Kinnikinnick is a Native American and

First Nations First nations are indigenous settlers or bands. First Nations, first nations, or first peoples may also refer to: Indigenous groups *List of Indigenous peoples *First Nations in Canada, Indigenous peoples of Canada who are neither Inuit nor Mé ...

herbal A herbal is a book containing the names and descriptions of plants, usually with information on their medicinal, Herbal tonic, tonic, culinary, toxic, hallucinatory, aromatic, or Magic (paranormal), magical powers, and the legends associated wi ...

smoking Smoking is a practice in which a substance is combusted, and the resulting smoke is typically inhaled to be tasted and absorbed into the bloodstream of a person. Most commonly, the substance used is the dried leaves of the tobacco plant, whi ...

mixture, made from a traditional combination of leaves or barks. Recipes for the mixture vary, as do the uses, from social, to spiritual to medicinal.

Etymology

The term ''kinnikinnick'' derives from the Unami Delaware , (''cf.''

Ojibwe The Ojibwe (; Ojibwe writing systems#Ojibwe syllabics, syll.: ᐅᒋᐺ; plural: ''Ojibweg'' ᐅᒋᐺᒃ) are an Anishinaabe people whose homeland (''Ojibwewaki'' ᐅᒋᐺᐘᑭ) covers much of the Great Lakes region and the Great Plains, n ...

'to mix ''something animate'' with ''something inanimate'''), from Proto-Algonquian , . By extension, the name was also applied by the colonial European hunters, traders, and settlers to various shrubs of which the bark or leaves are traditionally smoked,"Kinnikinnick" in Frederick Webb Hodge (editor) ''Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico''. Bureau of American Ethnology (Washington: 1911). Part 1, page 692. most often bearberry (''Arctostaphylos spp.'') and to lesser degree, the medicinal plants red osier dogwood ('' Cornus sericea''), silky cornel (''

Cornus amomum ''Cornus amomum'', the silky dogwood, is a species of dogwood native to the southern Ontario and eastern United States, from Michigan and Vermont south to Alabama and Florida. Other names include red willow, silky cornel, kinnikinnick, and squawb ...

''), Canadian bunchberry (''

Cornus canadensis ''Cornus canadensis'' is a species of flowering plant in the dogwood family Cornaceae, native plant, native to eastern Asia and North America. Common names include Canadian dwarf cornel, Canadian bunchberry, quatre-temps, crackerberry, and creepi ...

''), evergreen sumac ('' Rhus virens''), littleleaf sumac ('' Rhus microphylla''), smooth sumac ('' Rhus glabra''), and staghorn sumac ('' Rhus typhina'').

Indigenous names

* Algonquin: , (, ; , ) * Dakota and

Lakota Lakota may refer to: *Lakota people, a confederation of seven related Native American tribes *Lakota language Lakota ( ), also referred to as Lakhota, Teton or Teton Sioux, is a Siouan languages, Siouan language spoken by the Lakota people of ...

: * Hul̓q̓umín̓um̓’ : , * Lushootseed : , *

Menominee The Menominee ( ; meaning ''"Menominee People"'', also spelled Menomini, derived from the Ojibwe language word for "Wild Rice People"; known as ''Mamaceqtaw'', "the people", in the Menominee language) are a federally recognized tribe of Na ...

: , * Odaawaa: , (, ; , ) *

: , (, ; , ) * Shoshoni: , * Twana: , * Winnebago: ,

Preparation and use

The preparation varies by locality and

nation A nation is a type of social organization where a collective Identity (social science), identity, a national identity, has emerged from a combination of shared features across a given population, such as language, history, ethnicity, culture, t ...

. Bartlett quotes Trumbull as saying: "I have smoked half a dozen varieties of kinnikinnick in the North-west — all genuine; and have scraped and prepared the red willow- bark, which is not much worse than Suffield

oak An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisp ...

-leaf.""Kinnikinnick"
in John Russell Bartlett. ''Dictionary of Americanisms'', 4th Edition. Little, Brown, and Company (New York: 1877). Page 335. Eastern tribes have traditionally used '' Nicotiana rustica'' for social smoking, while western tribes usually use a variety of kinnikinick for ceremonial use.Charles L. Cutler. ''Tracks that speak: the legacy of Native American words in North American culture''. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (Boston : 2002)
Pages 174–176.
Cutler cites Edward S. Rutsch's study of the

Iroquois The Iroquois ( ), also known as the Five Nations, and later as the Six Nations from 1722 onwards; alternatively referred to by the Endonym and exonym, endonym Haudenosaunee ( ; ) are an Iroquoian languages, Iroquoian-speaking Confederation#Ind ...

, listing ingredients used by other Native American tribes: leaves or bark of red osier dogwood,

arrowroot Arrowroot is a starch obtained from the rhizomes (rootstock) of several tropical plants, traditionally ''Maranta arundinacea'', but also Florida arrowroot from ''Zamia integrifolia'', and tapioca from cassava (''Manihot esculenta''), which is of ...

, red sumac, laurel, ironwood,

wahoo The wahoo (''Acanthocybium solandri'') is a scombrid fish found worldwide in tropical and subtropical seas. In Hawaii, the wahoo is known as ono. The species is sometimes called hoo in the United States. It is best known to sports fishermen, a ...

huckleberry Huckleberry is a name used in North America for several plants in the family Ericaceae, in two closely related genera: ''Vaccinium'' and ''Gaylussacia''. Nomenclature The name 'huckleberry' is a North American variation of the English dialectal ...

, Indian tobacco,

cherry A cherry is the fruit of many plants of the genus ''Prunus'', and is a fleshy drupe (stone fruit). Commercial cherries are obtained from cultivars of several species, such as the sweet '' Prunus avium'' and the sour '' Prunus cerasus''. The na ...

bark, and mullein, among other ingredients.

Historical references

Among the

, Densmore records the following: The material smoked by the Chippewa in earliest times were said to be the dried leaves of the bearberry (''Arctostaphylos uva-ursi'' (L.) Spreng.), and the dried, powdered root of a plant identified as ''Aster novae-angliae'' L. Two sorts of bark were smoked, one being known as "red willow" ( ''Cornus stolonifera'' Michx.) and the other as "spotted willow" (''Cornus rugosa'' Lam.). The inner bark is used, after being toasted over a fire and powdered. It is then stored in a cloth or leather bag, and may be used on its own or in combination with other herbs.Frances Densmore. ''Chippewa Customs''. Bureau of American Ethnology (Washington: 1929) Reprint: Minnesota Historical Society Press (St. Paul: 1979). Pages 144-145.

References

Bibliography

* Moerman, Daniel E. (1998)
Native American Ethnobotany
'. Timber Press. .

External links

Traditional Tobacco
pamphlet by the Urban American Indian Tobacco Prevention & Education Network {{Smoking nav * Native American culture Native American religion Pipe smoking Religion and politics Tobacco smoking