The name Hare comes from the people’s reliance on the Arctic or snowshoe hare. Their self-designation was Kawchottine, "People of the Great Hares," or Kasogotine, "Big Willow People." They were culturally similar to the Kutchin and Dogrib. This description of "aboriginal" culture includes some postcontact influences as well.
Location Hare Indians lived and continue to live west (to just past the Mackenzie River) and northwest of Great Bear Lake, present-day Northwest Territories. They ranged in parts of Alberta, Yukon, and Alaska. This territory includes tundra, taiga, mountains, and intermediary areas.
Population There were probably no more than 800 Hares in the early eighteenth century, and there are about the same number (or somewhat fewer) today.
Language Hare is a Northern Athapaskan language.
Historical Information
History Shortly after the people encountered Alexander Mackenzie in 1789, the North West Company built Fort Good Hope (1806) in the area. Rapid involvement in the fur trade brought dependence on items of non-native manufacture. Non-native traders created trade chiefs among the people, so that their political organization eventually became more hierarchical.
The people were decimated by epidemics throughout the nineteenth century. A local Catholic church was built around 1866. Gradually, nomadic band life was mitigated in favor of growing concentration around the trade posts. As the government created "bands" for administrative purposes and assigned subsistence areas for such groups, ethnic and group identity became stronger The people were largely acculturated, as Hare Indians, by 1900.
Treaties signed with the Canadian government in the early twentieth century provided for payments and services in exchange for land title, although the Indians retained the right to use land for subsistence activities. Children began attending Catholic boarding school in 1926. Tuberculosis was rampant between the 1930s and the 1960s, and the people suffered periodic outbreaks of other diseases as well.
During the 1920s, many people built log homes and left native manufacture further and further behind. The fur trade continued to flourish until World War II. People increasingly worked at seasonal wage labor after the war, mainly in the oil and construction industries. The more traditional Colville Lake community dates from around 1960.
Religion Guardian spirits formed the basis of Hare religious belief. Spirit helpers were not formally sought out but appeared in dreams. Shamans were able to attract particularly powerful guardians through dreams and visions. They were said to be able to summon game, defeat enemies, and cure illness. Cures were effected by using medicinal plants, singing, and sucking. Shamans sometimes hung by ropes from trees or tent poles when communicating with the spirits. Religious feasts included a memorial to the dead a year after death and on the occasion of a new moon. Singing and dancing formed a part of these ceremonies.
Government There were perhaps five to seven small, autonomous, nomadic bands of fluid size and composition. The bands had defined hunting territories but informal leaders with little authority other than respect for their hunting and/or curing abilities.
Customs Sharing and generosity were highly valued. The bands gathered together several times a year for ceremonies, socializing, and hunting and fishing during migration and spawning seasons. Girls entering puberty were isolated in special huts and required to observe food and behavior taboos. Certain of these taboos, such as those regarding fish and animals, were continued during every monthly period. A feast would be held for young men who killed their first big game.
Intermarriage was common with several peoples, such as Bearlake Mountain (Kaska and other tribes) and Kutchin Indians. Marriage occurred in the early teens and was generally arranged, although divorce was readily available. There was some period of bride service after marriage.
The elderly as well as some female babies were killed or left to die. Corpses were wrapped in blankets or moose skin and placed in above-ground enclosures. Relatives cut their hair and disposed of their property.
Ghosts were feared and provided with offerings to keep them at bay. Souls were said to be reborn at a later date.
Dwellings People lived in rectangular or A-frame winter pole-frame houses with gabled roofs, covered with spruce boughs, brush, and snow. Caribou-hide tipis date from the nineteenth century. Summer lean-tos were common as well.
Diet Caribou and musk ox were staples, although small animals (especially hare) and fish (such as trout and whitefish) contributed the bulk of the diet. Meat was generally roasted or stone boiled. Meat and fish were also pounded and mixed with grease and berries to make pemmican. Surpluses might be frozen or smoke dried. There was a severe lack of food every seven years or so when hares became scarce.
Women gathered a few plant foods, such as berries and material predigested by caribou and other animals. Mosses and lichens were used as beverages and medicines. Wolves and dogs were not eaten.
Key Technology Stone tools included adzes and knives, the latter having a beaver-tooth blade. The main hunting and fishing equipment included bows and arrows as well as babiche snares, willow-bark nets, hooks, weirs, and spears. People made caribou ice chisels and wood or bark dishes. Willow and spruce-root baskets served as cooking vessels.
Trade Trade partners probably included fellow Athapaskans such as Yellowknife, Dogrib, Beaver, and Slavey Indians. Items exchanged included animal skins, copper, and various minerals. There may have been some trade in Inuit knives.
Notable Arts Women decorated a number of items, such as moccasins, shirts, belts, and bags, with fringe and woven quillwork or moose hair. Musical instruments included drums and caribou-hoof rattles. Beads, dentalium shell, and then silk floral patterns and ribbon applique replaced more traditional decorative styles by the nineteenth century.
Transportation Most travel was overland. Snowshoes were used in winter. Women pulled wooden toboggans before dogs took over in the twentieth century. Men also made spruce, birch-bark, and occasionally moose-hide canoes.
As with many tribes in this area, Hare Indians relied on fish for part of their diet. A man lifts a herring net in a spring-run fishery, Great Bear Lake (1923).
Dress Most clothing came from hare pelts, supplemented by caribou and moose hides. The standard summer wardrobe was shirt, leggings, moccasins, and possibly a breechclout. In winter, the people wore robes, mittens, and hats and added hoods to their shirts. Clothing was often decorated with porcupine-quill embroidery. They wore caribou or hare hairbands. There was very little personal ornamentation except for facial tattooing and painting.
War and Weapons Hares fought the Inuit and Yellowknife, although the people generally took pains not to fight at all. They were allied with the Dogrib and Kutchin. Prisoners were staked to the ground and their hearts cut out for the women to eat.
Contemporary Information
Government/Reservations Contemporary bands are located at Fort Franklin, Colville Lake, and Fort Good Hope. Some local bands are ethnically mixed and consist of Slavey and Bearlake as well as Hare Indians.
Economy The Colville Lake people rely mainly on traditional subsistence activities. People at Good Hope live mostly on part-time, seasonal, and some full-time wage labor as well as government payments.
Legal Status The Colville Lake and Good Hope communities are federally recognized entities.
Daily Life Full access to western culture has led to increased levels of acculturation and a comparable decline of traditional knowledge and practice. The Colville Lake and Good Hope communities remain in close touch.
