CHAPTER X.

CHRONOLOGY.

It is not within the scope of the present work to examine the several

systems of chronology of the American Indians, but only those

pictorially exhibited. The Mexican system, much more scientific and

more elaborate than that employed by the northern tribes, resembled it

in the graphic record or detail of exhibit, and is highly interesting

as compared with the Dakota Winter Counts. Although the principle of

designating the years was wholly different, the mode of that designation

was often similar, as is shown by collating the Codex Vaticanus and

the Codex Telleriano Remensis with the Winter Counts of Lone Dog and

Battiste Good, infra. It is also desirable to note the remarks of Prof.

Brinton (_e_) with regard to the Chilan Balam. At the close of each of

the Maya larger divisions of time (the so-called “Katum”), a “chilan” or

inspired diviner uttered a prediction of the character of the year or

epoch which was about to begin. This prophetic designation of the year

was like a Zadkiel’s almanac, while the Dakotan method was a selection

of the most important events of the past.

SECTION 1.

TIME.

Dr. William H. Corbusier, surgeon, U. S. Army, gives the following

information:

[Illustration: FIG. 182.--Device denoting succession of time. Dakota.]

The Dakotas make use of the circle as the symbol of a cycle of

time; a small one for a year and a large one for a longer period

of time, as a life time, one old man. Also a round of lodges or a

cycle of seventy years, as in Battiste Good’s Winter Count. The

continuance of time is sometimes indicated by a line extending in a

direction from right to left across the page when on paper, and the

annual circles are suspended from the line at regular intervals by

short lines, as in Fig. 182, upper character, and the ideograph for

the year is placed beneath each one. At other times the line is not

continuous, but is interrupted at regular intervals by the yearly

circle, as in the lower character of Fig. 182.

Under other headings in this paper are presented graphic expressions for

divisions of time--month, day, night, morning, noon, and evening. See,

for some of them, Chap. XX, Sec. 2.

SECTION 2.

WINTER COUNTS.

In the preliminary paper on “Pictographs of the North American Indians,”

published in the Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 58

pages of text and 46 full-page plates were devoted to the winter counts

of the Dakota Indians. The minute detail of explanation, the systematic

comparison, and the synoptic presentation which seemed to be necessary

need not now be repeated to establish the genuine character of the

invention. This consisted in the use of events, which were in some

degree historical, to form a system of chronology. The record of the

events was only the device by which was accomplished the continuous

designation of years, in the form of charts corresponding in part with

the orderly arrangement of divisions of time termed calendars. It was

first made public by the present writer in a paper entitled “A Calendar

of the Dakota Nation,” which was issued in April, 1877, in Bulletin III,

No. I, of the United States Geological and Geographical Survey. The

title is now changed to that adopted by the Dakotas themselves, viz,

Winter Counts--in the original, wan'iyetu wo'wapi.

The lithographed chart published with that paper, substantially the

same as Pl. XX, Lone-Dog’s Winter Count, now much better presented than

ever before, is the winter count used by, or at least known to, a large

portion of the Dakota people, extending over the seventy-one years

commencing with the winter of A. D. 1800-’01.

[Illustration: BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY TENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XX

LONE DOG’S WINTER COUNT.]

The copy from which the lithograph was taken is traced on a strip

of cotton cloth, in size 1 yard square, which the characters almost

entirely fill, and is painted in two colors, black and red, used in the

original, of which it is a facsimile. The plate is a representation of

the chart as it would appear on the buffalo robe. It was photographed

from the copy on linen cloth, and not directly from the buffalo robe.

It was painted on the robe by Lone-Dog, an Indian belonging to the

Yanktonais tribe of the Dakotas, who in the autumn of 1876 was near

Fort Peck, Montana. His Dakota name is given in the ordinary English

literation as Shunka-ishnala, which words correspond nearly with the

vocables in Riggs’s lexicon for dog-lone. Lone-Dog claimed that, with

the counsel of the old men of his tribe, he decided upon some event

or circumstance which should distinguish each year as it passed, and

marked what was considered to be its appropriate symbol or device upon

a buffalo robe kept for the purpose. The robe was at convenient times

exhibited to other Indians of the tribe, who were thus taught the

meaning and use of the signs as designating the several years.

It is not, however, supposed that Lone-Dog was of sufficient age in the

year 1800 to enter upon the work. Either there was a predecessor from

whom he received the earlier records or, when he had reached manhood,

he gathered the traditions from his elders and worked back, the object

either then or before being to establish some system of chronology for

the use of the tribe or more probably in the first instance for the use

of his own band.

Present knowledge of the winter-count systems shows that Lone-Dog was

not their originator. They were started, at the latest, before the

present generation, and have been kept up by a number of independent

recorders. The idea was one specially appropriate to the Indian genius,

yet the peculiar mode of record was an invention, and it is not probably

a very old invention, as it has not been used beyond a definite district

and people. If an invention of that character had been of great

antiquity it would probably have spread by intertribal channels beyond

the bands or tribes of the Dakota, where alone the copies of such charts

have been found and are understood.

The fact that Lone-Dog’s Winter Count, the only one known at the time

of its first publication, begins at a date nearly coinciding with the

first year of the present century, as it is called in the arbitrary

computation that prevails among most of the civilized peoples, awakened

a suspicion that it might be due to civilized intercourse and was not a

mere coincidence. If the influence of missionaries or traders started

any plan of chronology, it is remarkable that they did not suggest one

in some manner resembling the system so long and widely used, and the

only one they knew, of counting the numbers from an era, such as the

birth of Christ, the Hegira, the Ab Urbe Conditâ, or the first Olympiad.

But the chart shows nothing of this nature. The earliest character

merely represents the killing of a small number of Dakotas by their

enemies, an event neither so important nor interesting as many others

of the seventy-one shown in the chart, more than one of which, indeed,

might well have been selected as a notable fixed point before and after

which simple arithmetical notation could have been used to mark the

years. Instead of any plan that civilized advisers would naturally have

introduced, the one actually adopted was to individualize each year by

a specific recorded symbol. The ideographic record, being preserved

and understood by many, could be used and referred to with ease and

accuracy. Definite signs for the first appearance of the smallpox and

for the first capture of wild horses were dates as satisfactory to the

Dakota as the corresponding expressions A. D. 1802 and 1813 are to the

Christian world, and far more certain than the chronology expressed in

terms of A. M. and B. C. The arrangement of separate characters in an

outward spiral starting from a central point is a clever expedient to

dispense with the use of numbers for noting the years, yet allowing

every date to be determined by counting backward or forward from any

other known. The whole conception seems one strongly characteristic

of the Indians, who in other instances have shown such expertness in

ideography. The discovery of several other charts, which differ in

their times of commencement and ending from that of Lone-Dog and from

each other, removed any inference arising from the above-mentioned

coincidence in beginning with the present century. The following copies

of charts, substantially the same as that of Lone-Dog, are now or have

been in the possession of the present writer:

1. A chart made and kept by Bo-i'-de, The-Flame, a Dakota, who, in 1877,

lived near Fort Sully, Dakota.

The facsimile copy is on a cotton cloth about a yard square and in black

and red, thus far similar to the copy of Lone-Dog’s chart, but the

arrangement is different. The character for the first year mentioned

appears in the lower left-hand corner, and the record proceeds toward

the right to the extremity of the cloth, then crossing toward the left

and again toward the right at the edge of the cloth, and so throughout,

in the style called boustrophedon. It thus answers the same purpose of

orderly arrangement, allowing constant additions, like the more circular

spiral of Lone-Dog. This record is for the years 1786-’87 to 1876-’77,

thus commencing earlier and ending later than that of Lone-Dog.

2. A Minneconjou chief, The-Swan, kept another record on the dressed

skin of an antelope or deer, claiming that it had been preserved in his

family for seventy years.

The characters are arranged in a spiral similar to those in Lone-Dog’s

chart, but more oblong in form. The course of the spiral is from left to

right, not from right to left.

3. Another chart was kindly loaned to the writer by Bvt. Maj. Joseph

Bush, captain Twenty-second U. S. Infantry. It was procured by him, in

1870 at the Cheyenne Agency. This copy is one yard by three-fourths

of a yard, spiral, beginning in the center, from right to left. The

figures are substantially the same as those in Lone-Dog’s chart, with

which it coincides in time, except that it ends at 1869-’70, but the

interpretation differs from that accompanying the latter in a few

particulars.

4. The chart of Mato Sapa, Black-Bear. He was a Minneconjou warrior,

residing in 1868 and 1869 on the Cheyenne Agency reservation, on the

Missouri river, near the mouth of the Cheyenne river.

This copy is on a smaller scale than that of Lone-Dog, being a flat and

elongated spiral, 2 feet 6 inches by 1 foot 6 inches. The spiral reads

from right to left. This chart, which begins like that of Lone-Dog, ends

with the years 1868-’69.

5. A most important and interesting Winter Count is that made by

Battiste Good, a Brulé Dakota, which was kindly contributed by Dr.

William H. Corbusier, surgeon U. S. Army. It begins with peculiar cyclic

devices from the year A. D. 900, and in thirteen figures embraces the

time to A. D. 1700, all these devices being connected with myths, and

some of them showing European influence. From 1700-’01 to 1879-’80 a

separate character is given for each year, with its interpretation,

in much the same style as shown in the other charts mentioned. Several

Indians and half-breeds said that this count formerly embraced about the

same number of years as the others, but that Battiste Good gathered the

names of many years from the old people and placed them in chronological

order as far back as he was able to learn them.

Another Winter Count, communicated by Dr. Corbusier, is that in the

possession of American-Horse, an Oglala Dakota, at the Pine Ridge agency

in 1879, who asserted that his grandfather began it, and that it is the

production of his grandfather, his father, and himself.

A third Winter Count is communicated by Dr. Corbusier as kept by

Cloud-Shield. He was also an Oglala Dakota, at the Pine Ridge agency,

but of a different band from American-Horse. The last two counts embrace

nearly the same number of years, viz, from A. D. 1775 to 1878. Two dates

belong to each figure, as a Dakota year covers a portion of two of the

calendar years common to civilization.

Dr. Corbusier also saw copies of a fourth Winter Count, which was kept

by White-Cow-Killer, at the Pine Ridge agency. He did not obtain a copy

of it, but learned most of the names given to the winters.

With reference to all the Winter Counts and to the above remarks that

a Dakota year covers a portion of two calendar years, the following

explanation may be necessary: The Dakota count their years by winters

(which is quite natural, that season in their high levels and latitudes

practically lasting more than six months), and say a man is so many

snows old, or that so many snow seasons have passed since an occurrence.

They have no division of time into weeks, and their months are

absolutely lunar, only twelve, however, being designated, which receive

their names upon the recurrence of some prominent physical phenomenon.

For example, the period partly embraced by February is called the

“raccoon moon;” March, the “sore-eye moon;” and April, that “in which

the geese lay eggs.” As the appearance of raccoons after hibernation,

the causes inducing inflamed eyes, and oviposition by geese vary with

the meteorological character of each year, and as the twelve lunations

reckoned do not bring back the point in the season when counting

commenced, there is often dispute in the Dakota tipis toward the end of

winter as to the correct current date. In careful examination of the

several counts it often is left in doubt whether the event occurred in

the winter months or was selected in the months immediately before or in

those immediately after the winter. No regularity or accuracy is noticed

in these particulars.

In considering the extent to which Lone-Dog’s chart is understood and

used, it may be mentioned that every intelligent Dakota of full years to

whom the writer has shown it has known what it meant, and many of them

knew a large part of the years portrayed. When there was less knowledge,

there was the amount that may be likened to that of an uneducated person

or a child who is examined about a map of the United States, which

had been shown to him before, with some explanation only partially

apprehended or remembered. He would tell that it was a map of the United

States; would probably be able to point out with some accuracy the state

or city where he lived; perhaps the capital of the country; probably

the names of the states of peculiar position or shape, such as Maine,

Delaware, or Florida. So the Indian examined would often point out in

Lone-Dog’s chart the year in which he was born, or that in which his

father died, or in which there was some occurrence that had strongly

impressed him, but which had no relation whatever to the significance of

the character for the year in question. It had been pointed out to him

before, and he had remembered it, while forgetting the remainder of the

chart.

On comparing all the Winter Counts it is found that they often

correspond, but sometimes differ. In a few instances the differences are

in the succession of events, but they are usually due to an omission or

to the selection of another event. When a year has the same name in all

of them, the bands were probably encamped together, or else the event

fixed upon was of general interest; and when the name is different the

bands were scattered, or nothing of general interest occurred. Many of

the recent events are fresh in the memory of the people, as the warriors

who strive to make their exploits a part of the tribal traditions

proclaim them on all occasions of ceremony, count their coups, as the

performance is called. Declarations of this kind partake of the nature

of affirmations made in the invoked presence of a supposed divinity. War

shirts, on which scores of the enemies killed are kept, and which are

carefully transmitted from generation to generation, help to refresh

their memories in regard to some of the events.

The study of all the charts renders plain some points remaining in

doubt while the Lone-Dog chart was the only example known. It became

clear that there was no fixed or uniform mode of exhibiting the order

of continuity of the year-characters. They were arranged spirally or

lineally, or in serpentine curves, by boustrophedon or direct, starting

backward from the last year shown or proceeding uniformly forward from

the first year selected or remembered. Any mode that would accomplish

the object of continuity with the means of regular addition seemed

equally acceptable. So a theory advanced that there was some symbolism

in the right-to-left circling of Lone-Dog’s chart was abandoned,

especially when an obvious reproduction of that very chart was made by

an Indian with the spiral reversed. It was also obvious that when copies

were made, some of them probably from memory, there was no attempt at

Chinese accuracy. It was enough to give the graphic or ideographic

character, and frequently the character is better defined on one of the

charts than on the others for the corresponding year. One interpretation

would often throw light on the others. It also appeared that, while

different events were selected by the recorders of the different

systems, there was sometimes a selection of the same event for the

same year and sometimes for the next, such as would be natural in the

progress of a famine or epidemic, or as an event gradually became known

over a vast territory.

A test of the mode of selecting events for designating the Winter Counts

may be found in a suggestion made by the present writer in his account

of Lone-Dog’s chart, published in 1877, as follows:

The year 1876 has furnished good store of events for the

recorder’s choice, and it will be interesting to learn whether

he has selected as the distinguishing event the victory over

Custer, or, as of still greater interest, the general seizure of

ponies, whereat the tribes, imitating Rachel, weep and will not be

comforted, because they are not.

It now appears that two of the Counts made for 1876 and observed by the

writer several years later have selected the event of the seizure of the

ponies, and that none of them make any allusion to the defeat of Custer.

After examination of all the charts it is obvious that the design is

not narrative, that the noting of events is being subordinated to

the marking of the years by them, and that the pictographic serial

arrangements of sometimes trivial though generally notorious incidents

having been selected with special adaptation for use as a calendar.

That in a few instances small personal events, such as the birth of the

recorder or the death of members of his family, are set forth, may be

regarded as interpolations in or unauthorized additions to the charts.

If they had exhibited a complete national or tribal history for the

years embraced in them, their discovery would have been in some respects

more valuable, but they are interesting to anthropologists because they

show an attempt before unsuspected among the northern tribes of American

Indians to form a system of chronology.

While, as before mentioned, it is not now necessary to recapitulate the

large amount of matter before published concerning the Winter Counts of

the Dakota, it has been decided to present in an abbreviated form the

characters and interpretations of the Lone-Dog chart as being the system

which was first discovered, and the publication of which occasioned

the discovery of all the other charts mentioned. The Winter Count of

Battiste Good has not hitherto been published, and it possesses special

importance and interest apart from its chronology, for which reason it

is inserted in the present paper, see infra.

The several charts of The-Flame, The-Swan, American-Horse, and

Cloud-Shield, published in the Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of

Ethnology, are omitted, but selections from all of them are presented

under the headings of Ideography, Tribal and Personal Designations,

Religion, Customs, History, Biography, Conventionalizing, Comparison,

and in short are interspersed through the present paper where they

appropriately belong.

The reader of the Lone-Dog and Battiste Good charts may find it

convenient to note the following brief account of the tribal names

frequently mentioned:

The great linguistic stock or family which embraces not only the Sioux

or Dakota proper, but the Missouri, Omaha, Ponka, Osage, Kansa, Oto,

Assinaboin, Gros Ventre or Minnitari, Crow, Iowa, Mandan, and some

others, has been frequently styled the Dakota family. Maj. J. W. Powell,

the Director of the Bureau of Ethnology, from consideration of priority,

has lately adopted the name Siouan for the family, and for the grand

division of it popularly called Sioux has used the term Dakota, which

the people claim for themselves.

The word “Dakota” is translated in Riggs’s dictionary of that language

as “leagued” or “allied.” The title Sioux, which is indignantly

repudiated by the people, is either the last syllable or the last two

syllables, according to pronunciation, of “Nadowesioux,” which is the

French plural of the Algonkin name for the Dakotas “Nadowessi,” “hated

foe.” The Ojibwa called the Dakota “Nadowessi,” which is their word

meaning rattlesnake, or, as others translate, adder, with a contemptuous

or diminutive termination; the plural is Nadowessiwak or Nadawessyak.

The French gave the name their own form of the plural and the voyagers

and trappers cut it down to “Sioux.”

The more important of the tribes and organized bands into which the

Dakotas are now divided, being the dislocated remains of the “Seven

Great Council Fires,” are as follows:

Yankton and Yanktonai or Ihankto^nwạ^n, both derived from a root meaning

“at the end,” alluding to the former locality of their villages.

Sihasapa, or Blackfeet.

Oheno^npa, or Two-Kettles.

Itaziptco, Without Bow. The French equivalent Sans Arc is more commonly

used.

Minneconjou, translated “Those who plant by the water,” the physical

features of their old home.

Sitca^ngu, Burnt Hip or Brulé.

Santee, subdivided into Wahpeton, Men among Leaves, i. e., among

forests, and Sisseton, Men of Prairie Marsh. Two other bands, now

practically extinct, formerly belonged to the Santee, or as it is more

correctly spelled, Isanti tribes, from the root “Issan,” knife. Their

former territory furnished the material for stone knives, from the

manufacture of which they were called the “knife people.”

Uncpapa, once the most warlike and probably the most powerful of all the

bands, though not the largest.

Oglala. The meaning and derivation of this name and of Uncpapa have been

the subjects of controversy.

Hale, Gallatin, and Riggs designate a “Titon tribe” as located west

of the Missouri, and as much the largest division of the Dakotas,

the latter authority subdividing into the Sicha^ngu, Itazipcho,

Sihasapa, Minneconjou, Ohenonpa, Oglala, and Huncpapa, seven of the

tribes specified above, which he calls bands. “Titon,” (from the word

_ti^ntan_, meaning “at or on land without trees or prairie,”) was the

name of a tribal division, but it has become only an expression for

all those tribes whose ranges are on the prairie, and thus it is a

territorial and accidental, not a tribular distinction. One of the

Dakotas at Fort Rice spoke to the present writer of the “hostiles”

as “Titons,” with obviously the same idea of locality, “away on the

prairie,” it being well known that they were a conglomeration from

several tribes.

LONE-DOG’S WINTER COUNT.

[Illustration: FIG. 183.]

Fig. 183, 1800-’01.--Thirty Dakotas were killed by Crow Indians. The

device consists of thirty parallel black lines in three columns, the

outer lines being united. In this chart, such black lines always signify

the death of Dakotas killed by their enemies.

The Absaroka or Crow tribe, although belonging to the Siouan family, has

nearly always been at war with the Dakotas proper since the whites have

had any knowledge of either. They are noted for the extraordinary length

of their hair, which frequently distinguishes them in pictographs.

[Illustration: FIG. 184.]

Fig. 184, 1801-’02.--Many died of smallpox. The smallpox broke out in

the tribe. The device is the head and body of a man covered with red

blotches. In this, as in all other cases where colors in this chart are

mentioned, they will be found to correspond with Pl. XX, but not in that

respect with the text figures, which have no coloration.

[Illustration: FIG. 185.]

Fig. 185, 1802-’03.--A Dakota stole horses with shoes on, i. e., stole

them either directly from the whites or from some other Indians who

had before obtained them from whites, as the Indians never shoe their

horses. The device is a horseshoe.

[Illustration: FIG. 186.]

Fig. 186, 1803-’04.--They stole some “curly horses” from the Crows. Some

of these horses are still on the plains, the hair growing in closely

curling tufts. The device is a horse with black marks for the tufts. The

Crows are known to have been early in the possession of horses.

[Illustration: FIG. 187.]

Fig. 187, 1804-’05.--The Dakota had a calumet dance and then went

to war. The device is a long pipestem, ornamented with feathers and

streamers. The feathers are white, with black tips, evidently the tail

feathers of the adult golden eagle (Aquila chrysaëtos), highly prized

by the Plains Indians. The streamers anciently were colored strips of

skin or flexible bark; now gayly colored strips of cloth are used. The

word calumet is a corruption of the French chalumeau. Capt. Carver (_c_)

in his Three Years Travels Through the Interior Parts of North America,

after puzzling over the etymology of “calumet,” describes the pipe as

“about 4 feet long, bowl of red marble, stem of a light wood curiously

painted with hieroglyphics in various colors and adorned with feathers.

Every nation has a different method of decorating these pipes and can

tell at once to what band it belongs. It is used as an introduction

to all treaties, also as a flag of truce is among Europeans.” Among

the Indian tribes generally the pipe, when presented or offered to a

stranger or enemy, was the symbol of peace, yet when used ceremonially

by members of the same tribe among themselves was virtually a token of

impending war. For further remarks on this point see the year 1842-’43

of this Winter Count.

[Illustration: FIG. 188.]

Fig. 188, 1805-’06.--The Crows killed eight Dakotas. Again the short

parallel black lines, this time eight in number, united by a long

stroke. The interpreter, Fielder, says that this character with black

strokes is only used for grave marks.

[Illustration: FIG. 189.]

Fig. 189, 1806-’07.--A Dakota killed an Arikara (Ree) as he was about to

shoot an eagle. The sign gives the head and shoulders of a man with a

red spot of blood on his neck, an arm being extended, with a line drawn

to a golden eagle.

The drawing represents an Indian in the act of catching an eagle by the

legs, as the Arikara were accustomed to catch eagles in their earth

traps. These were holes to which the eagles were attracted by baits

and in which the Indians were concealed. They rarely or never shot war

eagles. The Arikara was shot in his trap just as he put his hand up to

grasp the bird.

[Illustration: FIG. 190.]

Fig. 190, 1807-’08.--Red-Coat, a chief, was killed. The figure shows the

red coat pierced by two arrows, with blood dropping from the wounds.

[Illustration: FIG. 191.]

Fig. 191, 1808-’09.--The Dakota who had killed the Ree shown in this

record for 1806-’07 was himself killed by the Rees. He is represented

running, and shot with two arrows, blood dripping. These two figures,

taking in connection, afford a good illustration of the method pursued

in the chart, which was not intended to be a continuous history, or even

to record the most important event of each year, but to exhibit some one

of special peculiarity. There was some incident about the one Ree who

was shot when, in fancied security, he was bringing down an eagle, and

whose death was avenged by his brethren the second year afterward. It

would, indeed, have been impossible to have graphically distinguished

the many battles, treaties, horse-stealings, big hunts, etc., so most of

them were omitted and other events of greater individuality and better

adapted for portrayal were taken for the year count, the criterion being

not that they were of historic moment, but that they were of general

notoriety, or perhaps of special interest to the recorders.

[Illustration: FIG. 192.]

Fig. 192, 1809-’10.--A chief, Little-Beaver, set fire to a trading

store, and was killed. The character simply designates his name-totem.

The other interpretations say that he was a white trapper, but probably

he had gained a new name among the Indians.

[Illustration: FIG. 193.]

Fig. 193, 1810-’11.--Black-Stone made medicine. The expression medicine

is too common to be successfully eliminated, though it is altogether

misleading. The “medicine men” have no connection with therapeutics,

feel no pulses, and administer no drugs, or, if sometimes they direct

the internal or external use of some secret preparation, it is as a

part of superstitious ceremonies, and with main reliance upon those

ceremonies. Their incantations are not only to drive away disease,

but for many other purposes, such as to obtain success in war, avert

calamity, and were very frequently used to bring within reach the

buffalo, on which the Dakotas depended for food. The rites are those

known as shamanism, noticeable in the ethnic periods of savagery and

barbarism. In the ceremonial of “making medicine,” a buffalo head, and

especially the head of an albino buffalo, held a prominent place among

the plains tribes. Many references to this are to be found in the Prince

of Wied’s Travels in the Interior of North America. Also see infra,

Chap. XIV. The device in the chart is the man figure, with the head of

an albino buffalo held over his own.

[Illustration: FIG. 194.]

Fig. 194, 1811-’12.--The Dakota fought a battle with the Gros Ventres

and killed a great many. Device, a circle inclosing three round objects

with flat bases, resembling heads severed from trunks, which are too

minute in this device for decision of objects represented; but they

appear more distinct in the record for 1864-’65 as the heads of enemies

slain in battle. In the sign language of the plains, the Dakota are

denoted by drawing a hand across the throat, signifying that they

cut the throats of their enemies. The Dakota count by the fingers,

as is common to most peoples, but with a peculiarity of their own.

When they have gone over the fingers and thumbs of both hands, one

finger is temporarily turned down for _one ten_. At the end of the

next ten another finger is turned, and so on to a hundred. _Opawinge_

(_Opawi^nxe_), one hundred, is derived from pawinga (pawi^nxa), to go

round in circles, to make gyrations, and contains the idea that the

round of all the fingers has again been made for their respective tens.

So the circle is never used for less than one hundred, but sometimes

signifies an indefinite number greater than a hundred. The circle, in

this instance, therefore, was at first believed to express the killing

in battle of many enemies. But the other interpretations removed all

symbolic character, leaving the circle simply as the rude drawing of a

dirt lodge to which the Gros Ventres were driven. The present writer, by

no means devoted to symbolism, had supposed a legitimate symbol to be

indicated, which supposition further information on the subject showed

to be incorrect.

[Illustration: FIG. 195.]

Fig. 195, 1812-’13.--Wild horses were first run and caught by the

Dakotas. The device is a lasso. The date is of value, as showing when

the herds of prairie horses, descended from those animals introduced

by the Spaniards in Mexico, or those deposited by them on the shores

of Texas and at other points, had multiplied so as to extend into the

far northern regions. The Dakotas undoubtedly learned the use of the

horse and perhaps also that of the lasso from southern tribes, with whom

they were in contact; and it is noteworthy that notwithstanding the

tenacity with which they generally adhere to ancient customs, in only

two generations since they became familiar with the horse they had been

so revolutionized in their habits as to be utterly helpless, both in war

and the chase, when deprived of that animal.

[Illustration: FIG. 196.]

Fig. 196, 1813-’14.--The whooping-cough was very prevalent and fatal. The

sign is suggestive of a blast of air coughed out by the man-figure.

[Illustration: FIG. 197.]

[Illustration: FIG. 198.]

The interruption in the cough peculiar to the disease is more clearly

delineated in the Winter Count of The-Flame for the same year, Fig. 197,

and still better in The-Swan’s Winter Count, Fig. 198.

[Illustration: FIG. 199.]

Fig. 199, 1814-’15.--A Dakota killed an Arapaho in his lodge. The device

represents a tomahawk or battle-ax, the red being blood from the cleft

skull.

[Illustration: FIG. 200.]

Fig. 200, 1815-’16.--The Sans Arcs made the first attempt at a dirt

lodge. This was at Peoria Bottom, Dakota. Crow-Feather was their

chief, which fact, in the absence of the other charts, seemed to

explain the fairly drawn feather of that bird protruding from the

lodge top, but the figure must now be admitted to be a badly drawn

bow, in allusion to the tribe Sans Arc, without, however, any sign of

negation. As the interpreter explained the figure to be a crow feather

and as Crow-Feather actually was the chief, Lone-Dog’s chart with its

interpretation may be independently correct.

[Illustration: FIG. 201.]

Fig. 201, 1816-’17.--“Buffalo belly was plenty.” The device rudely

portrays a side of buffalo.

[Illustration: FIG. 202.]

Fig. 202, 1817-’18.--La Framboise, a Canadian, built a trading store

with dry timber. The dryness is shown by the dead tree. La Framboise

was an old trader among the Dakota, who once established himself in the

Minnesota valley. His name is mentioned by various travelers.

[Illustration: FIG. 203.]

Fig. 203, 1818-’19.--The measles broke out and many died. The device in

the copy is the same as that for 1801-’02, relating to the smallpox,

except a very slight difference in the red blotches; and, though

Lone-Dog’s artistic skill might not have been sufficient to distinctly

vary the appearance of the two patients, both diseases being eruptive,

still it is one of the few serious defects in the chart that the sign

for the two years is so nearly identical that, separated from the

continuous record, there would be confusion between them. Treating the

document as a mere aide-de-mémoire no inconvenience would arise, it

probably being well known that the smallpox epidemic preceded that of

the measles; but care is generally taken to make some, however minute,

distinction between the characters. It is also to be noticed that the

Indian diagnosis makes little distinction between smallpox and measles,

so that no important pictographic variation could be expected. The head

of this figure is clearly distinguished from that in 1801-’02.

[Illustration: FIG. 204.]

Fig. 204, 1819-’20.--Another trading store was built, this time by Louis

La Conte, at Fort Pierre, Dakota. His timber, as one of the Indians

consulted especially mentioned, was rotten.

[Illustration: FIG. 205.]

Fig. 205, 1820-’21.--The trader, La Conte, gave Two-Arrow a war dress

for his bravery. So translated an interpreter, and the sign shows

the two arrows as the warrior’s name-totem; likewise the gable of a

house, which brings in the trader; also a long strip of black tipped

with red streaming from the roof, which possibly may be the piece of

parti-colored material out of which the dress was fashioned. This

strip is not intended for sparks and smoke, which at first sight was

suggested, as in that case the red would have been nearest the roof

instead of farthest from it.

[Illustration: FIG. 206.]

Fig. 206, 1821-’22.--The character represents the falling to earth of a

very brilliant meteor.

[Illustration: FIG. 207.]

Fig. 207, 1822-’23.--Another trading house was built, which was by

a white man called Big-Leggings, and was at the mouth of the Little

Missouri or Bad river. The drawing is distinguishable from that for

1819-’20.

[Illustration: FIG. 208.]

Fig. 208, 1823-’24.--White soldiers made their first appearance in

the region. So said the interpreter, Clement, but from the unanimous

interpretation of others the event portrayed is the attack of the United

States forces accompanied by Dakotas upon the Arikara villages, the

historic account of which is given in some detail in Chap. XVI, infra.

The device represents an Arickara palisaded village and attacking

soldiers. Not only the remarkable character and triumphant result of

this expedition, but the connection that the Dakotas themselves had with

it, made it a natural subject for the year’s totem.

All the winter counts refer to this expedition.

[Illustration: FIG. 209.]

Fig. 209, 1824-’25.--Swan, chief of the Two-Kettle tribe, had all of his

horses killed. Device, a horse pierced by a lance, blood flowing from

the wound.

[Illustration: FIG. 210.]

Fig. 210, 1825-’26.--There was a remarkable flood in the Missouri river

and a number of Indians were drowned. With some exercise of fancy the

symbol may suggest heads appearing above a line of water, and this is

more distinct in some of the other charts.

[Illustration: FIG. 211.]

Fig. 211, 1826-’27.--“An Indian died of the dropsy.” So Basil Clement

said. It was at first suggested that this circumstance was noted because

the disease was so unusual in 1826 as to excite remark. Baron de La

Hontan (_c_), a good authority concerning the Northwestern Indians

before they had been greatly affected by intercourse with whites,

specially mentions dropsy as one of the diseases unknown to them.

Carver, op. cit., also states that this malady was extremely rare. The

interpretations of other charts explained, however, that some Dakotas

on the warpath had nearly perished with hunger when they found and ate

the rotting carcass of an old buffalo on which the wolves had been

feeding. They were seized soon after with pains in the stomach, their

abdomens swelled, and gas poured from the mouth. This disease is termed

tympanites, the external appearance occasioned by it much resembling

that of dropsy.

[Illustration: FIG. 212.]

Fig. 212, 1827-’28.--Dead-Arm was stabbed with a knife or dirk by a

Mandan. The illustration is quite graphic, showing the long-handled dirk

in the bloody wound and withered arm.

[Illustration: FIG. 213.]

Fig. 213, 1828-’29.--A white man named Shadran, who lately, as reported

in 1877, was still living in the same neighborhood, built a dirt lodge.

The hatted head appears under the roof. This name should probably

be spelled Chadron, with whom Catlin hunted in 1832, in the region

mentioned.

[Illustration: FIG. 214.]

Fig. 214, 1829-’30.--A Yanktonai Dakota was killed by Bad-Arrow Indians.

The Bad-Arrow Indians is a translation of the Dakota name for a certain

band of Blackfeet Indians.

[Illustration: FIG. 215.]

Fig. 215, 1830-’31.--Bloody battle with the Crows, of whom it is said

twenty-three were killed. Nothing in the sign denotes number, it being

only a man figure with red or bloody body and red war bonnet.

[Illustration: FIG. 216.]

Fig. 216, 1831-’32.--Le Beau, a white man, killed another named Kermel.

Le Beau was still alive at Little Bend, 30 miles above Fort Sully, in

1877.

[Illustration: FIG. 217.]

Fig. 217, 1832-’33.--Lone-Horn had his leg “killed,” as the

interpretation gave it. The single horn is on the figure, and a leg is

drawn up as if fractured or distorted, though not unlike the leg in the

character for 1808-’09, where running is depicted.

[Illustration: FIG. 218.]

Fig. 218, 1833-’34.--“The stars fell,” as the Indians all agreed. This

was the great meteoric shower observed all over the United States on the

night of November 12 of that year. In this chart the moon is black and

the stars are red.

[Illustration: FIG. 219.]

Fig. 219, 1834-’35.--The chief Medicine-Hide was killed. The device

shows the body as bloody, but not the war bonnet, by which it is

distinguished from the character for 1830-’31.

[Illustration: FIG. 220.]

Fig. 220, 1835-’36.--Lame-Deer shot a Crow Indian with an arrow; drew

it out and shot him again with the same arrow. The hand is drawing the

arrow from the first wound. This is another instance of the principle

on which events were selected. Many fights occurred of greater moment,

but with no incident precisely like this. Lame-Deer was a distinguished

chief among the hostiles in 1876. His camp of five hundred and ten

lodges was surprised and destroyed by Gen. Miles, and four hundred and

fifty horses, mules, and ponies were captured.

[Illustration: FIG. 221.]

Fig. 221, 1836-’37.--Band’s-Father, chief of the Two Kettles, died.

The device is nearly the same as that for 1816-’17, denoting plenty of

buffalo belly.

Interpreter Fielder throws light on the subject by saying that this

character was used to designate the year when The-Breast, father of

The-Band, a Minneconjou, died. The-Band himself died in 1875, on Powder

river. His name was O-ye-a-pee. The character was, therefore, the

Buffalo-Breast, a personal name.

[Illustration: FIG. 222.]

Fig. 222, 1837-’38.--Commemorates a remarkably successful hunt, in which

it is said 100 elk were killed. The drawing of the elk is good enough to

distinguish it from the other quadrupeds in this chart.

[Illustration: FIG. 223.]

Fig. 223, 1838-’39.--A dirt lodge was built for Iron-Horn. The other

dirt lodge (1815-’16) has a mark of ownership, which this has not. A

chief of the Minneconjous is mentioned in Gen. Harney’s report in 1856

under the name of The-One-Iron-Horn.

The word translated “iron” in this case and appearing thus several times

in the charts does not always mean the metal of that name. According

to Rev. J. Owen Dorsey it has a mystic significance, in some manner

connected with water and with water spirits. In pictographs objects

called iron are painted blue when that color can be obtained.

[Illustration: FIG. 224.]

Fig. 224, 1839-’40.--The Dakotas killed an entire village of Snake or

Shoshoni Indians. The character is the ordinary tipi pierced by arrows.

[Illustration: FIG. 225.]

Fig. 225, 1840-’41.--The Dakotas made peace with the Cheyennes. The

symbol of peace is the common one of the approaching hands of two

persons. The different coloration of the two hands and arms shows that

they belonged to two different persons, and in fact to different tribes.

The mere unceremonial hand grasp or “shake” of friendship was not used

by the Indians before it was introduced by Europeans.

[Illustration: FIG. 226.]

Fig. 226, 1841-’42.--Feather-in-the-Ear stole 30 spotted ponies. The

spots are shown red, distinguishing them from those of the curly horse

in the character for 1803-’04.

A successful theft of horses, demanding skill, patience, and daring, is

generally considered by the Plains Indians to be of equal merit with the

taking of scalps. Indeed, the successful horse thief is more popular

than a mere warrior, on account of the riches gained by the tribe,

wealth until lately being generally estimated in ponies as the unit of

value.

[Illustration: FIG. 227.]

Fig. 227, 1842-’43.--One-Feather raised a large war party against the

Crows. This chief is designated by his long solitary red eagle feather,

and holds a pipe with black stem and red bowl, alluding to the usual

ceremonies before starting on the warpath. For further information on

this subject see Chap. XV. The Red-War-Eagle-Feather was at this time a

chief of the Sans Arcs.

[Illustration: FIG. 228.]

Fig. 228, 1843-’44.--The Sans Arcs made medicine to bring the buffalo.

The medicine tent is denoted by a buffalo’s head drawn on it, which in

this instance is not the head of an albino buffalo.

[Illustration: FIG. 229.]

Fig. 229, 1844-’45.--The Minneconjous built a pine fort. Device, a pine

tree connected with a tipi. Another account explains that they went to

the woods and erected their tipis there as affording some protection

from the unusually deep snow. This would account for the pine tree.

[Illustration: FIG. 230.]

Fig. 230, 1845-’46.--Plenty of buffalo meat, which is represented

as hung upon poles and trees to dry. This device has become the

conventional sign for plenty and frequently appears in the several

charts.

[Illustration: FIG. 231.]

Fig. 231, 1846-’47.--Broken-Leg died. Rev. Dr. Williamson says he knew

him. He was a Brulé. There is enough difference between this device and

those for 1808-’09 and 1832-’33 to distinguish each.

[Illustration: FIG. 232.]

Fig. 232, 1847-’48.--Two-Man was killed. His totem is drawn, two small

man figures side by side. Another interpretation explains the figure as

indicating twins.

[Illustration: FIG. 233.]

Fig. 233, 1848-’49.--Humpback was killed. An ornamented lance pierces

the distorted back. Other records name him Broken-Back. He was a

distinguished chief of the Minneconjous.

[Illustration: FIG. 234.]

Fig. 234, 1849-’50.--The Crows stole a large drove of horses (it is said

eight hundred) from the Brulés. The circle is a design for a camp or

corral from which a number of horse-tracks are departing.

[Illustration: FIG. 235.]

Fig. 235, 1850-’51.--The character is a distinct drawing of a buffalo

containing a human figure. Clément translated that “a buffalo cow was

killed in that year and an old woman found in her belly;” also that

all the Indians believed this. Good-Wood, examined through another

interpreter, could or would give no explanation except that it was

“about their religion.” The Dakotas have long believed in the appearance

from time to time of a monstrous animal that swallows human beings. This

superstition was perhaps suggested by the bones of mastodons, often

found in the territory of those Indians; and, the buffalo being the

largest living animal known to them, its name was given to the legendary

monster, in which nomenclature they were not wholly wrong, as the horns

of the fossil _Bison latifrons_ are 10 feet in length. Major Bush

suggests that perhaps some old squaw left to die sought the carcass of a

buffalo for shelter and then died. He has known this to occur.

[Illustration: FIG. 236.]

Fig. 236, 1851-’52.--Peace with the Crows. Two Indians, with differing

arrangement of hair, showing two tribes, are exchanging pipes for a

peace smoke.

[Illustration: FIG. 237.]

Fig. 237, 1852-’53.--The Nez Percés came to Lone-Horn’s lodge at

midnight. The device shows an Indian touching with a pipe a tipi, the

top of which is black or opaque, signifying night.

Touch-the-Clouds, a Minneconjou, son of Lone-Horn, when this chart was

shown to him by the present writer, designated this character as being

particularly known to him from the fact of its being his father’s lodge.

He remembered all about it from talk in his family, and said it was the

Nez Percés who came.

[Illustration: FIG. 238.]

Fig. 238, 1853-’54.--Spanish blankets were first brought to the country.

A fair drawing of one of those striped blankets is held out by a white

trader.

[Illustration: FIG. 239.]

Fig. 239, 1854-’55.--Brave-Bear was killed. His extended arms are

ornamented with pendent stripes.

[Illustration: FIG. 240.]

Fig. 240, 1855-’56--Gen. Harney, called by the Dakota Putinska (“white

beard” or “white mustache”), made peace with a number of the tribes or

bands of the Dakotas. The figure shows an officer in uniform shaking

hands with an Indian.

Executive document No. 94, Thirty-fourth Congress, first session,

Senate, contains the “minutes of a council held at Fort Pierre,

Nebraska, on the 1st day of March, 1856, by Brevet Brig. Gen. William

S. Harney, U. S. Army, commanding the Sioux expedition, with the

delegations from nine of the bands of the Sioux, viz, the Two Kettle

band, Lower Yankton, Uncpapas, Blackfeet Sioux, Minneconjous, Sans Arcs,

Yanctonnais (two bands), Brulés of the Platte.”

[Illustration: FIG. 241.]

Fig. 241, 1856-’57.--Four-Horn was made a calumet or medicine man.

A man with four horns holds out the same kind of ornamented pipestem

shown in the character for 1804-’05, it being his badge of office.

Four-Horn was one of the subchiefs of the Uncpapas, and was introduced

to Gen. Harney at the council of 1856 by Bear-Rib, head chief of that

tribe.

Interpreter Clément, in the spring of 1874, said that Four-Horn and

Sitting-Bull were the same person, the name Sitting-Bull being given him

after he was made a calumet man. No other authority tells this.

[Illustration: FIG. 242.]

Fig. 242, 1857-’58.--The Dakotas killed a Crow squaw. She is pierced by

four arrows, and the peace made with the Crows in 1851-’52 seems to have

been short lived.

[Illustration: FIG. 243.]

Fig. 243, 1858-’59.--Lone-Horn, whose solitary horn appears, made

buffalo “medicine,” doubtless on account of the scarcity of that

animal. Again the head of an albino bison. One-Horn, probably the same

individual, is recorded as the head chief of the Minneconjous at this

date.

[Illustration: FIG. 244.]

Fig. 244, 1859-’60.--Big-Crow, a Dakota chief, was killed by the Crows.

He had received his name from killing a Crow Indian of unusual size.

[Illustration: FIG. 245.]

Fig. 245, 1860-’61.--Device, the head and neck of an elk, similar to

that part of the animal for 1837-’38, with a line extending from its

mouth, at the extremity of which is the albino buffalo head. “The elk

made you understand the voice while he was walking.” The interpreter

persisted in this oracular rendering. This device and its interpretation

were unintelligible to the writer until examination of Gen. Harney’s

report, above referred to, showed the name of a prominent chief of the

Minneconjous set forth as “The Elk that Holloes Walking.” It then became

probable that the device simply meant that the aforesaid chief made

buffalo medicine, which conjecture, published in 1877, was verified by

the other records subsequently discovered.

Interpreter A. Lavary said, in 1867, that The-Elk-that-Holloes-Walking,

then chief of the Minneconjous, was then at Spotted-Tail’s camp. His

father was Red-Fish. He was the elder brother of Lone-Horn. His name

is given as A-hag-a-hoo-man-ie, translated The Elk’s Voice Walking;

compounded of he-ha-ka, elk, and omani, walk; this according to Lavary’s

literation. The correct literation of the Dakota word meaning elk is

heqaka; voice, ho; and to walk, walking, mani. Their compound would be

heqaka-ho-mani, the translation being the same as above given.

[Illustration: FIG. 246.]

Fig. 246, 1861-’62.--Buffalo were so plentiful that their tracks came

close to the tipis. The cloven-hoof mark is cleverly distinguished from

the tracks of horses in the character for 1849-’50.

[Illustration: FIG. 247.]

Fig. 247, 1862-’63.--Red-Feather, a Minneconjou, was killed. His feather

is shown entirely red, while the “one-feather” in 1842-’43 has a black

tip.

It is to be noted that there is no allusion to the great Minnesota

massacre, which commenced in August, 1862, and in which many of the

Dakotas belonging to the tribes familiar with these charts were engaged.

Little-Crow was the leader. He escaped to the British possessions, but

was killed in July, 1863. Perhaps the reason of the omission of any

character to designate the massacre was the terrible retribution that

followed it.

[Illustration: FIG. 248.]

Fig. 248, 1863-’64.--Eight Dakotas were killed. Again the short,

parallel black lines united by a long stroke. In this year Sitting-Bull

fought General Sully in the Black Hills.

[Illustration: FIG. 249.]

Fig. 249, 1864-’65.--The Dakotas killed four Crows. Four of the same

rounded objects, like severed heads, shown in 1825-’26, but these are

bloody, thus distinguishing them from the cases of drowning.

[Illustration: FIG. 250.]

Fig. 250, 1865-’66.--Many horses died for want of grass. The horse here

drawn is sufficiently distinct from all others in the chart.

[Illustration: FIG. 251.]

Fig. 251, 1866-’67.--Swan, father of Swan, chief of the Minneconjous in

1877, died. With the assistance of the name the object intended for his

totem may be recognized as a swan swimming on the water.

[Illustration: FIG. 252.]

Fig. 252, 1867-’68.--Many flags were given them by the Peace Commission.

The flag refers to the visit of the Peace Commissioners, among whom

were Generals Sherman, Terry, and other prominent military and civil

officers. Their report appears in the Annual Report of the Commissioner

of Indian Affairs for 1868. They met at Fort Leavenworth, August 13,

1867, and between August 30 and September 13 held councils with the

various bands of the Dakota Indians at Forts Sully and Thompson, and

also at the Yankton, Ponka, and Santee reservations. These resulted in

the Dakota treaty of 1868.

[Illustration: FIG. 253.]

Fig. 253, 1868-’69.--Texas cattle were brought into the country. This

was done by Mr. William A. Paxton, a well-known business man, resident

in Dakota in 1877.

[Illustration: FIG. 254.]

Fig. 254, 1869-’70.--An eclipse of the sun. This was the solar eclipse

of August 7, 1869, which was central and total on a line drawn through

the Dakota country. This device has been criticised because Indians

generally believe an eclipse to be occasioned by a dragon or aerial

monster swallowing the sun, and it is contended that they would so

represent it. An answer is that the design is objectively good, the sun

being painted black, as concealed, while the stars come out red, i. e.,

bright, and graphic illustration prevails throughout the charts where it

is possible to employ it.

Dr. Washington Matthews, surgeon, U. S. Army, communicated the fact

that the Dakotas had opportunities all over their country of receiving

information about the real character of the eclipse. He was at Fort

Rice during the eclipse and remembers that long before it occurred

the officers, men, and citizens around the post told the Indians of

the coming event and discussed it with them so much that they were on

the tip-toe of expectancy when the day came. Two-Bears and his band

were then encamped at Fort Rice, and he and several of his leading men

watched the eclipse along with the whites and through their smoked

glass, and then and there the phenomenon was thoroughly explained to

them over and over again. There is no doubt that similar explanations

were made at all the numerous posts and agencies along the river that

day. The path of the eclipse coincided nearly with the course of the

Missouri for over a thousand miles. The duration of totality at Fort

Rice was nearly two minutes (1′ 48″).

[Illustration: FIG. 255.]

Fig. 255, 1870-’71.--The Uncpapas had a battle with the Crows, the

former losing, it is said, 14, and killing 29 out of 30 of the latter,

though nothing appears to show those numbers. The central object is not

a circle denoting multitude, but an irregularly rounded object, perhaps

intended for one of the wooden inclosures or forts frequently erected

by the Indians, and especially the Crows. The Crow fort is shown as

nearly surrounded, and bullets, not arrows or lances, are flying. This

is the first instance in this chart in which any combat or killing is

portrayed where guns explicitly appear to be used by Indians, though

nothing in the chart is at variance with the fact that the Dakotas had

for a number of years been familiar with firearms. The most recent

indications of any weapon were those of the arrows piercing the Crow

squaw in 1857-’58, and Brave-Bear in 1854-’55, while the last one before

those was the lance used in 1848-’49, and those arms might well have

been employed in all the cases selected, although rifles and muskets

were common. There is an obvious practical difficulty in picturing, by

a single character, killing with a bullet, not arising as to arrows,

lances, dirks, and hatchets, all of which can be and are shown in the

chart projecting from the wounds made by them. Other pictographs show

battles in which bullets are denoted by continuous dotted lines, the

spots at which they take effect being sometimes indicated, and the

fact that they did hit the object aimed at is expressed by a specially

invented symbol. It is, however, to be noted that the bloody wound on

the Ree’s shoulder (1806-’07) is without any protruding weapon, as if

made by a bullet.

More distinct information regarding this fight, the record of which

concludes the original Lone-Dog chart, has been kindly communicated by

Mr. Luther S. Kelly, of Garfield County, Colorado.

The war party of Uncpapas mentioned charged upon a small trading post

for the Crows on the Upper Missouri river, at the mouth of Musselshell

river. Usually this post was garrisoned by a few frontiersmen, but

on that particular day there happened to be a considerable force of

freighters and hunters. The Indians were afoot and, being concealed by

the sage brush, got within shooting distance of the fort before being

discovered. They were easily driven off, and going a short distance

took shelter from the rain in a circular washout, not having any idea

of being followed by the whites. Meanwhile the whites organized and

followed. The surprise was complete, the leading white man only being

killed. The Indians sang their song and made several breaks to escape,

but were shot down as fast as they rose above the bank. Twenty-nine were

killed.

BATTISTE GOOD’S WINTER COUNT.

Dr. William H. Corbusier, surgeon, U. S. Army, while stationed in 1879

and 1880 at Camp Sheridan, Nebraska, near the Pine Ridge Indian Agency,

Dakota, obtained a copy of this Winter Count from its recorder Baptiste,

commonly called Battiste Good, a Brulé Dakota, whose Dakotan name is

given as Wa-po-cta^n-xi, translated Brown-Hat. He was then living at the

Rose Bud Agency, Dakota, and explained the meaning of the pictographs to

the Rev. Wm. J. Cleveland, of the last named agency, who translated them

into English.

The copy made by Battiste Good from his original record, of which it

is said to be a facsimile, is painted in five colors besides black,

in which the outlines are generally drawn, but with the exception of

red blood-marks these colors do not often appear to be significant.

This copy, which was kindly contributed by Dr. Corbusier, is made in

an ordinary paper drawing-book, the last page of which contains the

first record. This is represented in Fig. 256, and pictures what is

supposed to be an introduction in the nature of a revelation. The next

page, reading backwards and corresponding with Pl. XXI, is a pretended

record of a cycle comprising the years (presumed to be in the Christian

chronology) from 901 to 930. Eleven similar pages and cycles bring the

record down to 1700. These pages are only interesting from the mythology

and tradition referred to and suggested by them, and which must be

garnered from the chaff of uncomprehended missionary teaching. From

1700 to 1880, when the record closes, each year, or rather winter, is

represented by a special character according to the Dakota system above

explained.

Battiste Good, by his own statement in the present record, was born in

the year 1821-’22. Any careful examination of the figures as worked

over by his own hand shows that he has received about enough education

in English and in writing to induce him to make unnecessary additions

and presumptuous emendations on the pictographs as he found them and

as perhaps he originally kept and drew the more recent of them. He

has written English words and Arabic numerals over and connected with

the Dakota devices, and has left some figures in a state of mixture

including the methods of modern civilization and the aboriginal

system. To prevent the confusion to the reader which might result from

Battiste’s meddlesome vanity, these interpolated marks are in general

omitted from the plates and figures as now presented, but, as specimens

of the kind and amount of interference referred to, the designs on the

copy for the years 1700-’01, 1701-’02, and 1707-’08 are given below as

furnished.

The facts stated to have occurred so long ago as the beginning of

the last century can not often be verified, but those of later date

given by Battiste are corroborated by other records in the strongest

manner--that is, by independent devices which are not mere copies.

Therefore, notwithstanding Battiste’s mythic cycles and English writing,

the body of his record, which constitutes the true Winter Counts, must

be regarded as genuine. He is simply the bad editor of a good work. But

whether or not the events occurred as represented, the pictography is

of unique interest. It may be remarked that Battiste’s record is better

known among the Oglala and Brulé, and Lone-Dog’s Winter Count among the

Minneconjou.

It should be noted that when allusions are made to coloration in Fig.

256, and in any one of the other figures in the text which illustrate

this Winter Count, they must be understood as applicable to the

original. Pls. XXI, XXII, and XXIII are colored copies of those

furnished by Battiste Good, reduced, however, in size.

[Illustration: FIG. 256.--Battiste Good’s Revelation.]

Fig. 256 illustrates Battiste Good’s introduction. He is supposed to be

narrating his own experience as follows: “In the year 1856, I went to

the Black Hills and cried, and cried, and cried, and suddenly I saw a

bird above me, which said: ‘Stop crying, I am a woman, but I will tell

you something: My Great-Father, Father God, who made this place, gave

it to me for a home and told me to watch over it. He put a blue sky

over my head and gave me a blue flag to have with this beautiful green

country. [Battiste has made the hill country, as well as the curve for

sky and the flag, blue in his copy.] My Great-Father, Father God (or The

Great-Father, God my Father) grew, and his flesh was part earth and part

stone and part metal and part wood and part water; he took from them

all and placed them here for me, and told me to watch over them. I am

the Eagle-Woman who tell you this. The whites know that there are four

black flags of God; that is, four divisions of the earth. He first made

the earth soft by wetting it, then cut it into four parts, one of which,

containing the Black Hills, he gave to the Dakotas, and, because I am a

woman, I shall not consent to the pouring of blood on this chief house

(or dwelling place), i. e., the Black Hills. The time will come that you

will remember my words; for after many years you shall grow up one with

the white people.’ She then circled round and round and gradually passed

out of my sight. I also saw prints of a man’s hands and horse’s hoofs on

the rocks [here he brings in petroglyphs], and two thousand years, and

one hundred millions of dollars ($100,000,000). I came away crying, as I

had gone. I have told this to many Dakotas, and all agree that it meant

that we were to seek and keep peace with the whites.”

(NOTE BY DR. CORBUSIER.--The Oglálas and Brulés say that they, with the

rest of the Dakota nation, formerly lived far on the other side of the

Missouri River. After they had moved to the river, they lived at first

on its eastern banks, only crossing it to hunt. Some of the hunting

parties that crossed at length wandered far off from the rest and,

remaining away, became the westernmost bands.)

[Illustration: BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY TENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XXI

BATTISTE GOOD’S CYCLES.

A 901-930. B 931-1000.]

Pl. XXI A. The record shown by this figure dates from the appearance of

The-Woman-from-Heaven, 901 A. D.; but the Dakotas were a people long

before this. The circle of lodges represents a cycle of thirty years,

from the year 901 to 930, and incloses the “legend” by which this period

is known. All the tribes of the Dakota nation were encamped together, as

was then their custom, when all at once a beautiful woman appeared to

two young men. One of them said to the other, “Let us catch her and have

her for our wife.” The other said, “No; she may be something waka^n”

(supernatural or sacred). Then the woman said to them, “I came from

Heaven to teach the Dakotas how to live and what their future shall be.”

She had what appeared to be snakes about her legs and waist, but which

were really braids of grass. She said, “I give you this pipe; keep it

always;” and with the pipe she gave them a small package, in which they

found four grains of maize, one white, one black, one yellow, and one

variegated. The pipe is above the buffalo. She said, “I am a buffalo,

The White-Buffalo-Cow. I will spill my milk all over the earth, that

the people may live.” She meant by her milk maize, which is seen in the

picture dropping from her udders. The colored patches on the four sides

of the circle are the four quarters of the heavens (the cardinal points

of the compass). In front of the cow are yellow and red. She pointed in

this direction and said, “When you see a yellowish (or brownish) cloud

toward the north, that is my breath; rejoice at the sight of it, for you

shall soon see buffalo. Red is the blood of the buffalo, and by that you

shall live.” Pointing east [it will be noticed that Battiste has placed

the east toward the top of the page], she said, “This pipe is related to

the heavens, and you shall live with it.” The line running from the

pipe to the blue patch denotes the relation. The Dakotas have always

supposed she meant by this that the blue smoke of the pipe was one

with or nearly related to the blue sky; hence, on a clear day, before

smoking, they often point the stem of the pipe upward, in remembrance of

her words. Pointing south, she said, “Clouds of many colors may come up

from the south, but look at the pipe and the blue sky and know that the

clouds will soon pass away and all will become blue and clear again.”

Pointing west, i. e., to the lowest part of the circle, she said, “When

it shall be blue in the west, know that it is closely related to you

through the pipe and the blue heavens, and by that you shall grow rich.”

Then she stood up before them and said, “I am The White-Buffalo-Cow;

my milk is of four kinds; I spill it on the earth that you may live by

it. You shall call me Grandmother. If you young men will follow me over

the hills you shall see my relatives.” She said this four times, each

time stepping back from them a few feet, and after the fourth time,

while they stood gazing at her, she mysteriously disappeared. [It is

well known that four is the favorite or magic number among Indian tribes

generally, and has reference to the four cardinal points.] The young men

went over the hills in the direction she took and there found a large

herd of buffalo.

(NOTE BY DR. CORBUSIER.--Mr. Cleveland states that he has heard several

different versions of this tradition.)

The man who first told the people of the appearance of the woman is

represented both inside and outside the circle. He was thirty years old

at the time, and said that she came as narrated above, in July of the

year of his birth. Outside of the circle, he is standing with a pipe in

his hand; inside, he is squatting, and has his hands in the position for

the gesture-sign for pipe. The elm tree and yucca, or Spanish bayonet,

both shown above the tipis, indicate that in those days the Dakota

obtained fire by rapidly revolving the end of a dry stalk of the yucca

in a hole made in a rotten root of the elm. The people used the bow and

stone-pointed arrows, which are shown on the right. From time immemorial

they have kept large numbers of sticks, shown by the side of the pipe,

each one about as thick and as long as a lead-pencil (sic), for the

purpose of counting and keeping record of numbers, and they cut notches

in larger sticks for the same purpose.

(NOTE BY DR. CORBUSIER.--They commonly resort to their fingers in

counting, and the V of the Roman system of notation is seen in the

outline of the thumb and index, when one hand is held up to express

five, and the X in the crossed thumbs, when both hands are held up

together to express ten.)

The bundle of these sticks drawn in connection with the ceremonial pipe

suggests the idea of an official recorder.

Pl. XXI B, 931-1000. From the time the man represented in Pl. XXI A

was seventy years of age, i. e., from the year 931, time is counted by

cycles of seventy years until 1700. This figure illustrates the manner

of killing buffalo before and after the appearance of The-Woman. When

the Dakotas had found the buffalo, they moved to the herd and corralled

it by spreading their camps around it. The Man-Who-Dreamed-of-a-Wolf,

seen at the upper part of the circle, with bow and arrow in hand, then

shot the chief bull of the herd with his medicine or sacred arrow; at

this, the women all cried out with joy, “He has killed the chief bull!”

On hearing them shout the man with bow and arrow on the opposite side,

The-Man-Who-Dreamed-of-the-Thunder-and-received-an-arrow-from-the-Thunder-Bird

(wakinyan, accurately translated “the flying one”) shot a buffalo cow,

and the women again shouted with joy. Then all the men began to shout,

and they killed as many as they wished. The buffalo heads and the

blood-stained tracks show what large numbers were killed. They cut off

the head of the chief bull, and laid the pipe beside it until their

work was done. They prayed to The-Woman to bless and help them as they

were following her teachings. Having no iron or knives, they used sharp

stones, and mussel shells, to skin and cut up the buffalo. They rubbed

blood in the hides to soften and tan them. They had no horses, and had

to pack everything on their own backs.

The cyclic characters that embrace the period from 1001 to 1140

illustrate nothing of interest not before presented. Slight distinction

appears in the circles so that they can be identified, but without

enough significance to merit reproduction.

[Illustration: BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY TENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XXII

BATTISTE GOOD’S CYCLES.

A 1141-1210. B 1211-1280.]

Pl. XXII A, 1141-1210. Among a herd of buffalo, surrounded at one time

during this period, were some horses. The people all cried out, “there

are big dogs with them,” having never seen horses before, hence the name

for horse, sunka (dog) tanka (big), or sunka (dog) wakan (wonderful or

mysterious). After killing all the buffalo they said “let us try and

catch the big dogs;” so they cut a thong out of a hide with a sharp

stone and with it caught eight, breaking the leg of one of them. All

these years they used sharpened deer horn for awls, bone for needles,

and made their lodges without the help of iron tools. [All other Dakota

traditions yet reported in regard to the first capture of horses, place

this important event at a much later period and long after horses

were brought to America by the Spaniards. See this count for the year

1802-’03, and also Lone-Dog’s Winter Count for the same year.]

Pl. XXII B, 1211-1280. At one time during this period a war party of

enemies concealed themselves among a herd of buffalo, which the Dakotas

surrounded and killed before they discovered the enemy. No one knows

what people, or how many they were; but the Dakotas killed them all. The

red and black lodges indicate war, and that the Dakotas were successful.

The pages of the copy which embrace the period from 1281 to 1420 are

omitted as valueless.

[Illustration: BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY TENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XXIII

BATTISTE GOOD’S CYCLES.

A 1421-1490. B 1631-1700.]

Pl. XXIII A, 1421-1490. “Found horses among the buffalo again and caught

six.” Five of the horses are represented by the hoof prints. The lasso

or possibly the lariat is shown in use. The bundle of sticks is now in

the recorder’s hands.

Battiste’s pages which embrace the period from 1491 to 1630 are omitted

for the same reason as before offered.

Pl. XXIII B, 1631-1700. This represents the first killing of buffalo on

horseback. It was done in the year 1700, inside the circle of lodges

pitched around the herd, by a man who was tied on a horse with thongs

and who received the name of Hunts-inside-the-lodges. They had but

one horse then, and they kept him a long time. Again the bundle of

count-sticks is in the recorder’s hands.

This is the end of the obviously mythic part of the record, in which

Battiste has made some historic errors. From this time forth each year

is distinguished by a name, the explanation of which is in the realm of

fact.

It must be again noted that when colors are referred to in the

description of the text figures, the language (translated) used by

Battiste is retained for the purpose of showing the coloration of the

original and his interpretation of the colors, which are to be imagined,

as they can not be reproduced by the process used.

[Illustration: FIG. 257.]

Fig. 257, 1700-’01.--“The-two-killed-on-going-back-to-the-hunting-ground

winter (or year).” Two Dakotas returned to the hunting ground, after the

hunt one day, and were killed by enemies, of what tribe is unknown. The

blood-stained arrow in the man’s side signifies killed; the numeral 2

over his head, the number killed; and, the buffalo heads, the carcass

of a buffalo--which had been left behind because it was too poor to

eat--together with the arrow pointing toward them, the hunting-ground.

The dot under the figure 2, and many of the succeeding ones, signifies,

That is it. This corresponds with some gesture signs for the same

concept of declaration, in which the index finger held straight is

thrust forward with emphasis and repeatedly as if always hitting the

same point.

With regard to the numeral 2 over the head of the man see remarks, page

288.

[Illustration: FIG. 258.]

Fig. 258, 1701-’02.--“The-three-killed-who-went-fishing winter.” The

arrow pointing toward the 3, indicates that they were attacked; the

arrow in the man’s arm, and the blood stain, that they were killed; the

pole, line, and fish which the man is holding, their occupation at the

time.

[Illustration: FIG. 259.]

Fig. 259, 1702-’03.--“Camped-cutting-the-ice-through winter.” A long

lake toward the east, near which the Dakotas were encamped, was frozen

over, when they discovered about one thousand buffalo. They secured

them all by driving them on the ice, through which they broke, and in

which they froze fast. Whenever the people wanted meat, they cut a

buffalo out of the ice. In the figure, the wave lines represent the

water of the lake; the straight lines, the shore; the blue lines outside

the black ones, trees; the blue patches inside, the ice through which

the heads of the buffalo are seen; the line across the middle, the

direction in which they drove the buffalo. The supply of meat lasted one

year. (NOTE by DR. CORBUSIER.--The Apache of Arizona, the Ojibwa, and

the Ottawa also represent water by means of waved lines.)

[Illustration: FIG. 260.]

Fig. 260, 1703-’04--“The-burying winter,” or “Many-hole winter.”--They

killed a great many buffalo during the summer, and, after drying the

meat, stored it in pits for winter’s use. It lasted them all winter, and

they found it all in good condition. The ring surrounding the buffalo

head, in front of the lodge, represents a pit. The forked stick, which

is the symbol for meat, marks the pit. [Other authorities suggest that

the object called by Battiste a pit, which is more generally called

“cache,” is a heap, and means many or much.]

[Illustration: FIG. 261.]

Fig. 261, 1704-’05.--“Killed-fifteen-Pawnees-who-came-to-fight winter.”

The Dakotas discovered a party of Pawnees coming to attack them. They

met them and killed fifteen. In this chart the Pawnee of the Upper

Missouri (Arikara or Ree), the Pawnee of Nebraska, and the Omaha are all

depicted with legs which look like ears of corn, but an ear of corn is

symbol for the Rees only. The Pawnee of Nebraska may be distinguished by

a lock of hair at the back of the head; the Omaha, by a cropped head or

absence of the scalp-lock. The absence of all signs denotes Dakota. Dr.

W. Matthews, in Ethnography and Philology of the Hidatsa Indians, states

that the Arikara separated from the Pawnee of the Platte valley more

than a century ago. [To avoid confusion the literation of the tribal

divisions as given by the translator of Battiste Good are retained,

though not considered to be accurate.]

[Illustration: FIG. 262.]

Fig. 262, 1705-’06.--“They-came-and-killed-seven-Dakotas winter.” It is

not known what enemies killed them.

[Illustration: FIG. 263.]

Fig. 263, 1706-’07.--“Killed-the-Gros-Ventre-with-snowshoes-on winter.”

A Gros-Ventre (Hidatsa), while hunting buffalo on snowshoes, was chased

by the Dakotas. He accidentally dropped a snowshoe, and, being then

unable to get through the snow fast enough, they gained on him, wounded

him in the leg, and then killed him. The Gros-Ventres and the Crows

are tribes of the same nation, and are therefore both represented with

striped or spotted hair, which denotes the red clay they apply to it.

[Illustration: FIG. 264.]

Fig. 264, 1707-’08.--“Many-kettle winter.” A man--1 man--named Corn,

killed (3) his wife, 1 woman, and ran off. He remained away for a year,

and then came back, bringing three guns with him, and told the people

that the English, who had given him these guns, which were the first

known to the Dakotas, wanted him to bring his friends to see them.

Fifteen of the people accordingly went with him, and when they returned

brought home a lot of kettles or pots. These were the first they ever

saw. Some numerical marks for reference and the written words in the

above are retained as perhaps the worst specimens of Battiste’s mixture

of civilized methods with the aboriginal system of pictography. See

remarks above, page 288.

[Illustration: FIG. 265.]

Fig. 265, 1708-’09.--“Brought-home-Omaha-horses winter.” The cropped

head over the horse denotes Omaha.

[Illustration: FIG. 266.]

Fig. 266, 1709-’10.--“Brought-home-Assiniboin-horses winter.” The Dakota

sign for Assiniboin, or Hohe, which means the voice, or, as some say,

the voice of the musk ox, is the outline of the vocal organs, as the

Dakotas conceive them, and represents the upper lip and roof of the

mouth, the tongue, the lower lip and chin, and the neck.

[Illustration: FIG. 267.]

Fig. 267, 1710-’11.--“The-war-parties-met, or killed-three-on-each-side

winter.” A war party of Assiniboins met one of Dakotas, and in the fight

which ensued three were killed on each side.

[Illustration: FIG. 268.]

Fig. 268, 1711-’12.--“Four-lodges-drowned winter.” When the thunders

returned in the summer the Dakotas were still in their winter camp, on

the bottom lands of a large creek. Heavy rains fell, which caused the

creek to rise suddenly; the bottoms were flooded, and the occupants of

four lodges were swept away and drowned. Water is represented by waved

lines, as before. The lower part of the lodge is submerged. The human

figure in the doorway of the lodge indicates how unconscious the inmates

were of their peril.

[Illustration: FIG. 269.]

Fig. 269, 1712-’13.--“Killed-the-Pawnee-who-was-eagle-hunting winter.”

A Pawnee (Ree) was crouching in his eagle-trap, a hole in the ground

covered with sticks and grass, when he was surprised and killed by the

Dakotas. This event is substantially repeated in this count for the year

1806-’07.

[Illustration: FIG. 270.]

Fig. 270, 1713-’14.--“Came-and-shot-them-in-the-lodge winter.” The

Pawnee (Rees) came by night, and, drawing aside a tipi door, shot a

sleeping man, and thus avenged the death of the eagle-hunter.

[Illustration: FIG. 271.]

Fig. 271, 1714-’15.--“Came-to-attack-on-horseback-but-killed-nothing

winter.” The horseman has a pine lance in his hand. It is not known what

tribe came. (NOTE BY DR. CORBUSIER.--It is probable that horses were not

numerous among any of the Indians yet, and that this mounted attack was

the first one experienced by the Brulé.)

[Illustration: FIG. 272.]

Fig. 272,

1715-’16.--“Came-and-attacked-on-horseback-and-stabbed-a-boy-near-the-lodge

winter.” Eagle tail-feathers hang from the butt end of the lance.

[Illustration: FIG. 273.]

Fig. 273, 1716-’17.--“Much-pemmican winter.” A year of peace and

prosperity. Buffalo were plentiful all the fall and winter. Large

quantities of pemmican (wasna) were made with dried meat and marrow.

In front of the lodge is seen the backbone of a buffalo, the marrow of

which is used in wasna; below this is the buffalo stomach, in which

wasna is packed for preservation.

[Illustration: FIG. 274.]

Fig. 274, 1717-’18.--“Brought-home-fifteen-Assiniboin-horses winter.”

The sign for Assiniboin is above the horse.

[Illustration: FIG. 275.]

Fig. 275, 1718-’19.--“Brought-home-Pawnee-horses winter.” The sign for

Ree, i. e., an ear of corn, is in front of the horse.

[Illustration: FIG. 276.]

Fig. 276, 1719-’20.--“Wore-snowshoes winter.” The snow was very deep,

and the people hunted buffalo on snowshoes with excellent success.

[Illustration: FIG. 277.]

Fig. 277, 1720-’21.--“Three-lodges-starved-to-death winter.” The bare

ribs of the man denote starvation. [The gesture-sign for poor or

lean indicates that the ribs are visible. In the Ojibwa and Ottawa

pictographs lines across the chest denote starvation.]

[Illustration: FIG. 278.]

Fig. 278, 1721-’22.--“Wore-snowshoes-and-dried-much-buffalo-meat

winter.” It was even a better year for buffalo than 1719-’20.

[Illustration: FIG. 279.]

Fig. 279, 1722-’23.--“Deep-snow-and-tops-of-lodges-only-visible winter.”

The spots are intended for snow.

[Illustration: FIG. 280.]

Fig. 280, 1723-’24.--“Many-drying-sticks-set-up winter.” They set up

more than the usual number of sticks for scaffolds, etc., as they dried

the buffalo heads, hides, and entrails, as well as the meat. This figure

is repeated with differentiation for the year 1745-’46 in this chart.

[Illustration: FIG. 281.]

Fig. 281, 1724-’25.--“Blackens-himself-died winter.” This man was in the

habit of blacking his whole body with charcoal. He died of some kind of

intestinal bend [sic] as is indicated by the stomach and intestines in

front of him, which represent the bowels in violent commotion, or going

round and round.

[Illustration: FIG. 282.]

Fig. 282, 1725-’26.--“Brought-home-ten-Omaha-horses winter.” The sign

for Omaha is the head, as before.

[Illustration: FIG. 283.]

Fig. 283, 1726-’27.--“Killed-two-Pawnees-among-the-lodges winter.” The

Pawnees (Rees) made an assault on the Dakota Village, and these two ran

among the lodges without any arrows. The sign for Ree is, as usual, an

ear of corn.

[Illustration: FIG. 284.]

Fig. 284, 1727-’28.--“Killed-six-Assiniboins winter.” Two signs are

given here for Assiniboin. There is some uncertainty as to whether they

were Assiniboins or Arikaras, so the signs for both are given.

[Illustration: FIG. 285.]

Fig. 285, 1728-’29.--“Brought-home-Gros-Ventre-horses winter.” A Gros

Ventre head is shown in front of the horse.

[Illustration: FIG. 286.]

Fig. 286, 1729-’30.--“Killed-the-Pawnees-camped-alone-with-their-wives

winter.” Two Pawnees and their wives, who were hunting buffalo by

themselves, and living in one lodge, were surprised and killed by a war

party of Dakotas.

[Illustration: FIG. 287.]

Fig. 287, 1730-’31.--“Came-from-opposite-ways-and-camped-together

winter.” By a singular coincidence, two bands of Dakotas selected the

same place for an encampment, and arrived there the same day. They had

been separated a long time, and were wholly ignorant of each other’s

movements. The caps of the tipis face one another.

[Illustration: FIG. 288.]

Fig. 288, 1731-’32.--“Came-from-killing-one-Omaha-and-danced winter.”

This is the customary feast at the return of a successful war party. The

erect arrow may stand for “one,” and the Omaha is drawn at full length

with his stiff short hair and painted cheeks.

[Illustration: FIG. 289.]

Fig. 289, 1732-’33.--“Brought-home-Assiniboin-horses winter.” The sign

for Assiniboin is as before, over the horse.

[Illustration: FIG. 290.]

Fig. 290, 1733-’34.--“Killed-three-Assiniboins winter.” There is again

uncertainty as to whether they were Assiniboins or Arikaras, and both

signs are used.

[Illustration: FIG. 291.]

Fig. 291, 1734-’35.--“Used-them-up-with-bellyache winter.” About fifty

of the people died of an eruptive disease which was accompanied by pains

in the bowels. The eruption is shown on the man in the figure. This was

probably the first experience by the Dakotas of the smallpox, which has

been so great a factor in the destruction of the Indians.

[Illustration: FIG. 292.]

Fig. 292, 1735-’36.--“Followed-them-up-and-killed-five winter.” A war

party of Dakotas were chased by some enemies, who killed five of them.

The arrows flying from behind at the man indicate pursuit, and the

number of the arrows, each with a bloody mark as if hitting, is five.

[Illustration: FIG. 293.]

Fig. 293, 1736-’37.--“Brought-home-Pawnee-horses winter.” This date must

be considered in connection with the figure in this record for 1802-’03.

There is a distinction between the wild and the shod horses, but the

difference in tribe is great. The ear of corn showing the husk is as

common in this record for Pawnee as for Arikara.

[Illustration: FIG. 294.]

Fig. 294,

1737-’38.--“Killed-seven-Assiniboins-bringing-them-to-a-stand-under-a-bank

winter.” The daub, blue in the original, under the crouching figure,

represents the bank.

[Illustration: FIG. 295.]

Fig. 295, 1738-’39.--“The-four-who-went-on-the-war-path-starved-to-death

winter.” Starvation is indicated as before.

[Illustration: FIG. 296.]

Fig. 296, 1739-’40--“Found-many-horse winter.” The horses had thongs

around their necks, and had evidently been lost by some other tribe.

Hoof prints are represented above and below the horse, that is all

around.

[Illustration: FIG. 297.]

Fig. 297, 1740-’41.--“The-two-came-home-having-killed-an-enemy winter.”

They took his entire scalp, and carried it home at the end of a pole.

Only a part of the scalp is ordinarily taken, and that from the crown of

the head.

[Illustration: FIG. 298.]

Fig. 298, 1741-’42.--“Attacked-them-while-gathering-turnips winter.”

Some women, who were digging turnips (pomme blanche) near the camp, were

assaulted by a party of enemies, who, after knocking them down, ran off

without doing them any further harm. A turnip, and the stick for digging

it, are seen in front of the horseman.

[Illustration: FIG. 299.]

Fig. 299, 1742-’43.--“Killed-them-on-the-way-home-from-the-hunt winter.”

The men were out hunting, and about 100 of their enemies came on

horseback to attack the camp, and had already surrounded it, when a

woman poked her head out of a lodge and said, “They have all gone on

the hunt. When I heard you, I thought they had come back.” She pointed

toward the hunting-ground, and the enemies going in that direction, met

the Dakotas, who killed many of them with their spears, and put the rest

to flight. Hoof-prints surround the circle of lodges, and are on the

trail to the hunting-ground.

[Illustration: FIG. 300.]

Fig. 300, 1743-’44.--“The-Omahas-came-and-killed-them-in-the-night

winter.” They wounded many, but killed only one. The Dakotas were all

encamped together.

[Illustration: FIG. 301.]

Fig. 301, 1744-’45.--“Brought-home-Omaha-horses winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 302.]

Fig. 302, 1745-’46.--“Many-drying-scaffolds winter.” It was even a

better year for buffalo than 1723-’24.

[Illustration: FIG. 303.]

Fig. 303, 1746-’47.--“Came-home-having-killed-one-Gros-Ventre winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 304.]

Fig. 304, 1747-’48.--“Froze-to-death-at-the-hunt winter.” The arrow

pointing toward the buffalo head indicates they were hunting, and the

crouching figure of the man, together with the snow above and below him,

that he suffered severely from cold or froze to death.

[Illustration: FIG. 305.]

Fig. 305, 1748-’49.--“Eat-frozen-fish winter.” They discovered large

numbers of fish frozen in the ice, and subsisted on them all winter.

[Illustration: FIG. 306.]

Fig. 306, 1749-’50.--“Many-hole-camp-winter.” The same explanation as

for Fig. 260, for the year 1703-’04. The two figures are different in

execution though the same in concept. There would, however, be little

confusion in distinguishing two seasons of exceptional success in the

hunt that were separated by forty-six years.

[Illustration: FIG. 307.]

Fig. 307, 1750-’51.--“Killed-two-white-buffalo-cows winter.” (Note

by Dr. Corbusier: Two white buffalo are so rarely killed one season

that the event is considered worthy of record. Most Indians regard the

albinos among animals with the greatest reverence. The Ojibwas, who look

upon a black loon as the most worthless of birds regard a white one as

sacred.)

[Illustration: FIG. 308.]

Fig. 308, 1751-’52.--“Omahas-came-and-killed-two-in-the-lodge winter.”

An Omaha war party surprised them in the night, shot into the lodge,

wounding two, and then fled. The two shot died of their wounds.

[Illustration: FIG. 309.]

Fig. 309, 1752-’53.--“Destroyed-three-lodges-of-Omahas winter.” The

Dakotas went to retaliate on the Omahas, and finding three lodges of

them killed them. It will be noticed that in this figure the sign for

Omaha is connected with the lodge, and in the preceding figure with the

arrow.

[Illustration: FIG. 310.]

Fig. 310, 1753-’54.--“Killed-two-Assiniboins-on-the-hunt winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 311.]

Fig. 311, 1754-’55.--“Pawnees-shouted-over-the-people winter.” The

Pawnees (Rees) came at night, and standing on a bluff overlooking the

Dakota village shot into it with arrows, killing one man, and alarmed

the entire village by their shouts.

[Illustration: FIG. 312.]

Fig. 312, 1755-’56.--“Killed-two-Pawnees-at-the-hunt winter.” A war

party of Dakotas surprised some Pawnee (Ree) hunters and killed two of

them.

[Illustration: FIG. 313.]

Fig. 313, 1756-’57.--“The-whole-people-were-pursued-and-two-killed

winter.” A tribe, name unknown, attacked and routed the whole band. The

man in the figure is retreating, as is shown by his attitude; the arrow

on his bow points backward at the enemy, from whom he is retreating. The

two blood-stained arrows in his body mark the number killed.

[Illustration: FIG. 314.]

Fig. 314,

1757-’58.--“Went-on-the-warpath-on-horseback-to-camp-of-enemy-but-killed-nothing

winter.” The lack of success may have been due to inexperience in

mounted warfare as the Dakotas had probably for the first time secured a

sufficient number of horses to mount a war party.

[Illustration: FIG. 315.]

Fig. 315, 1758-’59.--“Killed-two-Omahas-who-came-to-the-camp-on-war-path

winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 316.]

Fig. 316, 1759-’60.--“War-parties-met-and-killed-a-few-on-both-sides

winter.” The attitude of the opposed figures of the Dakota and Gros

Ventre and the footprints indicate that the parties met; the arrows in

opposition, that they fought; and the blood-stained arrow in each man

that some were killed on both sides.

[Illustration: FIG. 317.]

Fig. 317, 1760-’61.--“Assiniboins-came-and-attacked-the-camp-again

winter;” or “Assiniboins-shot-arrows-through-the-camp winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 318.]

Fig. 318, 1761-’62.--“Killed-six-Pawnees (Rees) winter.” Besides the

arrow sticking in the body another is flying near the head of the man

figure, who has the tribal marks for Pawnee or Ree, as used in this

record.

[Illustration: FIG. 319.]

Fig. 319, 1762-’63.--“The-people-were-burnt winter.” They were living

somewhere east of their present country when a prairie fire destroyed

their entire village. Many of their children and a man and his wife,

who were on foot some distance away from the village, were burned to

death, as also were many of their horses. All the people that could get

to a long lake, which was near by, saved themselves by jumping into it.

Many of these were badly burned about the thighs and legs, and this

circumstance gave rise to the name Sican-zhu, burnt thigh (or simply

burnt as translated Brulé by the French), by which they have since been

known, and also to the gesture sign, as follows: “Rub the upper and

outer part of the right thigh in a small circle with the open right

hand, fingers pointing downward.”

[Illustration: FIG. 320.]

Fig. 320, 1763-’64.--“Many-sticks-for-drying-beef winter.” They dried so

much meat that the village was crowded with drying poles and scaffolds.

[Illustration: FIG. 321.]

Fig. 321, 1764-’65.--“Stole-their-horses-while-they-were-on-the-hunt

winter.” A Dakota war party chanced to find a hunting party of

Assiniboins asleep and stole twenty of their horses. It was storming at

the time and horses had their packs on and were tied. The marks which

might appear to represent a European saddle on the horse’s back denote

a pack or load. Hunting is symbolized as before, by the buffalo head

struck by an arrow.

[Illustration: FIG. 322.]

Fig. 322, 1765-’66.--“Killed-a-war-party-of-four-Pawnees winter.” The

four Pawnees (Rees) made an attack on the Dakota camp.

[Illustration: FIG. 323.]

Fig. 323, 1766-’67.--“Brought-home-sixty-Assiniboin-horses (one spotted)

winter.” They were all the horses the Assiniboins had and were on an

island in the Missouri river, from which the Dakotas cleverly stole them

during a snowstorm.

[Illustration: FIG. 324.]

Fig. 324, 1767-’68.--“Went-out-to-ease-themselves-with-their-bows-on

winter.” The Dakotas were in constant fear of an attack by enemies. When

a man left his lodge after dark, even to answer the calls of nature, he

carried his bows and arrows along with him and took good care not to go

far away from the lodge. The squatting figure, etc., close to the lodge

tells the story.

[Illustration: FIG. 325.]

Fig. 325, 1768-’69.--“Two-horses-killed-something winter.” A man who had

gone over a hill just out of the village was run down by two mounted

enemies who drove their spears into him and left him for dead, one of

them leaving his spear sticking in the man’s shoulder, as shown in the

figure. He recovered, however. (Note by Dr. Corbusier: They frequently

speak of persons who have been very ill and have recovered as dying and

returning to life again, and have a gesture sign to express the idea.)

[Illustration: FIG. 326.]

Fig. 326, 1769-’70.--“Attacked-the-camp-from-both-sides winter.” A

mounted war party--tribe unknown--attacked the village on two sides, and

on each side killed a woman. The footprints of the enemies’ horses and

arrows on each side of the lodge, which represents the village, show the

mode of attack.

[Illustration: FIG. 327.]

Fig. 327, 1770-’71--“Came-and-killed-the-lodges winter.” The enemy came

on horseback and assailed the Dakota lodges, which were pitched near

together, spoiling some of them by cutting the hide coverings with their

spears, but killing no one. They used spears only, but arrows are also

depicted, as they symbolize attack. No blood is shown on the arrows, as

only the lodges were “killed.”

[Illustration: FIG. 328.]

Fig. 328, 1771-’72.--“Swam-after-the-buffalo winter.” In the spring the

Dakotas secured a large supply of meat by swimming out and towing ashore

buffalo that were floating past the village and which had fallen into

the river on attempting to cross on the weak ice.

[Illustration: FIG. 329.]

Fig. 329, 1772-’73.--“Killed-an-Assiniboin-and-his-wife winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 330.]

Fig. 330, 1773-’74.--“Killed-two-Pawnee-boys-while-playing winter.” A

war party of Dakotas surprised two Pawnee (Ree) boys who were wrestling

and killed them while they were on the ground.

[Illustration: FIG. 331.]

Fig. 331, 1774-’75.--“Assiniboins-made-an-attack winter.” They were

cowardly, however, and soon retreated. Perhaps the two arrows of the

Assiniboins compared with the one arrow of the attacked Dakotas suggests

the cowardice.

[Illustration: FIG. 332.]

Fig. 332,

1775-’76.--“Assiniboins-went-home-and-came-back-mad-to-make-a-fresh-attack

winter.” They were brave this time, being thoroughly aroused. They

fought with bows and arrows only.

[Illustration: FIG. 333.]

Fig. 333, 1776-’77.--“Killed-with-war-club-in-his-hand winter.” A Dakota

war club is in the man’s hand and an enemy’s arrow is entering his body.

[Illustration: FIG. 334.]

Fig. 334, 1777-’78.--“Spent-the-winter-in-no-particular-place winter.”

They made no permanent camp, but wandered about from place to place.

[Illustration: FIG. 335.]

Fig. 335, 1778-’79.--“Skinned-penis-used-in-the-game-of-haka winter.”

A Dakota named as mentioned was killed in a fight with the Pawnees and

his companions left his body where they supposed it would not be found,

but the Pawnees found it and as it was frozen stiff they dragged it into

their camp and played haka with it. The haka-stick which, in playing

the game, they cast after a ring, is represented on the right of the

man. This event marks 1777-’78 in the Winter Count of American-Horse

and 1779-’80 in that of Cloud-Shield. The insult and disgrace made it

remarkable.

[Illustration: FIG. 336.]

Fig. 336, 1779-’80.--“Smallpox-used-them-up winter.” The eruption and

pains in the stomach and bowels are shown as before.

[Illustration: FIG. 337.]

Fig. 337, 1780-’81.--“Smallpox-used-them-up-again winter.” There is in

this figure no sign for pain but the spots alone are shown. An attempt

to discriminate and distinguish the year-devices is perceived.

[Illustration: FIG. 338.]

Fig. 338, 1781-’82.--“Came-and-attacked-on-horseback-for-the-last-time

winter.” The name of the tribe is not known, but it is the last time

they ever attacked the Dakotas.

[Illustration: FIG. 339.]

Fig. 339, 1782-’83.--“Killed-the-man-with-the-scarlet-blanket-on

winter.” It is not known what tribe killed him.

[Illustration: FIG. 340.]

Fig. 340, 1783-’84.--“Soldier-froze-to-death winter.” The falling snow

and the man’s position with his legs drawn up to his abdomen, one hand

in an armpit and the other in his mouth, are indicative of intense cold.

[Illustration: FIG. 341.]

Fig. 341, 1784-’85.--“The-Oglala-took-the-cedar winter.” During a great

feast an Oglala declared he was wakan and could draw a cedar tree out

of the ground. He had previously fastened the middle of a stick to the

lower end of a cedar with a piece of the elastic ligament from the

neck of the buffalo and then planted the tree with the stick crosswise

beneath it. He went to this tree, dug away a little earth from around

it and pulled it partly out of the ground and let it spring back again,

saying “the cedar I drew from the earth has gone home again.” After he

had gone some young men dug up the tree and exposed the shallow trick.

[Illustration: FIG. 342.]

Fig. 342, 1785-’86.--“The-Cheyennes-killed-Shadow’s-father winter.”

The umbrella signifies, shadow; the arrow which touches it, attacked;

the three marks under the arrow (not shown in the copy), Cheyenne; the

blood-stained arrow in the man’s body, killed. Shadow’s name and the

umbrella in the figure intimate that he was the first Dakota to carry

an umbrella. The advantages of the umbrella were soon recognized by

them, and the first they obtained from the whites were highly prized.

It is now considered an indispensable article in a Sioux outfit. They

formerly wore a wreath of green leaves or carried green boughs, to shade

them from the sun. The marks used for Cheyenne stand for the scars on

their arms or stripes on their sleeves, which also gave rise to the

gesture-sign for this tribe, see Fig. 495, infra.

[Illustration: FIG. 343.]

Fig. 343, 1786-’87.--“Iron-Head-Band-killed-on-warpath winter.” They

formerly carried burdens on their backs, hung from a band passed across

the forehead. This man had a band of iron which is shown on his head.

So said the interpreter, but probably the band was not of the metal

iron. The word so translated has a double meaning and is connected with

religious ideas of water, spirit, and the color blue.

[Illustration: FIG. 344.]

Fig. 344, 1787-’88.--“Left-the-heyoka-man-behind winter.” A certain

man was heyoka--that is, his mind was disordered and he went about the

village bedecked with feathers singing to himself, and, while so, joined

a war party. On sighting the enemy the party fled, and called to him to

turn back also; as he was heyoka, he construed everything that was said

to him as meaning the very opposite, and therefore, instead of turning

back, he went forward and was killed. If they had only had sense enough

to tell him to go on, he would then have run away, but the thoughtless

people talked to him just as if he had been in an ordinary condition and

of course were responsible for his death. The mental condition of this

man and another device for the event are explained by other records (see

Fig. 651).

[Illustration: FIG. 345.]

Fig. 345, 1788-’89.--“Many-crows-died winter.” Other records for the

same year give as the explanation of the figure and the reason for its

selection that the crows froze to death because of the intense cold.

[Illustration: FIG. 346.]

Fig. 346, 1789-’90.--“Killed-two-Gros-Ventres-on-the-ice winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 347.]

Fig. 347, 1790-’91.--“Carried-a-flag-about-with-them winter.” They went

to all the surrounding tribes with the flag, but for what purpose is

unknown. So said the interpreter, but The-Flame’s chart explains the

figure by the statement: “The first United States flags in the country

brought by United States troops.”

[Illustration: FIG. 348.]

Fig. 348, 1791-’92.--“Saw-a-white-woman winter.” The dress of the woman

indicates that she was not an Indian. This is obviously noted as being

the first occasion when the Dakotas, or at least the bands which this

record concerns, saw a white woman.

[Illustration: FIG. 349.]

Fig. 349, 1792-’93.--“Camped-near-the-Gros-Ventres winter.” They were

engaged in a constant warfare during this time. A Gros Ventre dirt

lodge, with the entrance in front, is depicted in the figure and on its

roof is a Gros Ventre head.

[Illustration: FIG. 350.]

Fig. 350, 1793-’94.--“Killed-a-long-haired-man-at-Rawhide-butte winter.”

The Dakotas attacked a village of 58 lodges and killed every soul in it.

After the fight they found the body of a man whose hair was done up with

deer-hide in large rolls, and, on cutting them open, found it was all

real hair, very thick, and as long as a lodge-pole. [Mem. Catlin tells

of a Crow called Long-Hair whose hair, by actual measurement, was 10

feet and 7 inches long.] The fight was at Rawhide butte (now so called

by the whites), which the Dakotas named Buffalo-Hide butte, because they

found so many buffalo hides in the lodges. According to Cloud-Shield,

Long-Hair was killed in 1786-’87, and according to American-Horse,

Long-Hair, a Cheyenne, was killed in 1796-’97.

[Illustration: FIG. 351.]

Fig. 351, 1794-’95.--“Killed-the-little-faced-Pawnee winter.” The

Pawnee’s face was long, flat, and narrow, like a man’s hand, but he had

the body of a large man.

White-Cow-Killer calls it: “Little-Face-killed winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 352.]

Fig. 352,

1795-’96.--“The-Rees-stood-the-frozen-man-up-with-the-buffalo-stomach-in-his-hand

winter.” The body of a Dakota who had been killed in an encounter with

the Rees (Pawnees), and had been left behind, frozen. The Rees dragged

it into their village, propped it up with a stick, and hung a buffalo

stomach filled with ice in one hand to make sport of it. The buffalo

stomach was in common use at that time as a water-jug.

[Illustration: FIG. 353.]

Fig. 353, 1796-’97.--“Wears-the-War-Bonnet-died winter.” He did not

die this winter, but received a wound in the abdomen from which the

arrowhead could not be extracted, and he died of the “bellyache” years

after.

[Illustration: FIG. 354.]

Fig. 354, 1897-’98.--“Took-the-God-Woman-captive winter.” A Dakota war

party captured a woman--tribe unknown--who, in order to gain their

respect, cried out, “I am a Wakan-Tanka,” meaning that she belonged to

God, whereupon they let her go unharmed. This is the origin of their

name for God (Wakan Tanka, the Great Holy, or Supernatural One). They

had never heard of a Supernatural Being before, but had offered their

prayers to the sun, the earth, and many other objects, believing they

were endowed with spirits. [Those are the remarks of Battiste Good, who

is only half correct, being doubtless influenced by missionary teaching.

The term is much older and signifies mystic or unknown.]

[Illustration: FIG. 355.]

Fig. 355, 1798-’99.--“Many-women-died-in-childbirth winter.” They died

of bellyache. The convoluted sign for pain in the abdominal region has

appeared before. Cloud-Shield’s winter count for the same year records

the same mortality among the women which was perhaps an epidemic of

puerperal fever.

[Illustration: FIG. 356.]

Fig. 356,

1799-1800.--“Don’t-Eat-Buffalo-Heart-made-a-commemoration-of-the-dead

winter.” A buffalo heart is represented above the man. Don’t Eat

is expressed by the gesture sign for negation, a part of which is

indicated, and the line connecting the heart with his month. The red

flag which is used in the ceremony is employed as its symbol. The name

Don’t-Eat-Buffalo-Heart refers to the man for whom that viand is taboo,

either by gentile rules or from personal visions. The religious ceremony

of commemoration of the dead is mentioned elsewhere in this work, see

Chapter XIV, section 6.

[Illustration: FIG. 357.]

Fig. 357, 1800-’01.--“The-Good-White-Man-came winter.” Seven white men

came in the spring of the year to their village in a starving condition;

after feeding them and treating them well, they allowed them to go on

their way unmolested. The Dakotas [of the recorder’s band] had heard of

the whites, but had never seen any before. In the fall some more came,

and with them, The-Good-White-Man, who is represented in the figure, and

who was the first one to trade with them. They became very fond of him

because of his fair dealings with them. The gesture made by his hands is

similar to benediction, and suggests a part of the Indian gesture sign

for “good.”

[Illustration: FIG. 358.]

Fig. 358, 1801-’02.--“Smallpox-used-them-up-again winter.” The man

figure is making a part of a common gesture sign for death, which

consists substantially in changing the index from a perpendicular to a

horizontal position and then pointing to the ground.

[Illustration: FIG. 359.]

Fig. 359, 1802-’03.--“Brought-home-Pawnee-horses-with-iron-shoes-on

winter.” The Dakotas had not seen horseshoes before. This agrees with

and explains Lone-Dog’s Winter Count for the same year.

[Illustration: FIG. 360.]

Fig. 360,

1803-’04.--“Brought-home-Pawnee-horses-with-their-hair-rough-and-curly

winter.” The curly hair is indicated by the curved marks. Lone-Dog’s

Winter Count for the same year records the same incident, but states

that the curly horses were stolen from the Crows.

[Illustration: FIG. 361.]

Fig. 361, 1804-’05.--“Sung-over-each-other-while-on-the-war-path

winter.” A war party while out made a large pipe and sang each other’s

praises. The use of an ornamented pipe in connection with the ceremonies

of organizing a war party is mentioned in Chapter XV.

[Illustration: FIG. 362.]

Fig. 362, 1805-’06.--“They-came-and-killed-eight winter.” The enemy

killed eight Dakotas, as shown by the arrow and the eight marks beneath

it.

[Illustration: FIG. 363.]

Fig. 363, 1806-’07.--“Killed-them-while-hunting-eagles winter.” Some

Dakota eagle-hunters were killed by enemies. See Lone-Dog’s Winter Count

for the same year.

[Illustration: FIG. 364.]

Fig. 364, 1807-’08.--“Came-and-killed-man-with-red-shirt-on winter.”

Other records say that Red-Shirt killed in this year was an Uncpapa

Dakota, and that he was killed by Arikaras.

[Illustration: FIG. 365.]

Fig. 365, 1808-’09.--“Pawnees-(Rees)-killed-Blue-Blanket’s-father

winter.” A blanket, which in the original record is blue, is represented

above the arrow and across the man’s body.

[Illustration: FIG. 366.]

Fig. 366, 1809-’10.--“Little-Beaver’s-house-burned winter.”

Little-Beaver was an English trader, and his trading house was a log one.

[Illustration: FIG. 367.]

Fig. 367,

1810-’11.--“Brought-home-horse-with-his-tail-braided-with-eagle-feathers

winter.” They stole a band of horses beyond the South Platte. One of

them was very fleet, and had his tail ornamented as described.

[Illustration: FIG. 368.]

Fig. 368, 1811-’12.--“First-hunted-horses winter.” The Dakotas caught

wild horses in the Sand Hills with braided lariats.

[Illustration: FIG. 369.]

Fig. 369, 1812-’13.--“Rees-killed-Big-in-the-Middle’s-father winter.”

Other records call this warrior Big-Waist and Big-Belly.

[Illustration: FIG. 370.]

Fig. 370, 1813-’14.--“Killed-six-Pawnees (Rees) winter.” Six strokes are

under the arrow, but are not shown in the copy.

[Illustration: FIG. 371.]

Fig. 371, 1814-’15.--“Smashed-a-Kiowa’s-head-in winter.” The tomahawk

with which it was done is sticking in the Kiowa’s head.

[Illustration: FIG. 372.]

Fig. 372, 1815-’16.-“The-Sans-Arcs-made-large-houses winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 373.]

Fig. 373, 1816-’17.--“Lived-again-in-their-large-houses winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 374.]

Fig. 374, 1817-’18.--“Chozé-built-a-house-of-dead-logs winter.” The

house was for trading purposes. The Frenchman’s name is evidently a

corruption.

[Illustration: FIG. 375.]

Fig. 375, 1818-’19.--“Smallpox-used-them-up-again winter.” They at this

time lived on the Little White river, about 20 miles above the Rosebud

agency. The two fingers held up may mean the second time the fatal

epidemic appeared in the particular body of Indians concerned in the

record.

[Illustration: FIG. 376.]

Fig. 376, 1819-’20.--“Chozé-built-a-house-of-rotten-wood winter.”

Another trading house was built.

[Illustration: FIG. 377.]

Fig. 377,

1820-’21.--“They-made-bands-of-strips-of-blanket-in-the-winter.” These

bands were of mixed colors and reached from the shoulders to the heels.

They also made rattles of deer’s hoofs by tying them to sticks with

bead-covered strings. The man has a sash over his shoulders and a rattle

in his hand.

[Illustration: FIG. 378.]

Fig. 378, 1821-’22.--“Star-passed-by-with-loud-noise winter,”

“Much-whisky winter,” and “Used-up-the-Omahas winter.” In the figure

the meteor, its pathway, and the cloud from which it came are shown.

Whisky was furnished to them for the first time and without stint.

It brought death to them in a new form, many since then having died

from the excessive use of it, Red-Cloud’s father among the number.

Battiste Good, alias Wa-po’stan-gi, more accurately Wa-po-cta^n-xi

(Brown-Hat), historian and chief, was born. He says that Omaha bullets

were whizzing through the village and striking and piercing his mother’s

lodge as she brought him forth. Red-Cloud was also born. In the count

of American-Horse for this year he makes no mention of the meteor, but

strongly marks the whisky as the important figure for the winter.

[Illustration: FIG. 379.]

Fig. 379, 1822-’23.--“Peeler-froze-his-leg winter.” Peeler was a white

trader, and his leg was frozen while he was on his way to or from the

Missouri river. The name is explained by White Cow Killer’s record as

follows: “White-man-peels-the-stick-in-his-hand-broke-his-leg winter.”

He was probably a Yankee, addicted to whittling.

[Illustration: FIG. 380.]

Fig. 380, 1823-’24.--“General-——-first-appeared-and-the-Dakotas-aided-

in-an-attack-on-the-Rees winter.” Also “Much-corn winter”. The gun and

the arrow in contact with the ear of corn show that both whites and

Indians fought the Rees. This refers to Gen. Leavenworth’s expedition

against the Arikara in 1823, when several hundred Dakotas were his

allies. This expedition is mentioned several times in this work.

[Illustration: FIG. 381.]

Fig. 381, 1824-’25.--“Killed-two-picking-plums winter.” A Dakota war

party surprised and killed two Pawnees who were gathering plums.

[Illustration: FIG. 382.]

Fig. 382, 1825-’26.--“Many-Yanktonais-drowned winter.” The river bottom

on a bend of the Missouri river, where they were encamped, was suddenly

submerged, when the ice broke and many women and children were drowned.

All the Winter Counts refer to this flood.

[Illustration: FIG. 383.]

Fig. 383, 1826-’27.--“Ate-a-whistle-and-died winter.” Six Dakotas on

the war path (shown by bow and arrow) had nearly perished with hunger,

when they found and ate the rotting carcass of an old buffalo, on which

the wolves had been feeding. They were seized soon after with pains in

the stomach, the abdomen swelled, and gas poured from mouth and anus,

and they died of a whistle or from eating a whistle. The sound of gas

escaping from the mouth is illustrated in the figure.

[Illustration: FIG. 384.]

Fig. 384, 1827-’28.--“Wore-snowshoes winter.” The snow was very deep.

[Illustration: FIG. 385.]

Fig. 385, 1828-’29.--“Killed-two-hundred-Gros Ventres (Hidatsas) winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 386.]

Fig. 386, 1829-’30.--“Old-Speckled-Face-clung-to-his-son-in-law winter.”

The daughter of Speckled-Face, who was coming out second best in an

altercation with her husband, called to her father for help. The latter

ran and grabbed his son-in-law around the waist, and, crying “That is my

daughter,” stabbed him. The son-in-law fell and the old man fell on top

of him, and, clinging to him, begged the lookers on to put an end to him

also, as he wished to bear his beloved son-in-law company to the spirit

land. No one, however, was in the humor to speed him on the journey, and

he remained with the living.

[Illustration: FIG. 387.]

Fig. 387, 1830-’31.--“Shot-many-white-buffalo-cows winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 388.]

Fig. 388, 1831-’32.--“Killed-him-while-looking-about-on-the-hill

winter.” A Dakota, while watching for buffalo at Buffalo Gap, in the

Black Hills, was shot by the Crows. The man is represented on a hill,

which is dotted with pine trees and patches of grass. Battiste makes the

grass blue. Blue and green are frequently confounded by other Indians

than Battiste, and some tribes have but one name for the two colors.

[Illustration: FIG. 389.]

Fig. 389, 1832-’33.--“Stiff-Leg-with-War-Bonnet-on-died winter.” He was

killed in an engagement with the Pawnees on the Platte river, in which

the Brulés killed one hundred Pawnees.

[Illustration: FIG. 390.]

Fig. 390, 1833-’34.--“Storm-of-stars winter.” All the Winter Counts

refer to this great meteoric display, which occurred on the night of

November 12, 1833, and was seen over most of the United States.

[Illustration: FIG. 391.]

Fig. 391, 1834-’35.--“Killed-the-Cheyenne-who-came-to-the-camp winter.”

A Cheyenne who stole into the village by night was detected and killed.

The village was near what is now the Pine Ridge agency.

[Illustration: FIG. 392.]

Fig. 392, 1835-’36.--“Killed-the-two-war-party-leaders winter.” A Dakota

war party met one of Pawnees and killed two of their leaders, whereupon

the rest ran.

[Illustration: FIG. 393.]

Fig. 393, 1836-’37.--“Fight-on-the-ice winter.” They fought with the

Pawnees on the ice, on the Platte river, and killed seven of them. The

two vertical marks, which are for the banks of the river, and the two

opposed arrows, signify that the tribes were on opposite sides of the

river.

[Illustration: FIG. 394.]

Fig. 394, 1837-’38.--“Spread-out-killed winter.” A Santee man, whose

name is indicated by his spread hands, was killed by soldiers.

[Illustration: FIG. 395.]

Fig. 395, 1838-’39.--“Came-and-killed-five-Oglálas winter.” They were

killed by Pawnees. The man in the figure has on a capote, the hood of

which is drawn over his head. This garment is used here as a sign for

war, as the Dakotas commonly wear it on their war expeditions.

[Illustration: FIG. 396.]

Fig. 396, 1839-’40.--“Came-home-from-the-starve-to-death-war-path

winter.” All of the Dakota tribes united in an expedition against the

Pawnees. They killed one hundred Pawnees, but nearly perished with

hunger.

[Illustration: FIG. 397.]

Fig. 397, 1840-’41--“Came-and-killed-five-of-Little-Thunder’s-brothers

winter,” and “Battiste-alone-returns winter.” The five were killed in an

encounter with the Pawnees. Battiste Good was the only one of the party

to escape. The capote is shown again.

[Illustration: FIG. 398.]

Fig. 398, 1841-’42.--“Pointer-made-a-commemoration-of-the-dead winter.”

Also “Deep-snow winter.” The extended index denotes the man’s name, the

ring and spots deep snow.

[Illustration: FIG. 399.]

Fig. 399,

1842-’43.--“Killed-four-lodges-of-Shoshoni-and-brought-home-many-horses

winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 400.]

Fig. 400, 1843-’44.--“Brought-home-the-magic-arrow winter.” This arrow

originally belonged to the Cheyennes from whom the Pawnees stole it. The

Dakotas captured it this winter from the Pawnees and the Cheyennes then

redeemed it for one hundred horses.

[Illustration: FIG. 401.]

Fig. 401, 1844-’45.--“The-Crows-came-and-killed-thirty-eight-Oglálas

winter.” The Oglálas were on the warpath, as indicated by the capote.

[Illustration: FIG. 402.]

Fig. 402,

1845-’46.--“Broke-out-on-faces-had-sore-throats-and-camped-under-the-bluff

winter.” “Also-had-bellyache.” The position of the camp is shown, also

the suggestive attitude of the man.

[Illustration: FIG. 403.]

Fig. 403, 1846-’47.--“Winter-camp-broke-his-neck winter.” He was thrown

from his horse while on a hunt. The red on his neck is the break.

[Illustration: FIG. 404.]

Fig. 404, 1847-’48.--“The-Teal-broke-his-leg winter.” His arm is

lengthened to direct attention to his leg. The Chinese radical and

phonetic character for the same concept, Fig. 1193, infra, may be

compared, as also Fig. 231, supra.

[Illustration: FIG. 405.]

Fig. 405, 1848-’49.--“Killed-the-hermaphrodite winter” and

“Big-horse-stealing winter.” They captured a Crow who pretended to be a

woman, but who proved to be a man, and they killed him. It is probable

that this was one of the men, not uncommon among the Indian tribes, who

adopt the dress and occupation of women. This is sometimes compulsory

from failure to pass an ordeal or from exhibition of cowardice. Eight

hundred horses were stolen from the Dakotas, but seven hundred of them

were recovered. The Crows killed one Dakota, as is indicated by the

arrow in contact with the red spot in the hoof print.

[Illustration: FIG. 406.]

Fig. 406, 1849-’50.--“Brought-the-Crows-to-a-stand winter.” This was

done at Crow Butte, near Camp Robinson, Nebraska. It is said that a

party of Crows, who were flying from the Dakotas, took refuge on the

Butte about dark and that the Dakotas surrounded them, confident of

capturing them the next morning, but the Crows escaped during the night,

very much to the chagrin of the Dakotas. The Crow’s head is just visible

on the summit of the hill, as if the body had gone down.

[Illustration: FIG. 407.]

Fig. 407, 1850-’51.--“The-big-smallpox winter.”

[Illustration: FIG. 408.]

Fig. 408, 1851-’52.--“First-issue-of-goods winter.” The colored patches

outside the circle are at the four cardinal points, the colored patches

inside the circle are meant for blankets and the other articles issued,

and the circle of strokes the people sitting. The Dakotas were told

that fifty-five years after that issue they would have to cultivate the

ground, and they understood that they would not be required to do it

before.

[Illustration: FIG. 409.]

Fig. 409, 1852-’53.--“Deep-snow-used-up-the-horses winter.” The spots

around the horses represent snow.

[Illustration: FIG. 410.]

Fig. 410, 1853-’54.--“Cross-Bear-died-on-the-hunt winter.” The travail

means they moved; the buffalo, to hunt buffalo; the bear with mouth

open and paw advanced, Cross-Bear; the stomach and intestines, took

the bellyache and died. The gesture sign for bear is made as follows:

Slightly crook the thumbs and little fingers, and nearly close the other

fingers; then, with their backs upward, hold the hands a little in

advance of the body or throw them several times quickly forward a few

inches. The sign is sometimes made with one hand only.

For explanation of the word “travail,” applied to the Indian sledge made

of the joined tent poles, see Fig. 764 and accompanying remarks.

[Illustration: FIG. 411.]

Fig. 411, 1854-’55.--“Killed-five-Assiniboins winter.” The Dakotas are

ashamed of the part they took in the following deplorable occurrence and

it is not therefore noted in the record, although it really marks the

year. In consequence of a misunderstanding in regard to an old foot-sore

cow, which had been abandoned on the road by some emigrants and which

the Dakotas had innocently appropriated, Lieut. Grattan, Sixth U. S.

Infantry, killed Conquering Bear (Mato-way'uhi, Startling Bear properly)

about ten miles east of Fort Laramie, August 19, 1854. The Dakotas then,

in retaliation, massacred Lieut. Grattan and the thirty men of Company

G, Sixth U. S. Infantry, he had with him.

The figure without the above statement tells the simple story about the

killing of five Assiniboins who are denoted by the usual tribal sign,

the number being designated by the five strokes below the arrow.

[Illustration: FIG. 412.]

Fig. 412,

1855-’56.--“Little-Thunder-and-Battiste-Good-and-others-taken-prisoners-

at-Ash-Hollow-on-the-Blue-creek winter,” and one hundred and

thirty Dakotas were killed by the white soldiers. Also called

“Many-sacrificial-flags winter.” The last-mentioned name for the

winter is explained by other records and by Executive Document No. 94,

Thirty-fourth Congress, first session, Senate, to refer to a council

held on March 18, 1856, by Brevet Brig. Gen. W. S. Harney, U. S. Army,

with nine of the bands of the Dakotas.

[Illustration: FIG. 413.]

Fig. 413,

1856-’57.--“Bad-Four-Bear-trades-with-Battiste-Good-for-furs-all

winter.” Bad-Four-Bear, a white trader, is represented sitting smoking

a pipe in front of Battiste’s tipi under a bluff at Fort Robinson,

Nebraska.

[Illustration: FIG. 414.]

Fig. 414, 1857-’58.--“Hunted-bulls-only winter.” They found but few

cows, the buffalo being composed principally of bulls. The travail is

shown.

[Illustration: FIG. 415.]

Fig. 415, 1858-’59.--“Many-Navajo-blankets winter.” A Navajo blanket is

shown in the figure. Several of the records agree in the explanation

about the bringing of these blankets at that time.

[Illustration: FIG. 416.]

Fig. 416, 1859-’60.--“Came-and-killed-Big-Crow winter.” The two marks

under the arrow indicate that two were killed.

[Illustration: FIG. 417.]