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COURTSHIP: Man Holding a Saber before a Woman

Ethnographic Notes

Inside Front Cover, vertical COURTING The man holds a saber out to the woman. The woman has a long braid down her shoulder, completely blue blanket, blue leggings showing under the blanket, and uncolored ankles and feet. She has lines around her ankles. These are similar to the black line "trails" drawn around the ankles of the honored "Sacred Woman" of the Sun Dance (Powell, 1969: 642). George Dorsey describes black lines as the representation of the four directional powers: "The first, or medicine-spirit of the south, was represented by a black circular line encompassing the right ankle; the west spirit by a line around the right wrist; the north spirit by a line around the left wrist; and the east spirit by a line around the right ankle" (1905: vol. 2, 105). One to four bands drawn on women's ankles occur throughout the ledger. The man also has a long braid, with otter tail ties at the ends. Neither he nor the woman wears facepaint. His eye is a blue dot. His blanket is mostly undecorated, with six small rows of alternating red dashes and blue dots. This could represent beadwork rows. The saber floats, blade down, between the two figures, as the man's arms do not support it. He is completely wrapped in his blanket. His leggings below the blanket are red, and his breechclout ends show, strips of trade cloth with undyed selvedge ends. His feet are uncolored. The saber is the center focus of the drawing, with the woman wrapped in a blue blanket to the right and the man in a decorated blanket to the left. The saber has two streamers with eight eagle feathers attached to each, and these are fastened to the hilt. Cheyennes and other plains tribal people used sabers "as a means of counting coup or as a thrusting weapon" (Bonnie B. Kahn, 2003: 27-29. See also Michael Cowdrey on Cheyenne association with sabers, 1999: 18, Fig. 4- ca. 1867 photograph of Cloud Chief, Southern Cheyenne, with 1860 light-cavalry saber, from the Lessard Photo Collection).The arc shape of the saber may reflect moon imagery (see Imre Nagy, 2003: 227 regarding accretive moon-horn-claw motives). The Northern Cheyenne-Kansas Historical Society ledger on the PILA site shows a warrior armed with a saber in a number of images (Plates 2, 13, 17, 26, 27, 30, 35).


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Provenance

Provenance: Drawn in 1879 by Northern Cheyenne leader Wild Hog (incorrectly denoted as "Hagetta" in the text) ...

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Document Info
Plate No: 2
Page No: Inside Front Cover
Media: Lead pencil outlines and details; red and blue crayon
Dimensions: 13x9 cm, single column
Custodian
The Sch�yen Collection. London and Oslo. http://www.schoyencollection.com/aboutus.html
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