Wild Hog Ledger-Kansas State Historical Society

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ANIMAL: ANTELOPE; GROUP, WOMEN. Five women Wear Red Blankets with Fringed Leggings

Ethnographic Notes

Right: A male pronghorn antelope, colored yellow, fills most of the page. The body is outlined in pencil, with details added, including distinctive horns, rough fur at the neck (three lines), split hooves, and small tail. It faces toward the inside of the page, so it moves from the powerful right-hand position forward. There are no eyes or mouth indicated. After the buffalo populations decreased antelope and elk became more important sources for meat. This is one of the few antelope in this and related Dodge City 1879 ledgers. Elk are much more numerous. Media: Pencil outline and details; yellow crayon fill. Left: WOMEN. Five women dressed identically in red blankets walk or dance in place. Dashes on the ground indicate their footsteps and/or activity. They are wrapped in their blankets, arms covered, from neck to knees, with the vertical blanket edge represented by a black line. Four have half of their faces painted, vertically, with red. One woman has all her face painted red. Black hair outlines their heads clearly, with braids resting on their shoulders. All have black, fringed legging tops turned down and showing below their blankets (Petersen, 1983: 287). All have striped red legs, not just bands around their ankles. Color symbolism was important to Cheyenne ledger artists. The colors black and blue were feminine. Michael Cowdrey writes about the persistent occurrence of the color dyad of red and black: “Red symbolizes the sun, the phallus, and all things masculine; black denotes night and death, the womb, and all things feminine” (1999: 46). Imre Nagy also describes the duality of masculine and feminine as an ever-present dynamic, where balance is constantly moving between the two spheres (“Cheyenne Shields and Their Cosmological Background.” American Indian Art Magazine 19.3 [summer 1994]: 40). Fringes also suggest scalps, and the colors red and black specifically evoke enemy scalps (Cowdrey, 1999: 45-6). Media: Outlines, details, and dashes in lead pencil; red watercolor fill; black ink fill.


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The cover inscription reads: "Pictures drawn by Wild Hog and other northern Cheyenne Indian Chiefs while in th...

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Document Info
Plate No: 27
Page No: 50-51
Media: Pencil, crayon, watercolor, ink
Dimensions: 3.25 x 5 in (8.5 x 12.75 cm)
Custodian
Kansas Historical Society/kansasmemory.org
Artist
Wild Hog
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