TITLE: Tlingit Spirit Mask
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: North America
COUNTRY: United States of America
SUBREGION: Alaska
ETHNICITY: Tlingit
DESCRIPTION: Spirit Mask
CATALOG ID: NAUS083
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Shamanic
FUNCTION: healing; protection/purification; spirit invocation
AGE: ca. 1870-1900
MAIN MATERIAL: cedar wood
OTHER MATERIALS: mineral-based paints
The Tlingit people inhabit southern Alaska and the northwestern coastal region of British Columbia. They are organized into some 21 tribes whose religious beliefs relied upon shamans to cure diseases, influence the weaether, assist in hunting, protect the people against witchcraft, and commune with spirits to foresee the future. This mask would have been worn by a shaman and probably represents a spirit. It would most probably have been worn in a healing ceremony or for the purpose of embodying the spirit to fight malevolent magic or otherwise invoke spiritual power.
For more on masks of the coastal peoples of western Canada, see Peter MacNair, Robert Joseph & Bruce Grenville, Down from the Shimmering Sky: Masks of the Northwest Coast (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd., 1998) and Edward Malin, A World of Faces: Masks of the Northwest Coast Indians (Portland: Timber Press, 1978).
