The Algonquian Totem and Totemism:

A Distortion of the Semantic Field

THERESA M. SCHENCK
Rutgers University
In 1952 A. R. Radcliffe-Brown asked whether "totemism as a technical
term has not outlived its usefulness" (1965:117). The question is rather
whether it should ever have been used at all. After more than a century of
use and abuse, it is time to re-examine the earliest k n o w n use of the word,
and to trace the development of the idea of totemism through the historic
period. It can be shown that the meaning became distorted in the 19th
century, and that this distortion has in rum influenced contemporary usage.
The earliest recorded form of the Algonquin word totem is 8ten,
translated as 'village' by an unknown Jesuit missionary in his Dictionnaire
algonquin (Anonymous 1661:48). Since it was usually spoken as nind
otem 'my village', the word was soon heard as totem, or dodem. For the
Algonquin, however, the word did not connote a permanent group of
houses as the word village did for the French. Rather the 8ten was a group
of people tied together by kinship, w h o moved together seasonally. The
village was the people, not the place. In general, all the people of the
village were related (except, of course, the wives, w h o were necessarily of
different totems), hence " m y village" was " m y family". In fact, in his
Algonquin dictionary, Jean-Andre Cuoq gave the following explanation for
ote- 'village' from the A b b e Thavenet, an early 19th-century missionary at
Lac-des-Deux-Montagnes, Quebec: "it signifies family, all the persons
who live in the same lodge under the same chief (Cuoq 1886:312). The
French called these groups nations, a practice which has givenriseto m u c h
misunderstanding in m o d e m times.
At the time offirstcontact each upper Great Lakes Algonquian village
had a symbol, usually an animal, which it used to designate itself and
which was used in turn by other groups to name them. According to Cuoq
the n a m e was chosen because of its familiarity: it was the most beautiful,
the most friendly, or the most feared, the object of the hunt, or even
ordinary food. This animal, then, became the distinctive mark of each
family, and was transmitted to posterity as the perpetual symbol of that
group (Cuoq 1886:313).

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THERESA M . SCHENCK

A m o n g the Algonquian of the upper Great Lakes m a n y of the earliest

recorded village names were derived from animal names: Amikouet
(amik), Atchiligouan (name achigan), Outchougai (oshugai), Nikikouec
(nikik), Chichigouak (chichik), Malameg (malameg), Nouquet (mak8a)
(Thwaites 1896-1901, 18:229-231, 44:247-251, 57:221; Anonymous
1661; Andre 1688:10-11). The totem was the village, the village name,
and by extension, the mark or symbol of the village.
The relationship between village and symbol was recognized even in
the 17th century. Pierre Esprit Radisson, when he was in the vicinity of
Hudson Bay around 1660, noted that "all the nations are distinguished by
the representation of the beast or animals" (Adams 1961:146). In relating
a story about an old Potawatomi m a n w h o was of the Hare clan, the Jesuit
Allouez stated that "the m a n and the hare were of the same village"
(Thwaites 1896-1901,51:33). Nicolas Perrot, w h o spent nearly forty years
among the Indians of the Great Lakes, wrote that "their villages each bear
the name of the animal which has given its people their being as that of
the crane, or the bear, or of other animals" (Blair 1911,1:37). Perrot also
reported that, in the ceremony at Sault Ste. Marie in which the French took
possession of the upper Great Lakes in 1671, all the chiefs signed with "the
insignia of their families; some of them drew a beaver, others an otter, a
sturgeon, a deer or an elk" (Blair 1911,1:347). A n dfinally,in 1701, at the
ratification of peace with the Iroquois, each chief drew la marque du
village 'the mark or sign of his village': the Amikouet, a beaver; the Otagami, a fox; the Missisagui, an eagle; and the Sauteurs, a crane (Figure 1).
Throughout the early 18th century most of the upper Great Lakes
Algonquian groups continued to be known by their totemic, or village,
names, even as n e w totemic groups (villages) were being formed and old
ones amalgamated. W h e n Charlevoix made his voyage in 1720, he found
several of the totemic groups already mixed, "each of them having a
distinct chief in every village" (Charlevoix 1761,2:22). In the enumeration
of Indian tribes taken in 1736 the "armorial bearing" or "device" of each
group was given. The Mississauga had a crane; the Monsoni, a moose;
the Ouace, a catfish; and the Cristinaux, a wild goose. The Sauteurs,
whose mark was earlier a crane, had n o w either been joined by other
groups orfissionedinto smaller villages: at Sault Ste. Marie were the crane
and catfish totems, while at the K e w e e n a w Peninsula were the crane and
stag totems. The totemic device for the Sauteurs of Chagouamegon was
not recorded (O'Callaghan and F e m o w 1853-87, 9:1052-8).

T H E A L G O N Q U I A N T O T E M A N D TOTEMISM

Figure 1. Totemic marks of villages ratifying the Peace Treaty at Montreal, 4 August 1701. NAC, Archives des Colonies, M G 1, CllA F-19:43A.
The extended concept of totem, which was nothing more than a village
or family naming system, had m a n y functions in early Algonquian society.
Not only was it the family name, but it also served to regulate exogamy 1
and to establish a bond among relatives, however distant. A s a symbol or
mark it identified a village or the route taken by members of a village, a
custom similar to that of the Huron, whose "armorial bearings" Gabriel
Sagard described in 1624 as "inscribed not only on a post erected in their
village, but also on birch bark along whatever route they took to let others
know they had passed by" (Sagard 1939:251-2). O n e additional, and
possibly later, use of the totem was on grave markers (Figure 2); as
Alexander Henry (1809:311) noted in the 18th century, it indicated "the
family to which the deceased belonged".
The basic idea of the totem as village or family continued well into the
19th century. Gradually, however, as the population grew and people of
1

Those who question exogamy should be aware of Andre's observation

(1688:3^1) that "quod possunt, ducunt uxores ex alia natione quam ex sua" ('when
they can, they take wives from another nation than their own').

THERESA M. SCHENCK

344

4r*.
a

1;
Ii

II

M
1'
1

ll
II

'Ml

II

(far
->4

I*-***.

Figure 2. Grave post of Waubojig (White Fisher) of the Addick (caribou)

totem. Other symbols tell of his leadership and success in battles. Drawn
by S. Eastman. Schoolcraft 1851-57, v. 1, plate 50.

different totems or families came to live in one village, the totemic m

came to be the sign of the family or clan only. This is reflected in the
different words for 'family' and 'village' in the 19th century. Frederick
Baraga (1878-80, 1:96, 278) recorded odem as 'family mark', and odena
as 'village'. It is likely by this time that the concept of village had taken
on another connotation as well, a location.
A s indicative of the n e w mixed villages w e find that, in numerous land
deeds in both the Canadian Archives and the Burton Collection, each group
signed the document not with one totem, but with the individual family
mark of each chief (Figure 3). It is probable that the Chippewa, Ottawa,
Potawatomi, and Mississauga w h o had been living in adjacent villages in

T H E ALGONQUIAN T O T E M A N D TOTEMISM

Figure 3. Chippewa signatures accompanying surrender of land on River

Thames near Lake Sinclair, 7 September 1796. NAC, RG 10, v. 1840.

the Detroit area since the early 18th century had intermarried, ther
adding n e w totems to each group.
Totems had likewise mixed and n e w ones had developed in other areas

346

THERESA M. SCHENCK

Figure 4. Symbolic petition of Chippewa chiefs presented at Washington,

28 January 1848. D r a w n by S. Eastman. Schoolcraft 1851-57, v. 1,
plate 60, pictograph A.
of the Great Lakes. In January 1849, at the instigation of a Metis interpreter, a Chippewa delegation from the headwaters of the Wisconsin River
journeyed to Washington, D.C., to try to recuperate s o m e of the land they
had ceded in the treaty of 1842. O n the letter of credence appear not the
individual n a m e s of the representatives, but their totems (Figure 4). The
group from M o n m o n c e a u w a s led by a chief of the crane totem; there were
three warriors from the marten totem, and one each of the bear, the catfish,
and the m e r m a n totems (Schoolcraft 1851-57, 1:415-7).
In a paper read before the Canadian Institute in 1857 the O d a w a
Francis Assikinack described life in his younger days:
the inhabitants were divided into tribes; and... a tribe was again subdivided into sections or families according to then "Ododams;" that is their
devices, signs, or what m a y be called according to the usage of civilised
communities, "Coats of Arms." The members of a particular family kept
themselves distinct, at least nominally, from the other members of the
tribe; and in then large villages, all people claiming to belong to the same
Ododam or sign, were required to dwell in that section of the village set
apart for them specially... [Assikinack 1858:119]
In the 19th century the concept of the totem seems to have taken on
greater importance, as the native people lost their separate village identity
and m u c h of their land base. T h e Ojibwa totem b e c a m e m o r e than a bond
of consanguinity; it developed into a matter of great pride. A s Schoolcraft
wrote in 1834:
The most striking trait in their moral history is the institution of the Totem
a sign manual, by which the affiliation of families is traced, agreeing,

THE ALGONQUIAN T O T E M A N D TOTEMISM

347

more exactly perhaps, than has been supposed, with the armorial bearings
ot the feudal ages. A n d this institution is kept up, with a feeling of
importance, which it is difficult to account for. A n Indian, it is well
known, will tell his specific name with great reluctance, but his generic
or family name in other words, his Totem, he will declare without
hesitation, and with an evident feeling of pride. [Mason 1993:94]
Similarly, in 1839 the French geographer Joseph N . Nicollet noticed that,
while the native people were unwilling to reveal their personal name, they
would not hesitate to disclose their totem name:
It is not a sacred name, neither is it connected with any favors of the
spirits. There is no mystery attached to it. The totem being an institution
of a purely civic nature, they are inclined to quote with pride the name of
the great family to which they belong. [Bray 1970:187]
During his stay at L a Pointe on Lake Superior in 1855, Johann Georg
Kohl learned about totemic pride. Mongo-sid (Loon-foot), a chief from
Fond du Lac, spoke so highly of his totem, the Loon totem, that he believed
it to be the oldest and noblest in the land. Then he met an old Metis,
probably Michel Cadotte, Jr., whose wife and mother were both of the
Crane totem.
La marque des Grues est la plus noble et la plus grande marque parmi les
Ojibbeways. Les Grues montentjusqu'au Deluge... Pour des siecles les
Grues avaient le n o m le plus haut... Enfin, monsieur, les Grues ont ere et
sont encore partout les hommes les plus remarquables du monde. [Kohl
1985:148-9]
The most thorough treatment of the totem in the mid-19th century,
however, is that of William Warren, the Metis historian of the Southweste m Ojibwa. F r o m his grandmother, a m e m b e r of the crane totem, and from
the elders w h o m he frequented as a young m a n , he learned the traditions
and stories of m a n y of the then-prominent totems. Furthermore, he was
able to identify the totem of each village chief of the Wisconsin and
Minnesota Ojibwa. With unusual insight Warren understood that "the most
important link in solving the deep mystery which covers their origin" could
be found in the totemic history of the Ojibwa (Warren 1984:53).
B y this time the totems of the Upper Algonquian peoples m a y have
begun to take on some of the characteristics of the Central Algonquian
clans, each of the six major totems or families having a particular quality
or function, according to Warren. The Catfish were noted for being longlived and having scant,finehair; the Cranes with their loud voice were
orators and chiefs; the Loons, too, wore a badge of honor as chiefs; the

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THERESA M. SCHENCK

Bears were the war chiefs and warriors; the Martens werefierceand warlike, and had absorbed the quarrelsome and once-powerful M o o s e totem.
Unlike the Central Algonquian clans, however, none of the Upper
Algonquian totems had ritual or ceremonial functions, and the Grand
Medicine, the Midewiwin, remained open to all without regard to totem
(Warren 1984:45-52).
The totemic system of the Southwestern Ojibwa, once the source of
such pride, began to disintegrate in some areas in the latter half of the 19th
century as so m a n y native w o m e n married fur traders and voyageurs. Since
the totemic name was passed only from a m a n to his children, the children
of these mixed marriages had no totem, or else totems such as the chicken
which were invented in jest. In m a n y cases today the totem remains a
symbol of past glory, and attempts are m a d e to restore the totemic
designations.
In the mid-19th century, however, just as the totem was in danger of
being lost, the word was appropriated by ethnologists and anthropologists
and endowed with a new, and even antithetical, meaning. The perpetrators
of this linguistic crime understood neither the Algonquian totem nor
Algonquian spirituality. Rather they combined two very different ideas,
the totemic animal as group n a m e and the animal spirit as personal
guardian, and applied the n e w concept to a socio-religious institution
c o m m o n to the aboriginal people of Australia. The n e w totemism included
descent from the totemic animal and certain prohibitions with regard to
hunting and eating the animal, neither of which was found in the earlier
idea of the totem. The result was what Levi-Strauss (1962:17-18) has
termed "the totemic illusion" and "a distortion of the semantic field".
The person w h o seems to have originated this confusion was John
Long, an English trader w h o spent two seasons in the Lake Nipigon country
north of Lake Superior. In relating his travels in 1791 he described the
totem as a favorite or guardian spirit, "an animal they never kill, hunt or
eat", and coined the word totemism to m e a n 'destiny, the influence the
totem has on one's actions' (Quaife 1922:110-2). Certainly the Ojibwa,
like most native people in touch with the spiritual world around them, often
had a personal relationship with an animal spirit, a kind of protector or
guardian usually acquired through a dream in early adolescence after a
period of fasting. But this individual spirit was not his totem. In fact, if the
totem is understood as a village or family mark, then the very concept of

THE ALGONQUIAN T O T E M A N D TOTEMISM

349

a personal totem is an oxymoron. Long's idea of totemism, however,

presented as it w a s in a then-popular format, a travel narrative, w a s to have
a more lasting and far-reaching influence than the better-informed works
of numerous other travelers and scholars. Contemporaries of John Long
understood and m a d e clear the difference between totem and personal
manitou. Alexander Henry (the elder) explained the totem as a family
mark, but the guardian spirit as something quite distinct.
The Indians universallyfixupon a particular object, as sacred to themselves; as the giver of their prosperity, and as then preserver from evil.
The choice is determined by a dream, or by some strong predilection of
fancy; and usually falls upon an animal, or part of an animal... [Henry
1809:286]
Peter Grant, w h o had been a partner in the North West C o m p a n y at
Rainy Lake in 1791 and later superintendent of the R e d River District,
called these spirits "demi-gods or patrons" and "powerful protectors"
(Masson 1889-90, 1:356). T h e totem, on the contrary, w a s not an individual possession but a family n a m e or mark, as described by Grant's contemporary, D u n c a n C a m e r o n (Masson 1889-90, 1:246-7). William H. Keating, a scientist with the L o n g expedition in 1823, explained the totem as a
sort of family distinction, a sign taken from an animal or from some part
of it, which by no m e a n s implies a supposed relationship with that animal.
It is merely a distinguishing mark or badge, which appears to belong to
every member of a family, whether male or female. The latter retain it
even after matrimony, and do not assume that of then husbands. It does
not appear that this implies the least obligation of the Indian, to the animal
from which it is taken. H e may kill it or eat it. The totem appears to
answer no other purpose than that of distinguishing families... Independently of the name which he bears, and of the totem or badge of family to
which he lays claim, an Indian has frequently a kind spirit to watch over
him and assist him. This tutelar saint is, of course, held in high veneration, and nothing is done that could in the least offend him. [Keating
1959:117]
In 1830, w h e n Dr. E d w i n James published a list of 18 Ojibwa and
O d a w a totems at the end of his Narrative of the captivity and adventures
of John Tanner, both he and Tanner m a d e it clear that the totem w a s merely
a family n a m e with certain social obligations attached (James 1955:166,
313-5). Likewise Albert Gallatin, noting the almost universal division of
American tribes into animal-named, exogamic clans, did not confuse these
clans with the distinctive Algonquian totem, which he recognized as "the
family n a m e of the Chippeways" (Gallatin 1836:109). Nevertheless,

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THERESA M. SCHENCK

James's list of totems, combined with Gallatin's observations and Long's

misinterpretation, helped to lay the foundation for the n e w totemism of
19th-century ethnologists. The word was gradually extended to describe
the social organization of all North American tribes,2 as scholars began to
search for, and sometimes created, evidence that would link the Algonquian
totem with the Australian kabong and the African siboko. In this new,
invented totemism m e n regarded their totemic animal with religious
even superstitious reverence, believed they were descended from this
animal, and were forbidden to hunt or eat the totem. Thus the characteristics of Australian "totemism" were reassigned to Algonquian totemism.
While these practices m a y be found in varying degrees a m o n g some
native peoples, they do not appear to have been c o m m o n to the original
people of the totem. In fact, there seems to have been no special relationship between a m a n and his totem, no religious superstition, and certainly
no worship. Furthermore, not all villages even bore animal names some
totemic names were merely geographic descriptions or locations, such as
a fork in a river, or sometimes even an artifact or a natural phenomenon.
The totemic n a m e was, of course, respected and often drawn as a means of
identification, but it was not a spirit w h o protected the people.
A s for belief in descent from the totemic animal, this was, in the rare
instances where it was found to exist, nothing more than an explanation
invented to account for the origin of a name. Perrot heard a storyfromthe
upper Great Lakes Algonquian that the Amikouet were "descendants of the
Beaver", that they originated from the corpse of the Great Beaver. The
legend he then narrated is similar to several stories told by Algonquian
peoples involving a beaver w h o created water passages for the people,
building dams as he passed through the country (Blair 1911,1:62-63). But
this is not the origin myth which the Amikouet probably shared with other
Algonquian peoples, in which creation is the work of Ke-che-mun-e-do
(Warren 1984:58, Johnston 1990:13) orNanabojo (Kohl 1985:438). It is
rather one explanation offered to account for the n a m e of the Amikouet,
and is not to be taken literally.
There is a rich variety and lack of canonical rigidity in native belief, a
fact which has been difficult for m a n y anthropologists to understand or
2

It may have been Henry R. Schoolcraft who first extended the use of the word
totem beyond the Upper Algonquian peoples. In his History of the Indian tribes of
the United States, he mentioned that the Neutral Nation had three totems (Schoolcraft

T H E A L G O N Q U I A N T O T E M A N D TOTEMISM

351

even accept. A s William K. Powers has observed: "Rituals, myths, songs,

dances, prayers in essence, the contents of religious belief change
circumstantially" (Powers 1975:xv). This is perhaps best illustrated by
comparing two Ojibwa origin stories, both collected by Henry Schoolcraft
at Sault Ste. Marie. In thefirst,two young m e n werefleeinga cruel mother
when they came to the falls of St. Mary's. Unable to cross the rapids, they
were transported to the south side by a crane of extraordinary size and great
age. This crane also destroyed the w o m a n w h o was pursuing them by
throwing her into the rapids. Her skull became the whitefish so important
to the Sauteurs. The sons "took up their permanent abode at these falls,
becoming the progenitors of the present tribe, and in gratitude to their
deliverer adopted the Crane as their Totem" (Mason 1958:95-96). Thus
this myth explains the origin of both the whitefish and the totem. In the
second version, thought to illustrate the relationship between the Shawnee
and the Ojibwa, it w a s an osprey (oshugay) w h o transported the two
brothers, but the crane was waiting for them on the other side. Each bird
gave a feather to one of the brothers; soon these feathers appeared as
human beings w h o m the brothers were to consider as their sons (Williams
1956:269-273). In a similar origin tale collected by William Jones in the
early 20th century, and attributed to William Kabaoosa of Garden River,
the crane dreamed of a w o m a n , and when he awoke, he found one lying
with him. They lived together and "from this pair came the Ojibwa people"
(Jones 1916:388-9). Only in this m u c h later version is descent from the
crane postulated.
Like a belief in descent from the totemic animal, a refusal to hunt or eat
the totemic animal m a y have developed and been practiced by some
individuals, but it was neither universal nor essential. Although the
Amikouet were the "People of the Beaver", they most certainly participated
in the beaver fur trade. W h e n the Ojibwa did not want to kill a certain
animal, such as a bear or a rattlesnake, it was not because of totemic
considerations, but because that animal in itself had power.
Ruth Landes, w h o lived and worked among the Ojibwa of northwestern
Ontario, was told that the totemic n a m e was "just a name", and that "the
eponymous creature is killed and used without any mystical associations"
(Landes 1936:31). Furthermore, she found no origin tales regarding the
totem, nor any interest in the subject. Sister Mary Inez Hilger, a contemporary of Landes w h o did field work among the Ojibwa of Wisconsin,

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THERESA M . S C H E N C K

Michigan and Minnesota, found that the totemic animals "are treated with
friendliness, but are not considered sacred, nor are any taboos associated
with them. They are killed, skinned, and eaten like other animals" (Hilger
1951:154).
Even where totemism has been lost, its exogamic function is still
remembered. A s M a u d e Kegg told John D. Nichols: " A long time ago the
Indians had totems... They couldn't marry each other if they had the same
totem. Long ago that's h o w they were related to each other" (Nichols
1991:143). Similarly, David M c N a b (personal communication, 1996)
informed m e that "at Walpole Island totems are k n o w n as 'family crests'
still today. They are naming devices."
True totemism is nothing more than a collective naming system such
as m e n have used from earliest times (Mallery 1972, 1:376). A totemic
name is merely a village or clan name, not necessarily an animal name. If
an individual or group did not eat or hunt the totemic animal, if a myth of
descent from the totemic animal was created, these were certainly not
inherent in the idea of totemism. In fact, in m a n y cases these prohibitions
appear only in m o d e m times, possibly even under the influence of the
inventors of the n e w totemism.
The study of totemism is valuable in that it reveals something about the
social organization of prehistoric peoples. But used to describe a universal
socio-religious phenomenon, it is indeed, as Levi-Strauss (1962:10) has
proclaimed it, "an artificial unity, existing solely in the mind of the
anthropologist, to which nothing specifically corresponds in reality".
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