Chapter 2. Insect Foods of North American Indigenous Populations ...

Chapter 264 of 68 9/20/2012 1:34 PMSteward (pp. 270-271, 299-300, 362) reported widespread use of insects as food among the Northern andGosiute Shoshoni of eastern Idaho and northern Utah. Steward says: "Except among groups having access tobison, rodents and insects were of outstanding importance....Most often, informants said crickets were picked upin the early morning when they were cold and dumped into the fire." Other insects that were widely usedincluded caterpillars, ants (as food, and by one group as medicine), ant and yellowjacket "eggs," and cicadas.Grasshoppers were eaten by the Idaho Shoshoni; of two kinds, only the large yellowish variety was edible.Cicadas, Mormon crickets, and grasshoppers were frequently stored.Stewart, O.C. 1941. Culture element distributions: XIV - Northern Paiute. Univ. Calif. Pubs. Anthropol. Rec.4(3): 361-446.Stewart reported (pp. 373, 419, 426-427) numerous insects used as food by the Northern Paiute, whooccupied a region including northeastern California, eastern Oregon, southwestern Idaho and Nevada exceptingits southern tip. Stewart discusses in detail, in relation to earlier accounts, the location of lakes where kutsavi [H.hians] pupae were found and which groups used them. Other insect foods included "piuga" (caterpillars of C.pandora), cicadas ("kua"), crickets ("miju" or "niju"). Grasshoppers were used by only two of the 14 groupsstudied.Stewart, O.C. 1942. Culture element distributions: XVIII - Ute-Southern Paiute. Univ. Calif. Pubs. Anthropol.Rec. 6(4): 231-354.Stewart (pp. 245, 337) reported widespread use of insects by the Ute-Southern Paiute Indians ofColorado, Utah and northern Arizona. These included caterpillars, ants, ant and wasp "eggs," cicadas, cricketsand grasshoppers. The latter three were gathered in baskets in the morning before they became active. Cicadaswere called "kovi," crickets were called "arcupits."Stewart, O.C. 1966. Ute Indians: before and after white contact. Utah Hist. Quart. 34(1): 38-61.The only mention of insects is quoted from Father Pierre Jean deSmet regarding the Sampeetches (p. 53):"Two, three, or at most four of them may be seen in company, roving over their sterile plains in quest of ants andgrasshoppers, on which they feed."Stewart, O.C. 1980. Temoke Band of Shoshone and the Oasis Concept. Nev. Hist. Quart. 23(4): 246-261.*Stewart reports (p. 250) the use of ants and bee eggs by the Western Shoshone in Ruby Valley, Nevada.Strong, E. 1969. Stone Age in the Great Basin. Portland, Ore.: Binfords & Mort, pp. 125-129.The author draws mainly on earlier accounts (Leonard, Fremont, Ogden) in briefly discussing the use ofthe shore flies, Ephydra hians and E. subopaca, crickets, locusts, ants, and the caterpillar, Coloradia pandora.He notes that: "Insects formed a small but important portion of the diet of the desert people, important becausethey offered a variety in the menu not less desirable to a primitive race than to ourselves, and because no foodsource could be overlooked. . . . Our culture generally revolts at the use of insects for food, and relegates thosewho do to an inferior status in the same manner as any other native trait differing from our beliefs, yet edibleinsects may have cleaner habits and be as tasty as some delicacies considered by us a luxury; for instance theoyster."Sturtevant, W.C. (Ed.). 1978 -1998. Handbook of North American Indians. Smithson. Inst., Washington, D.C.Contains numerous articles cited in this bibliography.Sutton, M.Q. 1985. The California salmon fly as a food source in northeastern California. J. Calif. & GreatBasin Anthropol. 7(2): 176-182. (Plecoptera: Pteronarcyidae)Sutton, M.Q. 1988. Insects as food: aboriginal entomophagy in the Great Basin. Ballena Press Anthropol.Papers No. 33, 115 pp. (See under Introduction and most insect orders.)Sutton, M.Q. 1995. Archaeological aspects of insect use. J. Archaeol. Method Theory 2: 253-298.