Travois
Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates
A travois (Template:IPAc-en; Canadian French, from French {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}; also travoise or travoy) is an A-frame structure used to drag loads over land, most notably by the Plains Indians of North America.Template:R
Construction and useEdit
Template:Multiple image The basic construction consists of a platform or netting mounted on two long poles, lashed in the shape of an A-frame; the frame is dragged with the sharply pointed end forward. Sometimes the blunt end of the frame is stabilized by a third pole bound across the two poles.
The travois is dragged by hand, sometimes fitted with a shoulder harness for more efficient dragging, or dragged by dogs or horses (after the 16th-century introduction of horses by the Spanish).
A travois can either be loaded by piling goods atop the bare frame and tying them in place, or by first stretching cloth or leather over the frame to hold the load to be dragged.
Although considered more primitive than wheel-based forms of transport, on the type of territory where the travois was used (forest floors, soft soil, snow, etc.), rather than roadways, wheels would have encountered difficulties which would have made them less efficient. As such the travois was employed by coureurs des bois in New France's fur trade with the Plains Tribes.
It is possible for a person to transport more weight on a travois than can be carried on the back.
Dog travoisEdit
.jpeg){kind=link}
According to The Canadian Encyclopedia, "The dog travois of pre-European times was small, capable of pulling not more than 20 to 30 kg."<ref name = "canencyc">Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> Travel by dog travois was slower in hot weather, which is tiring for dogs.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref name = "dogtravois">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
Horse travoisEdit
By the mid-18th century, the dog travois had given way to the horse travois.<ref name = "dogtravois"/> According to The Canadian Encyclopedia, "When dogs were replaced by horses, the greater pulling power allowed tipis to increase in size and household goods to multiply."<ref name = "canencyc"/> The Native Languages of the Americas website relates that:
After horses were introduced to North America, many Plains Indian tribes began to make larger horse-drawn travois. Instead of making specially constructed travois sleds, they would simply cross a pair of tepee poles across the horse's back and attach a burden platform between the poles behind the horse. This served two purposes at once, as the horses could then simultaneously carry the tepee poles and some additional baggage. Horses, of course, could pull much greater weight than dogs. Children often rode in the back of horse travois.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
When traveling with a travois, it was traditional for Salish people to leave the tipi poles behind at the camp "for use by the next tribe or family to camp there."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
A horse travois can be made with either A-frame or H-frame construction.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
- Kainai travois.jpg
Packhorse and travois, Canada 1910
- Native American baby transport; Travouis at Lake Windemere. Wellcome L0003105.jpg
Riding horse with travois, Canada 1922
- Travois or Indian ambulance, U.S. Army LCCN2014680130.jpg
US Army mule and travois "ambulance", circa early 1900s
- 35541 purilaat Rukajarvi 15081941.jpg
A workman's travois, Finland 1941
Other ways to use a travoisEdit
Before the use of horses, Blackfoot women made a curved fence of dog travois’ tied together, front end up, to hold driven animals enclosed until the hunters could kill them.<ref name=Ewers1988>Ewers, John C. (1988): A Blood Indian’s Conception of Tribal Life in Dog Days. Indian Life on the Upper Missouri. Norman and London. Pp. 7-13</ref>Template:Rp When the women put up a tipi, they placed an upright horse travois against a tipi pole and used it as a ladder so they could attach the two upper sides of the lodge cover with wooden pins.<ref name=Point1967>Point, Nicholas (1967): Wilderness Kingdom. Indian Life in the Rocky Mountains: 1840-1847. The Journals and Paintings of Nicholas Point, S. J.. New York, Chicago, San Francisco.</ref>Template:Rp A travois leaned against a branch of a tree functioned as a simple burial scaffold for a dead Crow baby tied to it.<ref name=Riebeth1985>Riebeth, Carolyn Reynolds (1985): J.H. Sharp among the Crow Indians, 1902-1910. Personal Memories of His Life and Friendship on the Crow Reservation in Montana. El Segundo.</ref>Template:Rp
Travois tracksEdit
What today is known as the Lewis and Clark Trail-Travois Road, and Montana's Lewis and Clark Pass were areas heavily traveled where travois "were dragged over the trail, causing deep, parallel tracks to mark the earth," which are still visible today.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Remains of travois tracks can also be seen at the Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site.
There is archeological evidence to support the thesis that travois were used before the invention of the wheel.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }} The film</ref> Travois tracks have been found in New Mexico dated to 22,000 years ago.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
See alsoEdit
Template:CommonscatTemplate:Sister project
ReferencesEdit
External linksEdit
- Dog Travois Plans
- Travois photos, A Song for the Horse Nation, National Museum of the American Indian
- Horse-Drawn travois Template:Webarchive, at Crow Fair
- Atsina Indian on horse pulling travois, photograph by Edward S. Curtis
- Travois photographs, from Denver Public Library
- Template:Citation