The constituent groups of the Northern Coast Salish included Island Comox, Mainland Comox (Homalco, Klahoose, and Sliammon), Pentlatch, and Sechelt.
Location Traditional Northern Coast Salish territory, all in Canada, included roughly the northern half of the Strait of Georgia, including east-central Vancouver Island. The climate is wet and moderate. In the 1990s, Northern Coast Salish Indians live in villages and reserves in their traditional territory and in regional cities and towns.
Population The Comox population in 1780 was about 1,800. In 1995, about 2,750 Northern Coast Salish from six bands (Comox, Homalco, Klahoose, Sliammon, Qualicum [Pentlatch], and Sechelt) lived in the region.
Language Northern Coast Salish, which includes the Comox, Pentlatch, and Sechelt languages, is a member of the Central division of the Salishan language family.
Historical Information
History Juan de Fuca may have encountered the Northern Coast Salish in 1752. British and Spanish trade ships arrived in 1792 to a friendly reception. Owing to the lack of sea otter in the Strait of Georgia, however, most Northern Coast Salish did not participate in the local maritime fur trade.
Miners and other non-natives founded Victoria in 1843. By this time local Indians had experienced severe epidemics with some concomitant village abandonment and consolidation. Catholic missionaries arrived in the 1860s, and many natives converted and renounced their ceremonials, including potlatching. Some self-sufficient overtly Christian villages were established, complete with a missionary-imposed governing structure. By the end of the century, the missionaries, along with Catholic boarding schools, had largely destroyed the native language and culture.
With their traditional economy severely damaged, many Indian men took jobs as longshoremen, loggers, and migrant farmers. They also worked in commercial fishing, including canneries. Canada officially established Indian reserves in 1876, by which time Indians had already lost much of their aboriginal land. In the early twentieth century, several Indian organizations, such as the Allied Tribes and the Native Brotherhood of British Columbia, formed to pursue title to aboriginal lands. The Alliance of Tribal Councils continued this work in the 1970s and worked to foster a positive self-image as well as political unity. Partly as a result of its activity, in 1986 the Sechelt Band became the first self-governing Indian group in Canada.
Religion People sought guardian spirits (from animate or inanimate objects) to confer special powers or skills. Spirits were acquired in dreams or by fasting or other physical tests. The Northern Coast Salish Indians celebrated two forms of winter ceremonials: spirit dancing, which was inclusive and participatory, and masked dancing, which was reserved for only certain high-status families. Shamans as well as various secret societies provided religious leadership.
Government Villages were headed by chiefs, who were the heads of the leading or established households. Chiefs had little or no power to govern; they were wealthy and influential men who entertained guests, made decisions about subsistence activity, and arbitrated disputes.
Customs Among most groups, the "local group" consisted of members who traced their descent patrilineally from a mythical ancestor; it was identified with and controlled certain specific subsistence areas. The right to hold potlatches and certain ceremonies, including dances and songs, was also inheritable. Northern Coast Salish people were either chiefs, nobles, commoners, or slaves.
Both parents, but especially the mother, were subject to pregnancy and childbirth taboos and restrictions. Infants’ heads were pressed for aesthetic effect. Pubescent girls were secluded and their behavior was restricted, but boys were physically and mentally trained to seek a guardian spirit. Those who embarked on extended training and quests became shamans.
People were considered marriageable when they reached adolescence. Men, accompanied by male relatives, first approached women in a canoe. Polygyny was common, and multiple wives resided in the same household. Corpses were washed, wrapped in a blanket, and placed in a coffin that was in turn set in a cave or a tree away from the village. Possessions were burned. The Comox and Pentlatch erected carved and painted mortuary poles.
Dwellings Northern Coast Salish people built three types of permanent plank houses (semiexcavated and with shed and gabled roofs). Planks could be removed and transported to permanent frameworks at summer villages. Some houses were up to 60 or 70 feet long and half as wide. Most were fortified with either stockades or deep trenches. The Pentlatch and Island Comox had enclosed sleeping areas and separate smoke-drying sheds. Structures housed several related households, including extended families and slaves.
Diet Fish was the staple, especially salmon. Fall salmon were smoke dried for winter storage; the catch from summer salmon runs was eaten fresh. The people practiced ritual preparation and consumption of the season’s first salmon. They also ate lingcod, greenling, steelhead, flounder, sole, and herring roe.
Other important foods included sea mammals (sea lion, harbor seal, porpoise); shellfish; land mammals, such as deer, bear, and some elk and mountain goat; birds and fowl; and plant foods, including berries, shoots and leaves, roots, bulbs, and cambium.
Key Technology Fish were taken with gill nets, basket traps and weirs, gaffs and harpoons, tidal basins of stakes or rocks, dip nets, and rakes (herring).
Seal nets, clubs, and harpoons with an identifiable float served as marine mammal hunting equipment. Land mammals were taken with pitfalls, snares, bow (2.5 to 3 feet long, made of yew) and arrow, nets, knives, traps, and spears. Waterfowl were snagged in permanent nets stretched across flyways. They were also hunted with bow and arrow, flares and nets at night, and snares.
Important raw materials included wood, hides, antler, horn, mountain goat wool, beaver teeth, wood, bone, stone, and shell. Wooden items included house materials, canoes, bent-corner boxes, dishes, tools, weapons, and ceremonial items. Shredded bark was used for towels, mattresses, and similar items. Sewn mats of cattail leaves and tule lined interior house walls, covered frames of summer shelters, and were made into mattresses, rain covers, and sitting or kneeling pads. Women made several types of baskets of cedar limb splints or roots, including wrapped lattice, coiled, twined, and woven.
Trade Goods such as fish oil, dentalia, baskets, berries, furs, and deer hides were traded among local groups as well as with neighboring Coast Salish peoples.
Notable Arts Wooden items such as house posts, canoes, grave monuments, and household and ritual items were artistically carved and/or painted. Designs featured humans, animals, and/or vision powers.
Transportation Several different types of red cedar canoes, from narrow trolling canoes to 20-person war canoes, served as water transportation.
Dress Men often went naked in warmer weather and added a woven down and nettle-fiber shirt in winter. Women wore long skirts made of cedar-bark strips and sometimes added a shirt similar to that of the men. Extra clothing, often made of skins, was worn on trips into the interior. The people also made blankets of mountain goat and coyote wool as well as fibers of various plants.
War and Weapons Regular enemies included the Lekwiltok (Kwakiutl) and Nootkans. Wars consisted of armadas of warriors armed with bow and arrow and spears. Warriors wore a long protective robe at least two heavy skins thick.
Contemporary Information
Government/Reservations In 1984, 234 reserves (approximately 25,000 hectares) were connected with 52 Canadian Coast Salish groups. Most Mainland Comox people lived on the Sliammon Indian Reserve. The Sechelt Indian Band Self-governing Act (1986) provided them with municipal constitutional and legislative powers. See profiles of selected bands under "Daily Life."
Economy The people currently engage in various activities. See profiles of selected bands under "Daily Life" for details.
Legal Status Bands listed under "Daily Life" are all federally and provincially recognized.
Daily Life Mainland Comox is still viable and spoken by about one-third of the population. See the following profiles of selected bands for further detail.
Selected Northern Coast Salish Bands in British Columbia (statistics are as of 1995):
Comox Band controls four reserves on 285 hectares of land on the east coast of Vancouver Island. The reserves were allotted in 1877. The population is 243, of whom 103 people live on the reserves. Elections are held under the provisions of the Indian Act. The band is affiliated with the Kwakiutl District Council. Children attend provincial schools. Important economic activities and resources include fishing, logging, and tourism. Facilities include a recreation building, a longhouse, and offices.
Homalco Band controls 11 reserves on 624 hectares of land near Calm Channel. The population is 346, of whom 130 people live on the reserves. Elections are held by custom. The band is affiliated with the Alliance Tribal Council. Children attend provincial schools. Important economic resources include a fish hatchery. Facilities include a recreation building and offices.
Klahoose Band controls ten reserves on 1,357 hectares of land on Cortes Island. The population is 242, of whom 45 people live in 16 houses on the reserves. Elections are held under the provisions of the Indian Act. The band is affiliated with the Alliance Tribal Council. Children attend provincial schools. Important economic activities include forestry and shell fishing. Facilities include a community center, a church, and offices.
Qualicum Band controls one 77-hectare reserve on the southeast coast of Vancouver Island. The reserve was allotted in 1876. The population is 91, of whom 50 people live in 16 houses on the reserves. Elections are held under the provisions of the Indian Act. The band is unaffiliated. Children attend provincial schools. Important economic resources include a fish hatchery and a campsite/store. Facilities include a sports field and offices.
Sechelt Band controls 33 reserves on more than 1,000 hectares of land 50 kilometers north of Vancouver. The population is 910, of whom 477 people live on the reserves. Elections are held under the provisions of their own constitution. The band is unaffiliated. Economic plans include a marina/hotel complex, a condominium complex, small businesses, and a fish hatchery. Facilities include a preschool.
Sliammon Band controls six reserves on 1,907 hectares of land near Powell River. The population is 775, of whom 569 people live in 165 houses on the reserves. Elections are held under the provisions of the Indian Act. The band is affiliated with the Alliance Tribal Council. Children attend band and provincial schools. Important economic activities and resources include a salmon hatchery, seafood products, forestry, land leases, and small businesses. Facilities include a gymnasium, a movie house, a clinic, group homes, a church, and offices.
