Haida Totem PolesPerhaps the greatest and most well known part of the Haida culture is the Totem pole. The totem pole is a massive cedar tree cut down and hand carved by a single person or a group of people.Each totem pole is carved with many different faces, one on top of another. The faces are called Totems, which is why they are called Totem poles.

The Haida became famous for their unique way of carving and colouring their totems. Most of the totems (faces) are of animals familiar to the Haida, like hawks and eagles and bears and ravens or frogs and fish, but they are carved in an odd way so that it is often difficult to know what the animals are. Some totems have overly large eyes, lips or tongues with dramatic colours. Nothing is carved to look exactly like the real animals they represent.

Do you know what animal these totems are representing?

The Seattle Sea hawks football team selected their logo based on the art of the West Coast Natives, like the Haida. Everyone can tell that their logo is a hawk, but the unique way in which it is painted (or carved then painted if on a totem pole) lets everyone know it is connected to the west coast Natives.

Although the Haida had been making totem poles for hundreds and hundreds of years, most experts believe the early totem poles were much smaller and far less common.It was not until after first contact with the Europeans that the Haida totem poles became very large and very common. They reached their peak between 1850 and 1880.The Haida gained wealth through trading furs with the Europeans. Through trading, the Haida acquired axes, knives and carving equipment. Having more wealth and better equipment allowed the Haida to built more and greater totem poles with greater detail.

What did the totems do?

Totem poles represented family history and told the story of the people that lived in the houses. The Haida did not believe that the poles had any religious or spiritual meaning at all. They were just carved wooden poles that told a story, like we would write a story on paper.Chiefs competed with other chiefs in the village to see who could have taller and more detailed totem poles. Carvers were in great demand to create these rich works of art.

Different Totem Poles

To us, most totem poles look the same. But to the Haida, there were many kinds of totem poles each with their own important purpose.House poles were carved with symbols of family history and were positioned at the back of the house for all to see. These poles often had a second purpose since they were a part of the house construction and were used to support the main beams of the building. House poles could also be located beside the house or be free-standing.

Frontal totem pole

Some longhouses featured a tall house frontal pole which would be located at the main entrance of the house. People entered the house through a hole located at the bottom of the house frontal totem pole.

A Haida house frontal pole dating from around 1920.

Mortuary PolesMortuary poles were burying places carved for high-ranking individuals or chiefs after they died. These poles had large holes cut out of the upper portion. How did they work? The deceased body was placed into a painted box and remained in a mortuary house for a period of one year. Then, the remains were then moved to a smaller box and placed into the hole of the mortuary pole. The front opening was covered with cedar boards and then painted or carved to complete the original design. The mortuary pole was really like our tomb stones, just a lot bigger and with the bones of the person stored at the top.

Shame Totem Pole

Memorial Pole of Chief Kalilix.

Shame poles

Memorial poles stood on their own apart from the village. Each pole was a single tribute to a great chief and showed the many achievements of the deceased chief. The pole was raised one year after his death. The last kind of totem pole is the “Shame” pole. This pole was rarely used by any First Nations groups, including the Haida. A shame pole was built when a native group or even an individual did not repay a debt. The pole was built in public so everyone could see that a debt had not been paid. It was meant to embarrass the individual or group into repaying the debt. When the debt was paid, the pole was removed. Many shame poles remain unidentified today because the original debt, now long forgotten, was never repaid.

The Watchmen A totem pole is to be read from the top down. The totem on top is not always the highest ranking. The largest figure would be the one that is featured in the story. The smaller figures are sometimes fillers and have only a little part in the story.

The "Watchmen" can be identified as three carved men wearing tall hats sitting at the top of tall totem poles, which are attached to the chief’s house. The main function of the watchmen was to warn the chief and the villagers of danger. The middle watcher faced the ocean to search for incoming canoes from other villages, and the other two looked to the sides along the shoreline and kept watch over the village.

Totem poles don’t last too long on the Pacific coast of Canada. The heavy rain and humid climate means the cedar wood of the totem poles rots and decays quickly. There are virtually no totem poles remaining from the early part of the 1800s. They have all rotted away. Even the totem poles remaining in Haida Gwaii today that were carved in the late 1880s or 1890s have lots of rot and many of the carved and painted faces are difficult to see.

Although many of the very large totem poles still remain in Haida Gwaii today, rotting where they were originally placed, others have been removed and have been relocated in museums around the world. In these environmentally protected museums, the Haida totem poles do not rot, and will remain for many hundreds of years for all to see and appreciate.

This totem pole is called Pole of Sa aw�een g̱� and was probably carved around 1880. It is located in the main stairs of the Royal Ontario Museum for all to see, and it is the largest totem pole located at the ROM. It was purchased by the Museum in 1920 and was already showing signs of rotting. It was not able to be displayed until 1933 when the ROM expanded. The wood has been specially preserved so it won’t rot any more and the insides have been reinforced with metal so it will not collapse on itself.