The northwest coast and plateau

Along the northwest coast, the western mountains descend to the sea. In places where there are no extensive islands on the coast that provide protection, the water slips through the high, tree-covered slopes, and the pressure rises through long flooded valleys and reaches the cold inner forests. Warm ocean currents flow between islands and coastal plains, generating abundant temperate rains surrounded by sand and slopes. On a dry plateau that stretches over mountains and fjords, coniferous forests are separated from the steep terrain by open meadows covered with artemis and splashed with oak. The scattered lakes and two large river systems, the Columbia and Fraser rivers, are fed by the water from the glacial meltdown that comes from the mountains.

People from these different landscapes depended on salmon. Adult and ripe fish flow upstream from the sea during the spring and move among the creeks of the river's submerged waters. Salmon was a source of food as predictable as seasons, and the only agriculture in the fertile river deltas and on the coast was the cultivation of scattered tobacco.

Despite the lack of salmon, the coast had a great deal of resources, such as trout, bacon, halibut, shrimp, eperlans and other fish. The oolichan, a small specimen, contains so much oil that they dried it, put a mecha on it and used it as a candle. Marine mammals also grew. All the villages hunted foxes, marsopes, sea lions and sea nutries, and the nootkas and makahs devoted themselves to whale fishing. The sites of ancient villages are distinguished by clusters of shells of many meters due to the abundance of strawberries, mejillons, sea rye and oysters. The nearby forests were filled with roots and fertile berries, as well as deer, castors, bears, martas and other small-hunting animals.

One of North America's most complex cultures arose from the overwhelming natural abundance. Red cedar wood, which is soft but sturdy, was the raw material. The two-water ceiling in the northern houses was built with wooden houses covered with cedar plates and a large parquet. They cut and painted the houses frequently. The houses in the south were larger, had roofed roofs and had little or no ornament.

Northern artists used heraldic stamps of surprisingly complex and peculiar styles to cut and paint posts, house facades, boats and household utensils. Belief in the fundamental creative forces was expressed artistically through the “Totemic posts”, especially among the Tlingites, the Haidas and the Tsimshian. The artistic activity coincided with the classist tendency of much of the poor population of the northwest coast.

The material representation of social status was crucial in areas where peoples were divided into nobles, plebeys and slaves. Individuals, families and clans exhibited and possessed representations of animal ancestors and other mythological figures. They defended the ownership of some names, titles, songs, dances and myths, as well as areas for fishing, hunting and collecting crustaceans. Fewer symbols related to social status were represented, and artists dedicated themselves to shaping religious objects in sectors where society was less stratified, as was the case with the salish and the chinook.

The inhabitants of the inland communities that lived along the Fraser and Columbia river systems were hunters and gatherers, and their diet included fish, deer, alms, mossons, rabbits and other small-hunting animals, as well as plants from meadows and forests. However, they did not completely separate themselves from the cultures of their embryo. It is possible that barge canoes were introduced by the Pacific Coast culture since antiquity, as evidenced by stone sculptures of figures and animals. In recent times, organizations such as the nez percé have verified that the horse is perfectly adapted to the pastures of the plateau.

Potlatch

In communities where each person had a social category and trait, residents demonstrated their material wealth by giving a part or burning it in a potlatch ceremony. Sometimes, the leader of a clan or other nobility welcomed hundreds of guests with impressive dances and abundant banquets. Items presented or burned in the fireplaces included fabrics, leather, dresses, baskets, utensils, counts, and canoes. The wealth at stake was really impressive.

Potlatch was traditionally celebrated to celebrate events such as birth, puberty, marriage, inheritance and death. The clan showed during the potlatch its material wealth, its strength and its connection with the past. Each music, dance, image and dress symbolized the heritage and vitality of the clan.

With the arrival of European merchandise, the festivals reached their peak and on one occasion thirty-three thousand blankets were presented. Potlatches became so popular that in 1885 the Canadian government banned them as anti-progressive waste at a time when traditional life was under pressure.

They were carried out in secret until in 1950, the ban was removed.

Cedar

Previously, the islands and mountainous slopes of the Pacific coast were filled with red cedars due to heavy rains. The ripe red cedar was a thin giant whose compact trunk was covered above the thick malice, unlike the firm, upright and sober Douglas and the naked madroño. The cut cedar bark was a valuable source of fibers for weaving a wide range of items, such as baskets, ropes, rods, coats and other garments.

Cedar wood is not only soft and easy to work, but also extremely elastic and resistant to wet weather and salty sea air. The carefully carved totem cedar poles survived the villages in which they were built. Occasionally, they removed large cedar trunks, enlarged the central area by using steam and stretching, and then knitted them to create aerodynamic offshore canoes. The Laidas reached a length of 21 meters. The carpenters reproduced the complex pictorial styles of the northwest coast on cedar wood panels and converted wooden blocks into spectacular masks and precious ceremonial basins.

The cedar fiber is so soft that long and thin bars and tablets can be easily manufactured. This made cedar an ideal material for the construction of large community houses that were found in abundance in the region. Cedar was also used to create "folded wooden boxes", which were created by casting steam on a cedar plate and shaping it to give it the desired shape.