Tobacco Pipe Bowl

This intriguing man is the upside-down bowl of a tobacco pipe. He was carved from argillite, a stone mined from the Queen Charlotte Islands in Western Canada. He has a flattened head and incised lines on the face which resemble tattooing. Archaeologists theorize that the artwork combined local Chinookan and Hawaiian attributes. If true, it would represent one of the collection’s few handmade artifacts demonstrating a melding of cultural traditions.