WIIGOB — A TRADITIONAL TIE TO THE LAND
Maude Kegg, Naawikamigookweban (Middle of the Earth Woman), featured in the Minnesota Historical Society and new Women of the Big Lake exhibit at the Mille Lacs Indian Museum, great-grandmother of the author.
Harvesting basswood
By MASHKODE-BIZHIKIGAHBAW, BENJI SAM
As Anishinaabe, we have always been known as stewards of the land and to have utilized our resources with respect and unbelievable ingenuity. Throughout the course of time, one of the most precious and innovative resources has been the development of rope/tying material for home building, basket making, etc. so that our relatives were able to master every resource available to them. In our world today, we have been passed down the knowledge of how to gather and process some of this material in the form of wiigob, commonly known as basswood, for tying together birch crafts and making grass dolls.
When the sun is hottest, and the air is dense with moisture, basswood bark can be harvested for making strands, ribbon, grass, and tying materials. You begin with a small vertical cut at the base of a young basswood tree, with hand-sized and nearly heart-shaped leaves, roughly two inches in size. Repeat this cut about two inches over and square the bottom of the section. Next, you must take the blade or a small chisel to pry the beginning of the bark from the inner wood. If done at the right time of year, this bark will release without difficulty as the inner lining of the inner bark is very moist and can be stripped up to the very top of the tree. Repeat this process around the tree and roll the wiigob into rolls, using the top end of the tree to tie the roll together.
Next, we must process much of the bark and separate the inner bark from the outer bark. You can distinguish each layer individually easily as the inner bark will feel damp and will be very pliable while the outer bark is more of a dry, spongy texture. We take each length and split, split, and split again until all the inner bark is separated into very fine, shoelace-sized material. We finish many of these rolls into individual packed spools of asigobaan, processed basswood fibers, for future projects through the summer, fall, and winter.
The same process can be completed with the few remaining strands of wiigob which we leave whole when separated from the outer bark to be soaked in Lake Mille Lacs for at least one month. The waves and water cleanse the inner bark and help dissolve the plant fibers so they become even more flexible and strong. This is how traditional ribbon was made, by splitting the inner bark even further into thin, ribbon-like strands of material that can be dyed, stained for art projects or tying together reed mats, or shaped in bundles down into grass dolls for children to play with. These dolls are known as asigobaani-mazinichigan, or grass dolls.
Like all other teachings in our culture, the work does not end here, as removing the bark from the basswood tree does eventually kill the tree. However, young basswood is incredibly pliable and dries very light and strong and makes for the perfect carving wood for decoys, spoons, and wooden toys for children to play with. What’s left over each summer from harvesting wiigob is turned into more art or cut into firewood to maintain our wood supply for boiling maple syrup, parching wild rice, and supplemental heat for our home. We owe the earth our complete use of these materials when they so politely allow us to use their resources. If we can help it, nothing goes to waste.
If you are interested in learning more about the uses of traditional materials and how these were gathered, processed, and used historically, I invite you to keep a watchful eye on activities at the Mille Lacs Trading Post and Mille Lacs Indian Museum for annual demonstrations that celebrate the teachings of our relatives and are open to our community. You can find more information on their Facebook page or Instagram page, or you can give them a call to learn more about upcoming events on our Reservation.
