Introduction

Kwah was a famous nobleman in the history of the Nak'azdli people of Stuart Lake in central British Columbia . Many of Kwah's descendants continue to live in the region today.

Figure 1

According to oral histories of the Nak'azdli First Nation, Kwah was the first person in the region to own an iron dagger. Kwah and his dagger figure prominently in a number of significant historical events, particularly in a story surrounding events in the life of a young man named James Douglas – who later became the governor of the Colony of Vancouver Island and the Colony of British Columbia.

The events surrounding Kwah's dagger forced the movement of Douglas to Fort Vancouver on the Columbia River. This move led to Sir James Douglas playing an important political role at a crucial point in the development of what is now British Columbia.

In the anthropology collections of the Royal B.C. Museum is a knife with an iron blade and a carved whalebone handle (RBCM, Ethnology col. #13345). Initially thought to be of Tlingit provenance based upon the handle design, artifact #13345 has now been identified as having belonged to one of Kwah's descendants, Chief Louis Billy.

Could this dagger be the famous Kwah's dagger known in the oral history of the Nak'azdli First Nations?

The following is an investigation into the history and analysis of artifact #13345 and the stories surrounding Kwah's dagger. The process of clarifying the past ownership of artifact #13345 entailed developing an overview of daggers in a number of museum collections as well as historic accounts of knives in general.

In addition, the events associated with Kwah and his dagger span the period of time from both pre-European contact and post-European contact in northern BC (late 1700's). This provided a unique opportunity to use modern scientific methods to help identify what is, or what is not, likely to be the original Kwah's dagger and to see if we could find a way to date iron as a means of establishing its early presence in the province.

This research project was to be focused particularly on Kwah's dagger, but of necessity it developed into an overview of daggers in museum collections (see appendix II) and a summary of the literature pertaining to 18 th century trade in iron along the coast of British Columbia; the movement of Iron across Canada from East to west; as well as around the Pacific Rim. This detailed information has been summarized in a separate report, THE EARLY INTRODUCTION OF IRON AMONG FIRST NATIONS OF BRITISH COLUMBIA.

KWAH’S DAGGER                          
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