The Claymakers

Editor’s Note: “Son of Claymaker” was written by North Augusta writer and archaeologist Mark Newell, after reviewing the research of colleague Ken Sassaman. It presents a picture of the life of early Indians as revealed by Sassaman’s excavations on Stallings Island. The story first appeared in Augusta Magazine in 1998

Son of Claymaker

The Ancient Ones of the tribe said today that it was indeed so. We, the wanderers, brought home the first signs to the elders, the dying of the leaves in the forests, the cooling of the waters in the river we call the Great Mother.

Soon she will turn very cold, the trees will die, nothing will grow, and the sun will sink closer to the world. Warmth and light will be brief, the dark and the cold of the night will be with us and the tribe will gather together here in the midst of the shoals. We will sit around the fires and speak our tales of the gods of the waters, the woods and the sky. We do this so that they, in their slumber, will hear us and dream of us - their children. Then they will not die in their slumber, they will awake when the sun climbs higher in the sky, and we will be alive and well when the rest of the world around us awakens.

I am Son of Claymaker, these months when the Gods sleep will be my last among the people of the river. When it next becomes time to plant, time to hunt and fish, I will be a man. Then, Claymaker, my mother, will call the Ancient Ones and tell them that my seasons among the tribe have passed. They will call upon me to prove my manhood, after which I must leave the island, seek out a mate among the distant tribes where I will bring power to the tribe of my mother through alliances and trade.

Today, we will prepare for the dark months to come. I will go to the high hills to help dig the pits in which we will store nuts that will fall from the trees as they die. The pits are round and shallow, the earth packed down in them to better preserve the nuts in beds of leaves and bracken. We will dig many, some will fall prey to the creatures of the forest, but most will remain intact and we will return to them when the leaves and the snow cover the ground. Some of the older men, those like my father who came here long ago to mate and live with my mother, will busy themselves making arrow points and blades from the hard stone found down river. Others will use the stone to carve small bone fish hooks. They will also tend to the basket traps that will be taken to the shoals where we have channeled the water through weirs to gather the fish together as they race down river to a place far, far away. Many of the fish will escape our hooks and our traps. They will take word of us back to the place far down river where Claymaker says our tribe came from in the distant days, where the earth meets the great waters. We must now begin to fish and hunt beyond our daily needs, the more food we can store away as the days grow shorter, the more of us will live to see the Gods awaken and bring life back to the land.

There must be magic as well. The Ancient Ones, now that the signs have been read, will gather my mother and the other women of the tribe together. Some of them will be the younger girls, who, coming of age like me, will be initiated into the secrets of the clay. The Ancient Ones, all of them the oldest and wisest women of the tribe, guard the secrets of clay making. This magic, of using fire to make soft clay turn into stone, was brought here by the first mothers of the tribe when they came here from down the Savannah river. It is told that the secret was given to them by the people of the great waters. When the secrets have been told, my mother will take the younger girls and some men to distant riverbanks where the clay will be gathered, balled up in skins, and carried back to the island.

They will work with the clay, then fashion it into bowls and pots. The soft clay is decorated with small, sharp sticks, the meaning of the lines and the holes in the surface of each vessel are not shared with the men. Then, special fires are built and the pots are slowly heated. The wind, more wood, and finally light sticks are used to make the clay glow red in the embers of the fire. The pots are slowly cooled. When we can finally take them from the fire, we can see the magic the women have made, for the clay will have turned to stone.

The magic of Claymaker is important to our tribe. The pots will enable us to preserve and store the dried meat and fish. Without them, we cannot keep enough food to make it through the dark months ahead. If the great mother gods of the river and the forest are kind to us, there will be an abundance of food to store. Then, we will be able to trade food for heating stones and skins with the tribes of the forests and the hills. They will come to us and treat us with respect -- all from the magic of the clay.

When this day ends, when the pits have been dug and we begin our wandering in the shoals and the forests, when we begin to bring home the deer, the fish and turtle, we shall gather with the women and speak of the times to come. The first fires may glow within our shelters of bent sapling and skin, and we shall gather around them to sing, to chant, to speak the old stories and to remind the Gods to remember us as they slumber like the giant bear.

When I sleep this night I will dream my hunting dream, my own message to the gods. In sleep I will see myself leap from rock to rock across the clear water of the shoals, and on into the deep forest. There, with my keenest spear blade atop my best spear shaft, I will slay one of the great bears as it seeks a sleeping place. I will bring to Claymaker an abundance of meat, I will sleep through the dark time beneath a new bear pelt, and in the awakening days of the long sun, I will go forth from the island with a bear claw necklace - as a man, as Son of Claymaker.