Would like help identifying origin and age of my Dugout Canoe

[CindyG]

Hi,
I would love your help identifying the origin and possible age of my Dugout canoe.

I purchased it from a woman who said, it had been in her family from the 1940’s. She said, her great grandfather made the canoe into a bookshelf.

I was hoping you all may know something about it.

Thank you for your help!
Cindy G

 

[Michael Grace]

I'm not at all sure how any meaningful information can be produced. This appears to be a partial canoe that has been significantly modified, painted multiple times, had most of the paint (and some of the canoe's surface) sanded off, and more. Plus we don't know where it came from. Location history might help a little, but these canoes have been moved, sometimes very great distances, by collectors. And dugouts were made across huge swaths of the world's geography. In short, there just doesn't appear to be anything here to go on. I wish there were better news for you.

 

[Benson Gray]

I agree with Michael's comments that identifing and dating this will be a challenge. Dendrochronology and/or Radiocarbon dating may offer something but these will probably require significant modifications and expense. The first two links below have more information. The third link has more details about a birch bark canoe that was carbon dated. The short summary is that Carbon-14 dating really isn’t very accurate for things that are only a few hundred years old. Good luck and please let us know what you find if you ever get additional information about this dugout. Good luck,

Benson

Dendrochronology - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Radiocarbon dating - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Thread 'Birchbark canoes and Carbon-14 dating'

Feb 27, 2023

Rob Stevens and I have been trading some emails recently about the canoe described at https://www.centralmaine.com/2017/09/02/museum-preserves-native-american-canoe-from-1700s/ which the Pejepscot Historical Society had restored and carbon dated in 2017. There are several bark canoes which have been described as the oldest. A few others include the Enys canoe at the Canadian Canoe Museum (https://canoemuseum.ca/2012-09-11-welcoming-a-canoe-back-to-canada-after-230-years/), the one at the Peabody Essex museum (https://wcha.org/catalogs/penobscot/), one at the Penobscot...

• Benson Gray
• Replies: 2
• Forum: Birchbarks, Dugouts and Indigenous Craft

• 

​