|
|
Definition of Potlatch
1. Noun. A ceremonial feast held by some Indians of the northwestern coast of North America (as in celebrating a marriage or a new accession) in which the host gives gifts to tribesmen and others to display his superior wealth (sometimes, formerly, to his own impoverishment).
Definition of Potlatch
1. n. Among the Kwakiutl, Chimmesyan, and other Indians of the northwestern coast of North America, a ceremonial distribution by a man of gifts to his own and neighboring tribesmen, often, formerly, to his own impoverishment. Feasting, dancing, and public ceremonies accompany it.
Definition of Potlatch
1. Noun. A ceremony amongst certain Native American peoples of the Pacific northwest in which gifts are bestowed upon guests and personal property is destroyed in a show of wealth and generosity. ¹
2. Noun. A communal meal where guests bring dishes to share, a potluck. ¹
¹ Source: wiktionary.com
Definition of Potlatch
1. to hold a ceremonial feast for [v -ED, -ING, -ES]
Lexicographical Neighbors of Potlatch
Literary usage of Potlatch
Below you will find example usage of this term as found in modern and/or classical literature:
1. Chinook texts by Franz Boas (1894)
"When potlatch he makes it a chief, then they go, they are sent THE potlatch. ...
ma'nix gö 11 t,p river potlatch he makes it a chief. ..."
2. On Canada's Frontier: Sketches of History, Sport, and Adventure, and of the by Julian Ralph, Frederic Remington (1892)
"This was the "potlatch," a thing to us so foreign, even in the impulse of which
it is begotten, that we have no word or phrase to give its meaning. ..."
3. The Rainbow's End: Alaska by Alice Palmer Henderson (1898)
"In Southeastern Alaska, the potlatch is usually given by an individual who ...
Among the Eskimo of the western coast, however, a potlatch is more like a ..."
4. Seal and Salmon Fisheries and General Resources of Alaska by David Starr Jordan, Henry Wood Elliott, Washburn Maynard, Sheldon Jackson, William Gouverneur Morris, Ivan Petroff, Charles Haskins Townsend, Frederick William True, John J. Brice, Leonhard Stejneger (1898)
"The meaning of the potlatch is very broad, and signifies that which is given by
one Indian to ... He is a big man according to the size of his potlatch, ..."
5. Seal and Salmon Fisheries and General Resources of Alaska by David Starr Jordan, Henry Wood Elliott, Washburn Maynard, Sheldon Jackson, William Gouverneur Morris, Ivan Petroff, Charles Haskins Townsend, Frederick William True, John J. Brice, Leonhard Stejneger (1898)
"THK "potlatch." One of thc most curious of the many remarkable customs of the
natives is the " potlatch," and a description of it at some length would seem ..."
6. Report of the Annual Meeting (1892)
"Every time the sacred objects of a gens are shown to the people a potlatch is given.
The sacred objects, although the property of the various gentes, ..."
Other Resources:
