Traditional Stories of the Northeast Nations

Traditional Stories of the Northeast Nations — page 5
The Native Nations know their lands well They originally settled in areas where they could fish hunt or plant crops Women traditionally gathered berries wild rice and maple sap The forests provided people with raw materials Groups used bark to build lightweight canoes The Beothuk of Newfoundland built with birch bark One of their canoe designs looked like a half-moon The people put mossy rocks at the bottom of each canoe to keep it balanced on the water THE SPOKEN WORD For most of their history the people of the Northeast did not have written languages so they could not write down their stories in words Symbols and pictures were sometimes used to record things People also told tales out loud passing them from one person to another It was one role of the community’s elders to carry on this tradition Through stories children learned about their history They were introduced to important lessons Children listen to a Native American storyteller at an event in Vermont 8