Population Map
Population was heavier in the South than in the North, heavier on the coasts than in the interior, and heavier on the Pacific Coast than on the Atlantic Coast. Pacific Coast contained density of 150-375 per hundreds square kilometers while New Jersey tribes and Atlantic Coast had density of 60-150 per hundred square kilometers. Nowhere in the Eastern including New Jersey tribes did cultivated plants seem to have furnished much over half of the total diet.
New Jersey tribes had same essential variety as those of the famous long house of the Iroquois Indians of New York State. This long house averaged about sixty feet in length, eighteen feet in width, and eighteen feet in height. Some long houses may be smaller than others. The entire frame was covered with bark, most often elm bark, which was perforated and sewed on in overlapping layers like shingles. On both sides of booths, each occupied by a separate family. Down the center of the hallway did pairs of families in opposite pairs of booths share series of fireplaces, each. These families were related, the whole constituting an extended family.
Two articles of clothing represented the minimum costume for the New Jersey tribes and other eastern tribes: the breechcloth, and moccasins. Male tribe members always kept a buffalo robe on hand to wear when appearing in public or cold weather. The breechcloth, leggings, and moccasins combined covered practically all the body from the waist down. A buckskin shirt, with flaps for sleeves was worn on the upper part of the body. The head was left bare most of the time, but a fur cap might be worn or the robe pulled over the head in the winter.
Women of the tribes wore a dress as a main garment that was made up of two deer or elk hides sewn together with the tail ends up. Women's leggings reached only to the knee, their moccasins were of the same type as the men's.
Both sexes wore the hair in two braids. Claws, teeth, and shells were worn as beads around the neck or as ear ornaments. There was little tattooing, and noses were sometimes pierced. The hair on the face and parts of the body was plucked with small tweezers.
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