally very particular about the behaviour of their wife or wives, and "if the wife should be found to be faulty, she will be put away or in danger to be killed by her husband ..." If a woman should lose her husband through death,
she does not marry again, but go about declaring her widowhood by daubing their face with coal beaten to powder and with grease and applied thickly. Indeed, as Lescarbot points out, they may dramatically change their diet - not eat meat until the death of her husband has been revenged.
"The first nourishment he takes is Fish oil or the melted fat of some animal. The Papoose is forced to swallow this, after which he gets only his mother's milk until he is strong enough to live as the others do. He is swathed in the skins of animals and a bundle of moss is placed like a diaper to avoid any damage to his swaddling clothes.
"The children would be slowly introduced to solid food by the mother. She did this as she ate her own food; chewing it first, until the little one could handle it on his or her own. We learn from Lescarbot how a baby board was devised for the infants which they carry on their backs, their legs hanging down: then being returned into their cabins, they set them in this manner up straight against stone or something else. And as in these parts [France] one gives small feathers and gilt things to little children, so they hang a quantity of beads and small square toys, diversely coloured, in the upper part of the said board or plank ..."
It is said that the English soldiers when they captured a group of Indians, in the southern frontier of Acadia, (present day State of Maine), in the late 1600s, would often bring the small Indian children back home to Boston with them, eventually sending them over to England as curiosities for their respective English families to admire.
“The wigwams were formed of poles stuck into the ground and secured at the top by a withe. This circular inclosure was covered with birch-bark; a blanket or skin covered the aperture which served for a door; and the centre was occupied by the fire, the struggling smoke of which found its way out at the top. Round the fire, boughs were laid, which served the family for seats. Dogs snored around the camps, and papooses lay sleeping in the cradles strapped to their mothers' backs, their brown faces upturned to the sun. One mother sat apart, nursing a dying babe. She had prepared a tiny carrying belt, a little pail, and a paddle, to aid her child in the spirit land.
"Here some of the women were busy sewing new and repairing old birch-bark canoes. In this primitive ship-yard neither broad-axe nor caulking-mallet was required. The framework was made of split ash, shaped with a knife and moulded by hand; this was covered with sheets of white birch-bark, sewed round the wood-work with the tough root-lets of trees.”
