EXPLANATORY NOTES
Page 9, l. 24: “We had corn a-plenty” The Hidatsas and Mandans were the best agriculturists of the north-plains Indians. Varieties of corn developed by them mature in the semi-arid climate of western North Dakota where our better known eastern strains will not ripen. The varieties include flint, flour, and a kind of sweet corn calledmaikadishake,[32]or gummy, which the Indians use for parching. Hidatsa seed planted at the United States Agricultural Experiment Station at Bozeman, Montana, has made surprising yields.
[32]mä´ ï kä dï shä kĕ
Page 10, l. 29: “the ghost land.” A Hidatsa Indian believed he had four ghosts. At death, one ghost went to the Ghost village, to live in an earth lodge and hunt buffaloes as on earth; a second remained at the grave until after a time it joined the first in the Ghost village where they became one again. What became of the other two ghosts does not seem to be known.
Page 11, l. 20: “The march was led by the older chiefs.” A Hidatsa chief was a man who by his war deeds, hospitality, and wisdom, came to be recognized as one of the influential men of the tribe. He was not necessarily an officer. When translating into English, Hidatsas usually call the officer elected for any executive duty aleader, as war-party leader, winter-camp leader, leader of the buffalo hunt. It should be remembered that the activities of an Indian tribe are decided in councils; and in these councils the eloquence and wisdom of the chiefs had greatest weight. The Hidatsa word for chief, literally translated, is excellent man, superior man.
Page 13, l. 8: “At this hour fires burned before most of the tepees.” In fall or winter the fire was within the tepee, under the smoke hole.
Page 15, l. 13: “for a woman to ... begin building her earth lodge.” While the work falling to an Indian woman was far from light, she did not look upon herself as overburdened. Women were more kindly treated by Hidatsas and Mandans than by some tribes.
Page 17, l. 28: “dried prairie turnips.” The prairie turnip,psoralea esculenta, is a starchy, bulbous root, growing rather plentifully on the plains. Its food value is high. Attempts have been made unsuccessfully to cultivate it.
Page 17, l. 30: “June berries.” The June berry,amelanchier alnifolia, is a small, hardwood tree, bearing sweet, dark-red berries. Its branches were much used for making arrow shafts.
Page 21, l. 14: “young men fasted and cut their flesh.” Such self-inflicted tortures were not, as is often believed, for the purpose of proving the warrior’s fortitude, but were made as a kind of sacrifice to the gods that these might pity the devotee and answer his prayers. See Bible, I Kings, XVIII; 28.
Page 24, l. 30: “It was a long pipe with black stone bowl.” The stone bowl was carved from a hard kind of grey clay, anointed with grease and baked in a fire to turn it black. It took a high polish.
Page 35, l. 11: “Telling tales ... in ... autumn and winter.” Tribal myths, told of the gods, were often forbidden in summer when nature wasalive. In winter nature wasasleepordead. One could talk of sleeping spirits without fear of offending them.
Page 36, l. 5: “Making ready her seed.” The Hidatsas used the greatest care in selecting their seed corn. Only large and perfect ears were chosen. The best ear for seed was theeeteeshahdupadee,[33]or muffled-head, so called because the kernels cover the cob quite to the tip, making the ear look like an Indian with his head muffled up in his robe.
[33]ēē tēē shä dṳ´ pä dēē
Page 36, l. 14: “Wooden bowl.” In olden days almost every family owned several of these feast bowls. A large knot was split out of a tree trunk with wedges and, after being hollowed out with fire, was slowly carved into shape with flint tools. Some of these bowls are beautiful examples of carving.
Page 37, l. 16: “Trying to parch an ear of corn.” Parched corn entered largely into the diet of our corn raising Indians. Among eastern tribes, a warrior set forth on a long journey with a sack of parched corn pounded to a meal. When hungry, he swallowed a spoonful of the parched meal, washing it down with a pint of water. In a short time the meal had absorbed the water, filling the stomach with a digestible mass like mush.
Every farmer’s lad should put away some ears of ripened sweet corn in the fall, to parch of a winter’s evening. Sweet corn was raised by the Hidatsas and Mandans for parching only.
Page 38, l. 21: “Ground beans,” or hog peanut;amphicarpa falcata. These beans, like peanuts, are borne under ground.
Page 38, l. 22: “Wild potatoes,” or Jerusalem artichoke. Roots ofhelianthus tuberosus, a plant of the sunflower family.
Page 41, l. 25: “Who had been a black bear.” Tradition has it that the art and mysteries of trapping eagles were taught the Hidatsas by the black bears. An eagle hunters’ camp was conducted as a kind of symbolic play, the hunters acting the ceremonies of the delivery to the Indians of the eagle-hunt mysteries.
Page 44, l. 17: “Earth lodges well-built and roomy.” The earth lodge of the Mandans and Hidatsas was the highest example of the building art among our plains tribes. Some of these lodges were quite large, having a height of eighteen feet or more, and a floor diameter exceeding sixty feet. Usually two or more families of relatives inhabited the same lodge.
An earth lodge had four large central posts and beams, supporting the roof; twelve surrounding posts and beams, supporting the eaves; and a hundred rafters. The roof was covered with a matting of willows over which was laid dry grass and a heavy coating of earth.
An earth lodge lasted but about ten years, when it was abandoned or rebuilt. The labor of building and repairing these imposing structures, especially in days when iron tools were unknown and posts and beams had to be burned to proper lengths, must have been severe.
When the author first visited Fort Berthold reservation in 1906, there were eight earth lodges still standing; in 1918 there were two.
Page 47, l. 18: “An earthen pot.” The potter’s craft was practiced professionally by certain women who had purchased the secrets of the art. The craft was an important one, as much of Hidatsa cooking was by boiling. Some of the earthen boiling pots held as much as two gallons. A collection of earthen pots, fired in 1910 by Hides-and-Eats, a Mandan woman nearly ninety years old, is in the American Museum of Natural History.
Page 49, l. 18: “From her cache pit.” The cache pit was a jug-shaped pit within or without the lodge, six or eight feet deep. It was floored with willow sticks and its walls were lined with dry grass. It was used to store the fall harvest.
Strings of braided ears were laid in series against the wall. Within these was poured the threshed grain, in which were buried strings of dried squash and sacks of beans and sunflower seed. Buffalo-Bird Woman says there were five cache pits in use in her father’s family.
Many families had a cache pit within the lodge to serve as a cellar. Besides corn for immediate use, it held sacks of dried berries, prairie turnips, packages of dried meat and even bladders of marrow fat.
The pits without the lodge with their stores of grain were carefully sealed with slabs and grass, over which were trampled earth and ashes. This was done to conceal the pits from any Sioux who might come prowling around when the tribe was away in winter camp. If a family lacked food in winter, they returned to their summer village and opened one of these cache pit granaries for its stores of corn.
Page 49, l. 31: “Red Blossom pounded the parched corn ... in a corn mortar.” The corn mortar, or hominy pounder, is a section of a cottonwood or ash trunk, hollowed out by fire. The pestal is of ash. The mortar was sunk in the floor of the earth lodge and covered, when not in use, by a flat stone.
Corn mortars are still used by the Hidatsas. Our grandmothers in pioneer days also used them.
Page 51, l. 4: “Chief.” A Hidatsa chief, as explained, was not necessarily a tribal officer. His position was like that of an influential citizen of a country village, who is often a member of the local school or hospital board, is chosen to preside at patriotic meetings, and is expected to extend hospitality and charity to those in need.
Hospitality, indeed, is the Indian’s crowning virtue. In tribal days, when one had food, all had food; when one starved, all starved. A reservation Indian does not like to take pay for a meal, especially from one of his own race; and he can not comprehend how any white man having food can let another go hungry.
His hospitality is often a hindrance to the Indian’s progress. Indolent Indians eat up the food stores of industrious relatives.
Page 56, l. 14: “Dried meat pounded fine and mixed with marrow fat.” This was regarded as a delicate dish. Old people especially were fond of it. The plains Indians usually had sound teeth, but their coarse diet wore the teeth down so that old men found it hard to eat dried meat unless it was thus pounded to shreds. Marrow fat was used much as we use butter.
Page 57, l. 1: “A doll, woven of rushes.” Very good mats were also woven of rushes.
Page 58, l. 4: “Tossing in a blanket.” The blanket tossing game has been found among widely separated peoples. In Don Quixote, we are told how Sancho Panza unwilling participated in the game.
Page 66, l. 6: “Every Hidatsa belonged to a clan.” The clan was, nevertheless, relatively weak among the Hidatsas, its functions apparently having been usurped at least in part by the age societies. (The Black Mouths were an age society. See chapter V).
In many tribes a man was forbidden to marry within his clan.
Page 68, l. 25: “He was a great medicine man.” The story of Snake Head-Ornament is a good example of the tales told of the old time medicine men. Snake Head-Ornament’s friendship for the bull snake would seem uncanny even to a white man.
Page 73, l. 1: “In old times we Indian people had no horses.”
At the time of America’s discovery the Indians had domesticated the llama in the Peruvian highlands; the guinea pig, raised for food by many South American tribes; turkeys, and even bees, in Mexico; dogs, developed from wolves or coyotes, were universally domesticated among the North American tribes.
Indian dogs were used as watch dogs and as beasts of burden. Dog flesh was eaten by many tribes. An edible, hairless variety of dog, bred by the Mexican Indians has become extinct.
Page 77, l. 23: “My grandmother brought in some fresh sage.” The sage was a sacred plant.
Page 81, l. 10: “Our dogs dragged well-laden travois.” Older Indians say that a well-trained dog could drag a load of eighty pounds on a travois.
Page 85, l. 6: “The big tendon ... we Indians call theeetsuta.”[34]When dried this tendon becomes hard, like horn; and arrow points and even arrow shafts were carved from it.
[34]ēēt sṳ´ tä
Page 87, l. 32: “Coyote Eyes, a Ree Indian.” The Rees, or Arikaras, are an offshoot of the Pawnee tribe, whose language they speak. They removed to Fort Berthold reservation and settled there with the Hidatsas and Mandans in 1862.
Page 92, l. 7: “To embroider with quills of gull.” The tribe used to make annual journeys to the lakes near Minot, North Dakota, where, older Indians say, the gulls nested. The feathers were gathered along the beach. The quill was split, the flat nether half being the part used. Quills were dyed with native vegetable colors.
Page 99, l. 10: “Bear Man was an eagle hunter.” The tail feathers of the golden eagle were much worn by all the plains tribes. These feathers, in eagles under two years of age, are of a pure white, with dark brown or black tips, and were much prized. Eagle hunting was a highly honored occupation.
Page 112, l. 17: “The huskers came into the field yelling and singing.” Buffalo-Bird Woman laughingly adds, that the yelling was by young men who wanted their sweethearts to hear their voices.
Page 114, l. 2: “The hollow buffalo hoofs rattled.” The earth lodge door was a heavy buffalo skin, stretched when green on a frame of light poles. It was swung from the beam above by heavy thongs. The puncheon fire screen stood between it and the fireplace, about which the family sat or worked. As the moccasined tread of a visitor made little noise, a bunch or two of buffalo hoofs was hung to a bar running across the middle of the door.
The hoof was prepared by boiling and removing the pith. Its edges were then trimmed and a hole was cut in the toe. Through this hole a thong was run with a knotted end, to keep the hoof from slipping off. As the door dropped after an entering visitor, the hollow hoofs fell together with a clittering noise, warning the family.
Page 118, l. 28: “Hanging Stone.” A literal translation of the Hidatsa word. It refers to a form of war club, a short stick, from an end of which swung a stone sewed in a piece of skin.
Page 125, l. 3: “With ankles to the right, as Indian women sit.” A warrior sat Turkish fashion, or, often, squat-on-heels. An Indian woman sat with feet to the right unless she was left-handed, when feet were to the left.
Page 125, l. 6: “Mixed with marrow fat.” Marrow fat was obtained by boiling the crushed bones of a buffalo in a little water. The yellow marrow as it rose was skimmed off and stored in bladders or short casings made of entrails, like sausage casings.
Page 126, l. 10: “I have come to call you.” Buffalo-Bird Woman means that her father invited his son-in-law to come and live in his earth lodge. If he had not sent this invitation, the young couple would have set up housekeeping elsewhere.
Page 128, l. 37: “Only a strong, well-fed pony could go all day on wet ground.” Nature designed the solid hoof of the horse for a prairie or semidesert country. A pony finds it hard to withdraw his hoof in wet spongy soil, and soon tires. A deer or buffalo, with divided hoof, runs upon wet ground with comparative ease. Every farmer’s boy knows that an ox will walk through a swamp in which a horse will mire.
Page 142, l. 26: “With two fingers crooked like horns, the sign for buffaloes.” So many languages were spoken by our Indian tribes, that they found it necessary to invent a sign language so that Indians, ignorant of each other’s speech, could converse. A well-trained deaf mute and an old plains Indian can readily talk together by signs.
Page 143, l. 4: “Creeping up the coulees.” A coulee in the Dakotas is a grassy ravine, usually dry except in spring and autumn, and after a heavy rain.
Page 157, l. 19: “They starved, because they are hunters and raise no corn.” The Hidatsas and Mandans as agriculturists felt themselves superior to the hunting tribes. Small-Ankle refers here to the western, or Teton, Sioux. The eastern Sioux were corn raisers.
Page 158, l. 10: “My mothers and I were more than a week threshing.” In the summer of 1912, the author had Buffalo-Bird Woman pace off on the prairie the size of her mothers’ field, as she recollected it. It measured one hundred and ninety yards in length by ninety yards in width. Such were some of the fields which in olden days were cultivated with wooden sticks and bone hoes.