American Indian Culture and Research Journal

ETHNOGRAPHIC INTRODUCTION In the years before 1850 the Indians who lived along the lower reaches of the Klamath and Trinity Rivers in Northwestern California enjoyed a fantastic wealth of natural resources. Salmon and acorns were so plentiful that subsistence needs could be met by working no more than a few months out of the year. These Indians-the Yurok, Hupa, and Karok-lived in permanent villages in stout semi-subterranean houses made of cedar planks or thick redwood boards. Among these three groups there was great focus on symbols of wealth, also. The main type of money was dentalium shells, but other classes of objects were also recognized as treasures. These included scarlet-colored woodpecker scalps, large flaked blades of obsidian, unusually colored deerskins, and other object that were precious for their significance in religious ceremonies. Men had their forearms tattooed as a means of calculating the value of strings of shell money, and each could precisely figure the worth of his redwood canoe or the bride price he could demand when his daughter was ready for marriage. Ironically, there was no central authority among these peoples. Rather, affairs in a given small village were settled informally among a relatively few of the richest males. They were known in Yurok as pergerk, "real men" or "real people," and it was believed that their wealth and power accrued from their spiritual superiority over lesser individuals.