PLATEAU INDIAN

member of any of various North American Indian tribes who inhabited the high plateau between the Rocky Mountains on the east and the Cascade Range on the west. Linguistically they belonged to four main families: the Salish, Kutenai, Sahaptin, and Klamath-Modoc (Lutuami), although the majority languages were Salish and Sahaptin. Their tribes included the Shuswap, Lillooet, and Thompson of the Northern Plateau group and the Okanagon, Lake, Wenatchee, Sanpoil, Nespelim, Spokan, Kalispel (with the Pend d'Oreille), Coeur d'Alene, and Flathead of the Interior group. There were also the Nez-Perc, the Cayuse-Molala, and other subdivisions of the Central Sahaptin. The Plateau Indians in the main were a seasonal people, spending their winters in permanent villages along the waterways of the area and their summers in camps on the upland hunting grounds. Winters were harsh (as cold as -30 F ) and summers hot (as high as 100 F ), but the area had plentiful opportunities for fishing (mostly salmon), hunting, and gathering. The Plateau Indians lived in earth lodges in the winter and in mat-covered conical lodges on the summer camping grounds. The basic unit was the village, but, beyond that, customs varied. The Thompson Indians based their decisions on informal village meetings, deferring to the consent of all the villagers. The Sanpoils had a more formal structure based on a chief, a subchief, and a general assembly including all adults except unmarried young men. The Nez Perc had a similar structure with a hereditary chief; the Flathead had a powerful head chief with subordinate band chiefs. There were annual firstling rites on the occasion of the first salmon catch and the first root or berry harvest. Trickster, or transformer, figures such as the Coyote and the Bluejay were central elements of the mythology. Plateau Indian art is undistinguished, consisting largely of pictographic representations of supernatural beings and cosmic phenomena. The demise of the old culture and traditions began with the penetration of the Northwest by fur traders and trappers from the east. Among these were Iroquois Christians who spread Christian culture through the area. The fur traders brought modern tools and weapons as well as diseases to which the Indians had no resistance. The horse was introduced at the beginning of the 18th century by the neighbouring Plains Indians and became more widely used than among the Plains Indians themselves. The great invasion by the white man began with the first wagon train led into the Northwest area by Marcus Whitman, an eastern missionary-doctor, early in the mid-19th century. In the 1850s and '60s there were great waves of settlers and gold seekers, with the result that a series of wars broke out with the Indian tribes. The most famous of these was the Nez Perc War of 1877. By the end of the century the tribes were reduced to living on small reservations, and most of the old culture and the traditional economic ways of life have now been lost. Plateau Indian cultures in the 20th century represent a mixture of aboriginal and white elements. The members of some tribes have become ranchers or ranch hands while continuing to engage in seasonal fishing; others have become farmers. The Indians have partly retained their religion and group identification but adopted modern technology and material culture. Distribution of North American Plateau Indians. member of any of the aboriginal North American peoples inhabiting the high plateau region between the Rocky Mountains and the coastal mountain system. The North American Plateau is both a complex physiographic unit and a native cultural area. It is bounded on the west by the Canadian Coast Mountains and the Cascade Range, on the south by the Blue Mountains and the Salmon River (excepting a narrow corridor to California), on the east by the Rocky Mountains and the Lewis Range, and on the north by low extensions of the Rocky Mountains, such as the Cariboo Mountains. It may be defined as the drainage territory of the Columbia and Fraser rivers and as the high plateau between the main range of the Rocky Mountains and the coastal mountain system. In the south the natural area of the Plateau gradually merges with the Great Basin natural area: the boundaries between the corresponding culture areas are indeed also very imprecise. Previously, anthropologists included both culture areas as one, the Plateau. The climate is a harsh, continental type. Temperatures range from -30 F (-34 C) in winter to 100 F (38 C) in summer. Precipitation is low, except in the mountainous areas, and forms a snow cover during the winter. There are three different provinces of vegetation, which correspond to three subcultures: the Middle Columbia area, a steppe of sagebrush and bunchgrass fringed by yellow pine on higher levels, is the territory of the Sahaptin groups and some Salish; the Upper Columbia area, a mainly wooded area with grassland in river valleys, is the home country of such Salish groups as the Okanagon and Flathead, and of the Kutenai; and the Fraser area, with a semi-open coniferous forest interspersed with dry grassland and a partly maritime flora, is the tribal ground of the northern Salish groups. The fauna is not rich, but there are deer and elk in the mountains and salmon and trout in the rivers. The Indians of the Plateau belong mainly to four linguistic families: Salish, Kutenai, Sahaptin, and Klamath-Modoc (Lutuami). The majority of Plateau groups speak Salishan and Sahaptian. The Salish may be conveniently divided into Northern Plateau and Interior Salish (there are also Coast Salish on the Northwest Coast). To the Northern Plateau group belong the Shuswap, Lillooet, and Thompson (Ntlakyapamuk) Indians; to the Interior group belong (mostly in the Upper Columbia area) the Okanagon (with Sinkaietk), the Lake (Senijextee), the Wenatchee, Sanpoil and Nespelim, the Spokan, Kalispel (with Pend d'Oreille), Coeur d'Alene, and Flathead. Some early works term all Salish Flathead. The Sahaptin may be subdivided into three main groups: the Nez Perc, the Cayuse-Molala, and the Central Sahaptin (Umatilla, Yakima, Wallawalla, Tenino, and others). Additional reading The archaeological background has been described by Earl H. Swanson, The Emergence of Plateau Culture (1962); and B. Robert Butler, The Old Cordilleran Culture in the Pacific Northwest (1961). Monographs on single tribes include James A. Teit, The Thompson Indians of British Columbia (1900, reprinted 1975); Herbert Joseph Spinden, The Nez Perc Indians (1908, reprinted 1974); Leslie Spier, Klamath Ethnography (1930, reprinted 1976); Verne F. Ray, The Sanpoil and Nespelem: Salishan Peoples of Northeastern Washington (1933, reprinted 1980); and Leslie Spier (ed.), The Sinkaietk or Southern Okanagon of Washington (1938). Modern cultural contact problems are dealt with in a skillful way in Deward E. Walker, Jr., Conflict and Schism in Nez Perc Acculturation: A Study of Religion and Politics (1968, reissued 1985). ke Gunnar Birger Hultkrantz The Editors of the Encyclopdia Britannica