Social life of the Crow Indians / by Robert H. Lowie.

  • Robert Lowie
Date:
1912
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Social life of the Crow Indians / by Robert H. Lowie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    69/72 page 245
    ‘swearing. One is to call hima ghost,— di axpard’aze, “You are a ghost.” In the Crow version of a familiar Plains tale, the hero’s buffalo-wife, who ‘has warned him not to insult her, immediately runs away when her husband ‘calls her a ghost. Apparently, it is a still greater insult to be twitted with being an akiri’hawe, “orphan,” that is, a person without relatives. It is not considered proper to mention the name of a dead person before his relatives except while those present are smoking. The relatives them- ‘selves refer to a deceased kinsman by some new name. Thus, Currant is ‘spoken of as “ Thistles.”’ The rear of the lodge was called aco’ and was the place of honor. There medicines were tied to the lodge poles, and a backrest (icérek6’tsi‘te) was put in front of them. Between this backrest and the fireplace no one was permitted to pass... A man and his wife slept on one side of the backrest, ‘children and other relatives on the other side. A visitor took his seat on -either side of the backrest. A woman sat next to her husband, but nearer ‘to the door. Songs composed in derision of someone that had transgressed the rules of propriety, or in revenge for some personal or group affront, seem to have figured rather prominently in Crow society. Some of those composed by the rival Fox and Lumpwood organizations will be given in another paper. ‘Similar punishment was meted out by jilted lovers, and by one of the three local groups, when affronted by one of the others. The latter case is illustrated by the following narrative. When Gray- bull was a young man, his division, the Many-Lodges, took a pipe to the Black-Lodges near the Missouri, and offered it to their hosts to smoke. When asked for the reason of their visit, the leaders explained that they desired the Black-Lodges to join them in fighting the Sioux. The Black- _Lodges refused to take the pipe, and the Many-Lodges departed in anger. Shortly after, at the Musselshell crossing, they caught sight of about 100 hostile Sioux, with their women and children; they had put up some sweat lodges. The Sioux espied the Crow, abandoned everything and fled, pursued by the Crow. The Crow gave chase, killed twelve of the enemy, -and appropriated the property left by the Sioux. Only one Crow was hit ‘in the chest by an arrow, and he was not severely wounded. The Many-Lodges then went back to laugh at the Black-Lodges. As ‘soon as they were seen, the Black-Lodges guessed from their actions that 1 Later Gray-bull said that not every lodge kept its rear backrest sacred. Rulings on this point seem to have differed also in different Hidatsa earth-lodges. In 1911 my Hidatsa ‘interpreter was amazed to find that the grandchildren of the most conservative Indian of that tribe were allowed to pass freely between the medicines stored in the rear and the fire- place. In the earth-lodge where he had passed his youth there was a strict taboo against this practice.
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3