The SealEaters, 20,000 BC

by Bonnye Matthews

  Emuka absent-mindedly touched the scar on his leg. It was a large rounded, somewhat rough area. He wondered whether Nagangna saved his life by burning it. He’d never know. He shuddered remembering. Emuka looked back towards Three Trees. The sky was darkening from the tall clouds of a storm. He decided it would be best to return home.

  By the time he reached home, the storm had already begun to send rain to the ground. Lightning flashed and thunder roared. There was little wind. Emuka slipped into the hut he shared with Kik. When she had become his wife, he had gone to the forest to find the tallest lengths of wood he could find to construct their hut, so it was roomier than most. He had also filled the cracks with moss from the oaks and covered that with the muddy clay from the river side. They had a small hearth for warmth and they remained dry from rain. He had moated around the hut to prevent rain from running onto the floor of the hut. Kik scraped the rain from Emuka’s skin, and he put on dry clothes. The hearth fire had warmed up the hut, casting a rosy glow over the hut interior. They sat on the bearskin and smiled at each other. Kik had brought a bowl of jerky and some freshly cooked edges of camel that were still roasting under the oak nearest them. She was very happy to know that Emuka was pleased with the idea of a child. Some of the men did not wish to have children enter their lives so quickly.

  Emuka wore a hairless mid-thigh tunic and a knee-length loincloth. The tunic was made simply of a long piece of leather cut transversely for his head to slip through. It was sewn simply on either side. He tied a soft piece of leather around his waist more for carrying things than for any other reason. Kik wore a brown rabbit fur tunic made from skins most women spurned. It was designed to go over one shoulder. Her tunic was not belted. It fell to just below her knees. It was somewhat lumpy for it was made of many skins. She loved the softness of her tunic, even if it was lacking in longevity.

  “Do you think our child will have your blue eyes and reddish hair?” she asked.

  Emuka was surprised. He never thought of the color of his eyes or hair. Except for Nagangna, everyone at Three Trees had black hair and brown eyes.

  “He will probably have brown eyes,” I think, because all the Maiket have brown eyes.

  “He?” she asked. “Why do you think our child will be a male?”

  Emuka was brought up short. He looked into her eyes, startled. “I just assumed that’s what our child would be.” He paused considering. “Kik, if it’s a girl that’s fine. When I knew you carried a child, I just saw a boy.”

  “Well, I have no control over whether it’s a boy or girl child, Emuka. We must be accepting and happy to receive whatever the Great Creator Spirit gives us.”

  “Of course, Kik.” Emuka had to spend some time readjusting his thoughts. He had fantasies of teaching his son to hunt and catch fish. Somehow a girl hadn’t fit this picture. Now it did.

  “Among your customs, do girls hunt and fish?” he asked.

  “We hunt some things,” she assured him. We make snare traps and use the forest animal trails to place numbers of them at one time. We use bolas to catch geese and ducks.”

  “What’s a bola?” Emuka asked. He well understood snares.

  “Rock weights on cordage,” she replied and rose to pull one from one of her bags that hung on a partial projection from the side of the hut. “Here you can see it. I made mine with three stones. You can use two or three or more. It can tangle an animal’s legs so you can kill it; a direct hit will stun or kill animals, maybe break a bone; and for geese and ducks, it can entangle them in air and bring them down.”

  “How does it work?” he asked.

  “You hold all the pouched stones in your left hand straight down while you hold the other end in your right hand, arm stretched to the right. Raise your left arm out straight following with the right. Turn loose of the stone pouches with your left hand, while swinging them around your right side with your right hand. Turn loose when your aim is right to hit your prey. If the prey is at a distance, sometimes you’ll circle the stones about your head to make the bola fly farther.”

  Emuka held the bola, examining it carefully. “You would have to make five or seven holes in the leather pouches, so as to make the attachment come from the center while the tie that wraps the pouch comes from the outside?”

  Kik was startled at his thoughts of construction after just having examined the bola. “You are right, Emuka. How’d you learn that?”

  “It’s my life to know tools and how to make them. Whoever designed this was very clever.”

  “These tools were in use before memory,” she replied.

  “Will you teach me to use one of these?” Emuka asked.

  “Of course,” she said, “the Maiket, however, see them as women’s weapons.”

  “Women’s weapons?” he laughed. “Any tool is valuable for anyone, if it works. You said this could entangle the legs of an animal. Could you catch a camel or horse with one of these?”

  “Well, yes,” she admitted, “if you could cause it to wrap around two legs or made a direct hit.”

  “Then, the Maiket may see it as a woman’s tool, but I see it as one that would function well in the grassland, whatever the animal you hunted.”

  She smiled. She thought that she was very fortunate to have such a man as her husband.

  For days she taught Emuka to use the bola. Some of the men and many of the women were fascinated that he’d spend so much time learning that weapon. As the days passed he became more and more proficient in its use.

  Early one morning six of the best young hunters left before the morning ceremony. They all carried spears that bore tips made by Emuka. By early afternoon, Yul returned at a run. After catching his breath, he asked Chief Dai for help. They had killed a mammoth in the place Emuka had pointed out, and they needed butchers and people to transport the meat. Quickly, more young hunters, and a few who were not so young, went across the river and grassland. That night they would celebrate the kill and the effectiveness of Emuka’s spear points.

  The same day Kik and Emuka followed the river beginning early in the morning. He carried spears, and both of them took bolas. About high sun, they spotted a number of peccaries.

  “Now, the test,” Emuka whispered. “I take the one on the left; you, the one on the right.”

  Both laid down everything but their bolas. They prepared, looked at each other, aimed, and slung the bolas toward their peccaries. A loud thwock let them know a stone had connected directly with something. They gathered their things and jogged to the site. Sure enough there were two peccaries lying there. Emuka quickly killed them. They tied the legs of the animals together. Using two spears which they held on their shoulders, Kik walking ahead and Emuka behind, they carried the animals back home.

  People were delighted with the feast that would come from their kill, and men took another look at bolas. It was a lightweight tool that could be carried on hunts with ease. All it would take is practice in making and using them. They found that learning the skill was not as easy as they had thought. Some men gave up in disgust claiming the tools were women’s tools. But some men learned with practice just as Emuka had done.

  Months passed. One day, Kik stood up and promptly put her hands on her belly. “I think the time nears,” she said. I will talk to the baby bringer woman,” she said with a smile. “Whether it comes as a boy or a girl, you’ll teach our child to hunt using all tools,” she said.

  Emuka nodded.

  It was not until high sun of the next day that the infant arrived—a girl. She had blue eyes. They named her Gemukik. By the time she was five-years-old, she could handle a small bola and spear. Her distance was short, but her accuracy was superb.

  Emuka would live to the age of seventy. Kik died at the age of sixty. He and Kik had fifteen children. Three died before Emuka no longer breathed air. He taught every child how to hunt and fish. Even the girl children were required to attain mastery. They were also required to master the technique of making the large double-pointed spe
ar points. His concern was that despite their place in life, they could survive well.

  Chapter 4

  Mongwire and Wen’s Story

  Having fled the Maiket, the SealEaters traveled north on the sea to a wide river. They built a cache for their sea traveling clothing and some of their winter garments for their return to the Cove. The group split into fragments, planning to gather at the headwater of the largest river below, where, at the solstice in two years, all together the SealEaters would set forth for home at the Cove. They hid their boats they were not using. They would decide after regrouping which place seemed best for all their people. Meanwhile they’d explore, each going in a different direction. Mongwire, of course, kept his youngest son, Wen, with him. He had two other sons, Morg and Torq. Morg remained at the Cove. Torq had come on the voyage in a different boat. He and Mongwire were not close. Torq had already matured into a strong, responsible man.

  As he belonged to the water, Mongwire had chosen to take a small boat north as far up the river as possible. He and Wen rowed far into the land, going north until the river split. They took the northeast direction. They had rowed for days. Early one morning as they set out, Mongwire noticed what looked like a trail. They hid the boat well and climbed the hill only to discover that the trail led over a hill and up a mountain. Laden with heavy backpacks, skins, some food, and spears, Mongwire began his assault on the trail. He rarely did anything indifferently but rather drove himself as if powered by something others lacked. Wen followed, grateful that no branches remained to block his progress. His father removed them as he climbed.

  Mongwire’s thick heavy legs seemed never to tire. Wen was much more slender of build and had his mother’s features. He was light-footed and had good stamina, but he always tired before the day went dark. SealEaters could go on the trail from sunup to sundown, pushing into dark, if needed. Wen gave out too soon. Mongwire wanted him to become more like himself and his other sons, in a word, manly. He wasn’t ashamed of Wen. Quite the contrary, Wen was his favorite child. But he was still just that—a child. It was past time for him to grow out of his childish ways like drawing in the sand or feminine things like learning names and functions of plants. Mongwire wanted him to become a great mariner or hunter, if not both. Mongwire had taken Wen along to toughen him, to grow him into the man he thought Wen should become.

  The forest was composed of some birch interspersed among countless evergreens as far as they could see. Mongwire’s thought that a shape in the vegetation was a trail proved correct. The trail they took towards the west up the hill and mountain led to another trail clearly man-made that went from north to south. It seemed to Mongwire to be a trail used by humans as well as by animals, but he admitted that thought remained to be proven. It was too well used and too wide to be an animal route through the mountain forest, he reasoned. They came to a rock that jutted out over the valley. Mongwire turned off the path and walked out upon the rock. The valley below was green and treed as far as the eye could see. He couldn’t see the dirt floor through any of the trees, so closely did they grow together. Mongwire was convinced they could go back now to begin to bring the people to this new land. He saw no need other than caution to wait for two years. But that was the agreement. Nowhere did he see heat waves from hearth fires, and if a SealEater could have seen it, he’d be the one. So keen was Mongwire’s vision that SealEater hunters relied on it. He decided to wait that night to observe the valley below for human life. Wen was looking badly trail worn, but Mongwire credited him with keeping his fatigue to himself.

  They shrugged off their backpacks and began immediately to build a hut for the night. They found enough dead wood lying about to create a very small hut into which they placed their things. They gathered evergreen boughs to keep themselves above the ground and on softness, piled them in the hut into rough rectangles, and laid their furred skins over the boughs. Each rolled his leather sleeping cover, and placed it on the sleeping skin.

  Nearby was a small spring from which they could drink.

  “Which way do you think we should explore this north-south trail?” Mongwire asked, setting Wen up to learn how to make good hunter decisions.

  Wen knew his father was testing him. For a long time he did not reply. This was his silent, mysterious son, Mongwire reminded himself. Mongwire was patient.

  Finally, Wen said, “We should go north, Father. We should find the limit of this land. We should know where the ice begins so we can assure ourselves we are well south of it, in case it grows. With so much ice in the sea, we cannot be far from where it should be on land, if it rests on the land. We should keep in our thinking places the value of the ice. The ice is like a huge wall keeping others from making war from the north. Any who live near it have protection from one side.”

  Mongwire was startled as usual. Rarely did he guess what Wen’s thoughts might be. He had planned to steer his son to the south where conditions would be warmer and better for the SealEaters to begin a new life where varieties of food animals abounded. But Wen had thought it through and made good sense of his reply.

  “Then, Son,” Mongwire replied, “We’ll follow your recommendation to see what we will see. It may be we can find this boundary.” Mongwire grasped a handful of jerky, offering some to Wen. They ate silently. Mongwire was musing over the idea of limits of land. Certainly, he knew land had limits, but he’d never considered that as something to think on systematically. As was so often the case, he thought Wen had said something significant. How, he wondered, did a child of thirteen have such thoughts?

  Mongwire looked at the jerky. He frowned. “You stay here. I’m going to hunt for some real meat,” he told his son.

  Wen raised his hand in acknowledgement. He also raised his left eyebrow. His eyes spotted a couple of plantains and other greens that he knew were edible by observing the local people they’d met.

  Wen formed the hearth, surrounded it with stones, and laid the twigs and branches in the pattern that would encourage a fire to burn readily once a spark ignited their starter. He gathered the greens. Using the fire starter platform and the revolving hard straight fire starter stick, he began rubbing his hands in practiced motion to spark the dry moss that laid beside the platform. It did not take long. He had a perfect small hearth fire by the time Mongwire returned with a young deer from which he’d removed the guts. As evening turned dark, they ate very well.

  The next morning Mongwire and Wen packed a few things, concealing the others except for the deer meat that hung out of the reach of scavengers. They began following the path to the north. They traveled it to the end of the mountain on the path. From the top of the mountain, which wasn’t a very tall one, they saw the ice sheet, not expecting it would be so close. Both were astonished at the sight. Mongwire and Wen couldn’t take their eyes from it. They’d never seen such a sight. The ice sheet was so much thicker than they had even begun to imagine. It looked one way as the sheet met the sea; quite another from where it met land as viewed from the mountain. Both were eager to reach the lowland to see the ice sheet closer. Others must have had similar thoughts, for the trail had a descending pathway not more than ten body lengths ahead. Mongwire and Wen began to descend the path. It was steep, but they could go down, even with their backpacks.

  Hours later when they had reached the lowland, the two were astounded. The ice sheet looked different to them from the ground. Not only were they amazed at the size of the sheet which rose quite a way overhead, far beyond the heights where non-migratory birds flew, but also there was a palpable power there, so close to the ice. It was something they each could feel. It was as if the ice sheet pulsed with life. It raised hairs on the back of Mongwire’s neck. He was not used to feeling things he couldn’t explain.

  “It’s as if the ice were a living human, and we are ants,” Mongwire said.

  “Good comparison, Father,” Wen said really meaning it.

  Momentarily Mongwire forgot the ice sheets. The compliment from his son was a treasure to
him. He glowed in it for a brief time.

  Wen went straight up to the ice sheet and touched it. At a distance the ice groaned. Wen backed away quickly, as if the spirit of the ice had groaned at his touch.

  “That was not wise,” Mongwire said to admonish his son, all the while wishing he’d done the same thing, but for fear had not.

  “It’s really ice resting here on land!” Wen said, still clearly in awe. “I’m used to seeing it on the water, but on land it looks so out of place!”

  A huge cracking sound rent the quiet. As if in slow motion, a piece of the ice sheet broke off in the sunshine and fell to the ground below to the west of them, smaller pieces shattered off flying through the air on the large chunk’s impact with the ground. The impact shook the ground. Wen and Mongwire looked long and hard at each other. That was a caution from the gods, they both understood without exchanging a word.

  There was a breeze blowing from the ice, and it chilled them. Mongwire and Wen sought refuge in the forested area across from the ice. As if frozen still themselves, they watched the ice. A little later, they heard the sound of trumpeting mammoths. The ground moved again. Mongwire and Wen were glad they’d retreated back into the forested area. They could see the grassland below, and when the mammoths drew near, they could observe the large beasts without being in the way. Each was startled to see the speed at which the mammoths could move. They’d only seen them walking slowly. The forest also provided another benefit. They were at a distance from falling chunks of ice.

  “Could we remain here for a while to observe?” Wen asked. “All we know is that it’s cold here and mammoths pass by. There might be more we should learn. If we stayed for a moon or more, we might gain information.”