Skidi Stories THESIS Presented in Partial Fulfillment

Skidi Stories

THESIS

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Fine Arts in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University

Brian Ray Barber

Graduate Program in Art

The Ohio State University

2012

Master's Examination Committee:

Richard Harned, Advisor,

Steven Thurston,

George Rush

Brian Ray Barber

2012

Abstract

The Pawnee traditionally lived between the Platte and Loup Rivers in what would become central Nebraska. In 1875 the majority of the Pawnee Nation moved to Indian

Territory, bringing to an end their traditional way of life on the plains. My grandfather, the son of a tribal chief, was an important figure in the preservation of Pawnee artifacts in the twentieth century through large donations to major U.S. museums.

These artifacts, along with the myths and folktales of the Pawnee, have inspired my artwork. I am fascinated by the Pawnee culture and am very proud to be a part of the

Pawnee Nation. I look to draw meaning and insight from these traditions using glass as my chosen medium of expression. I combine the traditions of western art that I have spent the last sixteen years studying with the stories and traditions of this “lost universe” in an effort to live with the traditions of my ancestors. “We tell the stories of our past”, writes the ethnographer Keith Basso, “and in turn, history breathes life into us.”

I have produced three individual pieces that are each based on a specific Pawnee myth. The final form of each piece is based on an architectural modeling process that best suites the conceptual thrust of the piece. I am interested in the intersection of art and architecture and how materials along with tradition meet at this point. Ultimately, I am interested in using architectural space as an atmosphere in which the sacred elements of the Pawnee may be embodied in an effort to represent the culture through stories.

Dedication

This document is dedicated to my wonderful wife, Amber.

You see the best in me and bring it out.

iii

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank all of those who have encouraged me along the way. I owe a great deal to Richard Harned for allowing me the opportunity to return to Ohio State and for guiding me through the past few years. As I move on to architecture school I will do my best to make you proud.

George Rush for challenging me as I developed a voice of my own. I have had a few teachers along the way that have fundamentally shifted the way I look at things by broadening my view of the world around me. You are on that list George.

Steve Thurston brought a degree of philosophical insight into my working process, and posed the most challenging questions in my reviews. You have helped me stay on track in a calm, thoughtful manner.

Tom Hawk has always been an ever-present resource, not only for employment, but also for insight and positive thinking when I needed it the most. Tom, you are a true friend.

Luca Rattazzi, for teaching me how to really work with glass and for giving the naïve kid from Ohio a chance to work in his shop. I miss those days.

Finally, Preston Singletary for showing me that being a Native American, an artist, a mentor, and most importantly, a family man, is not an impossible endeavor. You live life well my friend and I admire you for it!

Vita

2010- Present ...... Instructor of Record

Department of Art

The Ohio State University

2001 - 2009 ...... Glassblower/Gaffer, Manifesto Corporation,

Seattle, WA

2009 - 2010 ...... Volunteer, Hilltop Artist in Residence,

Tacoma, WA

2000 ...... Core Student, Penland School of Crafts,

Penland, NC

1999 ...... B.F.A.

The Ohio State University

Exhibitions

2012 ...... Next Wave 2012:

Master of Fine Art Thesis Exhibition

Urban Arts Space

The Ohio State University v

2005 ...... Changing Hands 2: Art Without Reservation

Museum of Arts and Design

New York, NY

2002 ...... Fusing Traditions

Museum of Craft and Folk Art

San Francisco, CA

Fields of Study

Major Field: Art

Table of Contents

Abstract...... ii

Dedication...... iii

Acknowledgments ...... iv

Vita...... v

List of Figures...... viii

Chapter 1: Introduction...... 1

Chapter 2: Tradition...... 4

Chapter 3: Material ...... 7

Chapter 4: The Work ...... 11

Chapter 5: Conclusion ...... 24

Appendix A: Pawnee Stories ...... 30

vii

List of Figures

Figure 1. Installation view in Urban Arts Space...... 11

Figure 2. “A Story of Faith (Loup River)” ...... 12

Figure 3. Loup River drawing...... 13

Figure 4. “A Story of Faith (Loup River)” detail ...... 14

Figure 5. “When Stars Came to Earth”...... 15

Figure 6. Elk skin map...... 16

Figure 7. “When Stars Came to Earth” drawing...... 18

Figure 8. Kepler’s drawing of the universe ...... 19

Figure 9. “Pawnee Lodge”...... 20

Figure 10. Pawnee Lodge drawing ...... 21

Figure 11. Pawnee village, 1868...... 22

Figure 12. Pawnee Buttes ...... 23

Figure 13. “The Breath of Heaven, The Vault of Heaven” ...... 26

Figure 14. “The Great Cleansing Ceremony”...... 27

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Chapter 1: Introduction

The Loup River is a 68-mile tributary of the Platte River in central Nebraska. Like the land between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, the fertile land between the Platte and

Loup Rivers once provided for its inhabitants everything they needed to survive. It was a veritable Garden of Eden for the Pawnee Nation. Along the north bank of the Loup River the lives and stories, traditions and ceremonies of my ancestors, the Skidi Pawnee, took place and were passed on from generation to generation.

There are universal truths found in these stories that speak to everyone. We find a connection and a feeling of camaraderie, in the troubles and triumphs of the protagonists.

To the authors, life and death were found in the rolling grasslands, in the blanket of stars across the night sky, and in the rivers that fed their Garden. It was a cosmos to itself, a grand story that took place over hundreds, perhaps thousands of years.

My trips through Nebraska have been tied to an imaging of how the landscape appeared to the Skidi two hundred years ago, before their move to the reservation in

Oklahoma. The Platte and Loup Rivers meandered through this landscape as two crystal clear arteries of life, untouched and not yet polluted by “progress”. The only earth- altering element in the landscape was the enormous herds of buffalo, numbering in the tens of thousands each. How beautiful the grassy landscape must have been, sparsely populated by men and trees; the currents of air recorded by the tall grass, mimicked the waves and rhythms of a far off ocean. The sky, unframed by buildings or other signs of 1 man must have seemed so large and wonderful. There are remnants of this universe in the ground: ruins of an Earthlodge, arrowheads, and fragments of bones. These are evidence of the stories that took place here, “that happened here, in this very place.”1

We all participate in a story, and ultimately our stories help to create communities. Each of these communities eventually fades and bleeds into the next.

Realities become memories, and memories become artifacts and legacies. We are left with the history of a way of living. “We are not completely separated from these past worlds”, William Chapman wrote, “the past is at its best when it takes us to places that counsel and instruct, that show us who we are by showing us where we have been, that remind us of our connection to what happened here.”2

The importance of this activity could not be a heavier load. There will forever be the threat of a culture and its wisdom fading into history to be forgotten and lost. Maurice

Frink expressed the delicacy of the contemporary atmosphere in 1961 when he wrote:

“So what? One may ask. Who cares to what deities a vanished people prayed?

What does it matter today that once there were Indians that believed in a

supernatural being named Tirawa, that they saw him in the rains and the

lightning, and heard the first thunder of the spring as his sign that planting

season had come? It matters because the people who were possessors of our land

are becoming part of us. Their dark skins are becoming lighter as their blood

slowly mingles with ours. This process of integration, which is proceeding at a

steady pace, will strengthen us to the point that the good stays on top – to the

extent that we derive value from assimilation of higher qualities of a people whom

some of us have found it too easy to consider a lesser race.

The Indian contribution to our culture is by no means limited to our folklore and

our place names. It appears in our art and music and literature; and even in such

mundane matters as food and clothing and equipment. But in our fast-moving

civilization the Indian, in a process of acculturation, is rapidly losing his “Indian-

ness”, and there is an urgent necessity to make sure that the traditions and

values, tangible and intangible, of his culture are preserved.”3

I am the product of the assimilation. While I was blessed to grow up under fortunate circumstances, I have always experienced a deep-seeded longing for the world that passed into history so long ago and to connect with my ancestors and extended family.

My work is an expression of this desire; it is my effort to rediscover and personalize cultural elements that were so important to my ancestors. It is an exploration of my

“Indian-ness”.

In this paper I will begin by looking at how tradition has influenced my worldview. I will then discuss the material of glass as a medium of expression, including a brief history of glass and the experience of the glassblowing process. Then I will discuss the three pieces I have produced for my thesis project, describing each piece in detail and how each piece was inspired by a specific Pawnee myth. I will also describe the specific processes I used in making the pieces and the technical challenges they presented.This work is not only an exploration of material processes, but also a study of tradition, myth, and the importance of the sacred to a specific culture: the Pawnee.

Chapter 2: Tradition

“Tradition constructs the future out of the past; its force is the individual who makes through a single action – carving a saint or singing a song – a double connection.”4

Tradition can only come from community. A craftsman must have the insight of the past in order to streamline the knowledge, react to the accepted standards, and to help forge a path for the future.

Today in the western world we are able to choose our community. We have become a transient society, both physically and socially. Our knowledge base comes from our physical community as well as a digital community: a collection of information and sporadic social interactions. If we are interested in 18th century Hindu painting, we can study the tradition and practice the methods that we find online. We could even contact someone in India who is perhaps a master of the “Company” painting style and become a student. How can this compare to the lifelong investment in a community tradition linked to a people and their land? Tradition is born out of necessity, shaped by innovation, and is an effort to make the conditions (environmental, social, or political) of a given society more tolerable, more efficient, and perhaps even more enjoyable.

This is my crisis of identity: I am by blood Pawnee; I grew up separated from the

Pawnee customs, traditions, and community. My knowledge of the Pawnee culture has 4 been from sporadic family gatherings and books that I have been able to study on the

Pawnee. In college I studied the traditions of Western art and after school I studied and practiced the traditions of Venice. The search for my own voice has led me to an amalgamation of these traditions.

The Pawnee have always adapted to environmental conditions. When the weather grew cold, they moved in to earthen lodges with other families to pool resources and provide greater warmth. In the summers they migrated with the buffalo in teepees. The appearance of the first Europeans prompted the tribes to prolong the inevitable as long as possible and work with the new settlers. When they were moved to the reservation, most became full-time farmers. My grandfather was one who saw that the future would be shaped by a malleable, yet culturally strong people.

Uppit (Pawnee for grandfather) was born at the beginning of the twentieth century on the reservation in eastern Oklahoma. At the age of twelve he was sent to a boarding school in Kansas. Until that time, he had been living as the Pawnee had for the previous forty years since relocating to the reservation: farming the land given to them by the U.S. government. By the end of his academic career he had attended Oklahoma Baptist

University, playing on the football team all four years. Eventually, he attended

Southwestern Baptist Seminary to become a preacher and missionary. After college he married the redheaded daughter of a white Baptist preacher and by the time he attended seminary they had five children. In an effort to protect his family from the troubles of reservation life he chose to spend his preaching career elsewhere. Uppit died in May of

1987, when I was just eleven years old. The two things he impressed upon me in the short

5 time I had with him: hold tightly to the faith, and be proud to be Pawnee, “Chaticks Si

Chaticks!” (Men of Men!).

The Pawnee will once again adapt to shifting cultural influences. The author

Elizabeth Dodd once wrote while reflecting on the Skidi star chart, standing in a Kansas streambed:

“Indian Grass still lifts its light-catching spikelets like feather fronds, bright in

the southern-sky sun. When I turn so it is backlit, each seed incandesces,

impossibly fragile and bright. Throughout the growing season, stalks lift bits of

silica skyward, then spill their mineral cargo back to earth when at last the plant

degrades to soil. And what is silica? Minute ejecta from exploded stars, exhaled

to the universe to fetch up in sand grains in a prairie streambed or in dead grass

left standing from summers past. Hikusu’, breath; hutu:ru’, wind.”4

I am Skidi, people born from stars, and by some simple twist I was introduced to glassblowing, (lifting silica), at a young age. At times I wonder if it is any accident that I have come to work with this medium of glass. I have been developing work that addresses what I see as an evolving purpose of tradition within contemporary cultural currents. The necessity of tradition has shifted from the use of everyday objects in ceremony and common activities to one of preservation and renewal.

Chapter 3: Material

Throughout history, glass has been looked upon with dream-like wonder. Glass lenses are made to gaze upon the heavens and dream of what is out there. Fiber optics, made of tiny threads of glass, are used in hi-tech communication linking countries and continents around the world. In the Bible, Heaven is said to be on the shores of a sea of glass. It is at once a mysterious and beautiful material that inspires dreams and clarifies visions. No other material has the ability to affect our thoughts or shape our reality in the same manner. Its origins are somewhat cloudy, only adding to the mysterious aura of the material. In Renaissance Venice it was one of the largest assets for the empire. If glassblowers were able to escape from the islands of Murano and make it to England they were knighted. If they were caught, they were killed. In 1667 four glassmakers managed to make it to Paris. Venice’s ruling Council of Ten heard of this and sent assassins after them. Once found, each man was killed on the spot.

Working in glass is difficult. The level of skill required to realize a form sometimes takes years to achieve. Glass studios are always hot, smoky environments and the actual practice of blowing glass is unlike any other process. The Maestro, Lino

Tagliapietra, used to tell his apprentices, “If you really want to learn to work with glass, really get to know its nature, make goblets for seven years!” The sentiment in this statement is that the student’s focus must be sharp because the material is too broad; there 7 are too many possibilities. Lino shared this insight because of his own experiences in the factories of Murano. Each day was spent making product; repeating the same form all day. The form would change with each product, but an entire workday was always spent making the same product.

Any student of glassblowing has the desire to reproduce what was once made. It is a curiosity of “how did they do that?” as well as “am I capable of doing that too?”

These questions are only answered through manual experience. It is an addiction to the material and all of its mysterious traits. Like a new lover, the glass student becomes obsessed with every nuance and physical quality encapsulated in this seductive material.

The student wants to know everything; they want to spend all of their free time getting to know its movements, its reaction to motion, touch, interaction to light and heat. The student wants to know what it is like to be a master of glass, and for many, this becomes the meaningful focus of their life in glass.

As the rest of the world evolved with periods like the Industrial Revolution, and the idea of efficiently producing materials by way of mechanized production spread, the process of glassblowing remained unchanged. An assistant who establishes the first bubble also makes the initial gather of glass on the pipe. It is then passed to another assistant so the glass can be manipulated further through additional gathers of glass, the application of color, or blowing the glass into a mold. Finally, it is passed to the “gaffer” or Maestro to be finished and placed into a cooling oven. It has been the same for over a thousand years.

Manifesto Corporation was a production glass shop that was part of Resolute lighting in Seattle, and I was there for eight years. We produced hand-blown glass lighting for companies such as Starbucks, Wells Fargo, Panera Bread, and various architecture firms from the area. The man who ran the whole operation was Luca

Rattazzi. The son of Italian immigrants, Luca had spent his college years studying industrial design. He began blowing glass at a relatively young age and eventually became an apprentice of the famed Maestro Lino Tagliapietra. All of this experience culminated in Manifesto. Luca and Lino designed the glass shop, so it was set up and run in the Venetian tradition. There was a team of glassblowers working out of multiple furnaces of clear and colored glass. Each team member had a specific job, and all were collectively working on a single product. It was the same setup Lino had worked in since the beginning of his career in Venice.

As part of a larger lighting company, Manifesto was able to enjoy worldwide distribution of their products. Needless to say, the pressure was on to produce, and Luca was the ever-patient teacher. With the constant flow of young, new graduates from glass programs across the country trying to fulfill the dream of making it in Seattle, Luca was always hiring and training new employees, most of whom had no idea how to blow glass in a factory. When I began at Manifesto I had been working with glass for four years. I thought I had a pretty good handle on the material, and after a week in the hotshop, I was questioning my legitimacy as a glassblower. Eventually I caught on to the fast pace of production at Manifesto, moving up the ranks from opening and closing a two-part mold to managing the team of glassblowers, but it was a long process.

It has long been my desire to distance my work from that which has already been accomplished. I have sought to produce work that is very personal and seeks to touch on some universal truth while pushing the physical and conceptual limits of my chosen material. I wish to re-till this fertile soil in an effort to produce new growth because no longer are clever ideas or technical mastery based on traditional virtuosity enough. In this age of technological magic wands, those who make objects with their hands must wave a double-edged sword: they must engage with their minds. There must be a certain depth of meaning or poetic intellectual engagement.

Chapter 4: The Work

Fig. 1 View of installation at Urban Arts Space Gallery, May 2012

A Story of Faith: Loup River

Fig. 2 “A Story of Faith: Loup River”

“A Story of Faith: Loup River” (Figure 2) consists of a 36” x 14” x 3” piece of sandcast glass resting on a sawhorse base fabricated from 1”x 3” oak boards and is 34” tall. The glass is a scale contour model of a segment of the Loup River in Nebraska. Cast into the glass is a small copper foil silhouette of a magpie (Figure 4) measuring roughly

1/8” x 1/8”. The top surface of the casting is smooth as a result of the casting process.

The underside, which follows the measurements of a satellite map of the Loup is embedded with bits of sand and is textured as a result of the sandcasting process. The resulting object appears as a frozen river that has been pulled from the earth for examination.

Fig. 3 drawing for “Loup River” based on satellite imagery

There are several versions of the folktale that this piece is based, depending on what band of Pawnee the storyteller belongs. The differences are minimal and what is important is that the boy in the story is guided to the Animal Lodge, found beneath the

Loup River, by a small messenger bird that is able to fly through water. To follow the bird, the boy must act in faith and take the plunge into the river, an act that would

13 normally result in death. The prayerful boy places his faith in the Great Spirit, Tirawa, to whom he has been praying. The help of the animals is employed to find a cure for an illness given to him by a jealous medicine man because the boy is himself a gifted medicine man, and the elder feels threatened. His dubious act results in his own demise once the boy has fully recovered. A version of the complete stories that inspired this work can be found in Appendix A.

Fig. 4 detail of “A Story of Faith: Loup River”

The glass element for “Loup River” was cast in a bed of sand. Sandcasting involves pressing an object, the positive, into a bed of sand to create a negative space.

The negative space is then filled with molten glass, creating another positive, in solid glass. I found it poetic that sand remained on the bottom surface of the casting. The elements of earth and fire were involved in the process of producing this object and remain a part of it once it is finished. 14

When Stars Came to Earth

Fig. 5 “When Stars Came to Earth”

“When Stars Came to Earth” (Figure 5), is based on the Pawnee creation myth.

The glass “bowl” is 22” across and 11”deep. Carved into the inside surface of the glass is a map of the stars that is based on an elk-skin map from a sacred ceremonial bundle. The 15 map was found in a Sacred Bundle held at the Field Museum in Chicago. It is hand drawn directly on the elk hide. It is an oval piece of leather so the map can include both the winter and summer constellations. Around the rim of the skin are small holes meant for a drawstring. It was this detail that initially inspired the piece. The idea of taking the night sky and bundling it up in a small bag sparked the idea of transcribing such a map on the inside of a piece of glass.

Fig. 6 Skidi star map

In the story, the Morning Star fell in love with the Evening Star and chased her across the night sky. Finally catching up with her, he convinced her to fall in love and their offspring were sent to earth as the first humans.

This piece was challenging to produce for a couple of reasons. My initial thought was that scale would be very important to the finished piece. I wanted the viewer to 16 experience it physically as well as engaging the story or history of the work. I decided the best way to make the glass was to make a large bubble off the end of a blowpipe and cut it in half after it came out of the annealing oven. I knew I would be limited by the inside dimensions of the annealing ovens, and also by my own physical abilities to handle such a large amount of glass. In the end I was able to make a bubble twenty-two inches in diameter. Once it came out of the annealing oven, the next step was to cut it in half.

The most effective way to achieve this was to use an oxy-propane torch. First the annealed bubble is placed on a turntable. It is spun on the turntable to draw a line at the halfway point with a marker. Next, a quarter inch line is scored on opposite sides along the line with a glasscutter. Finally, the piece is turned on the turntable while holding an oxygen propane torch on the line for roughly thirty seconds. The build up of heat on the line creates tension at that point on the bubble. After thirty seconds, the torch is taken away and the score line begins to cool. As the glass is cooling it must release the built up tension and it breaks along the line. Once the bubble was cut in half, I had a dome that would serve as my map. I then carved the image of the map on the inside by hand with a diamond-tipped engraving tool.

Fig.7 drawing for “When Stars Came to Earth” based on star map

The inspiration for the final form of this piece was Kepler’s model of the universe. I found the correlation between the map and the model by Kepler intriguing and decided that the piece that I was making could resemble one of his models, making a visual connection to a search for information and truth that was taking place in both cultures, highlighting yet another common trait of what it is to be human.

Fig. 8 Kepler’s Platonic solid model of the solar system, 1600

Pawnee Lodge

Fig. 9 Pawnee Lodge

“Pawnee Lodge” (Figure 9) is a 10” x 15” x 16” mold-blown piece of milky white, semi-transparent glass that rests on a 40” x 24” x 24” oak pedestal. Inside of the mold-blown glass is a four-sided plate glass cube made up of white, yellow, red, and smoke colored sides. Each side of the cube corresponds to a direction of the wind. The form of the mold-blown glass is an amalgamation of shapes derived from the outer shape of an Earthlodge and the form of the Pawnee Buttes in eastern Colorado/ western

Nebraska. The buttes, according to myth, were formed by the breath of Tirawa, and made as a means of protection for the Pawnee. Tirawa, as a gift to the Pawnee, also described the plans of the earth lodge at the beginning of time. Its architecture is based around the observation of constellations and the seasons, the basis of their everyday life as well as their belief system.

Fig. 10 drawing of the observational geometry of a Pawnee Earthlodge

I was initially interested in producing some form of an Earthlodge because it is the encapsulation of the Pawnee culture. Civilizations have their pinnacle of expression, the one form of visual art that embodies a certain level of importance within the society.

In Italy the debate is whether painting or sculpture holds this honor. In New Zealand it is the Maori marae. For the Pawnee it is the Earthlodge.

The challenge with this piece was to make a mold that was large enough in scale, and variable to a certain degree. I thought the notion that the mold could produce a

21 slightly different shape each time I used it would provide for a more complex final product that I might not necessarily be able to conceive of initially. The result was a mold that was a 24” in diameter and 26” in height circle of welded plate steel resting on a solid wood base. Inside the steel cylinder I placed lengths of 1” x 1” wood on end, which filled the inside area. The negative space defined by the varying lengths of 1” x 1” described the amalgamated shape of the Earthlodge and butte. The mold was open-ended on the top so I was able to blow a large-scale bubble into the mold and fill the negative space. The resulting shapes were both unique, and beyond anything I could have anticipated. This process also lends itself to more experimentation in the future.

Fig. 11 Pawnee village, 1868

By merging the two forms of the Earthlodge and the Pawnee Buttes, I am highlighting the connection between the landscape and Pawnee way of life. Every detail

22 about the world around them was important. Their belief was to live in harmony with everything, being good stewards of what Tirawa provided.

The Pawnee Buttes are mysterious formations in the middle of the Pawnee

Grasslands National Park. Almost appearing out of nothing, the impression they leave is that only some supernatural force could have placed them.

Fig. 12 Pawnee Buttes

Chapter 5: Conclusion

I have come to realize that the work I have produced for my thesis is an extension of two works that I produced ten years ago. Perhaps I needed time to mature and catch up with myself. The two pieces, “The Breath of Heaven, The Vault of Heaven” (Figure 13), and “The Great Cleansing Ceremony” (Figure 14) are based on springtime ceremonies.

Both glass elements are sandcast.

“The Vault of Heaven, the Breath of Heaven” is a depiction of a face painting used in the Great Cleansing ceremony with the line over the forehead symbolizing the vault of Heaven and the line down the nose is the breath of Heaven. The bust is a portrait of my grandfather I made from memory. The pattern is painted on the surface of the glass with oil paint that was applied by hand.

“The Great Cleansing Ceremony” has two sandcast figures mounted on two pieces of wood painted with wax and pigment. The figures symbolize a type of before and after that is the theological crux of the ceremony.

This thesis project began as an effort to build an Earthlodge out of wood and glass. As my research progressed, my focus shifted from merely replicating an

Earthlodge to engaging other cultural elements. I was able to develop multiple layers of

24 meaning and push myself both conceptually and technically. The result, I believe, is a rich blend of technical difficulty and cultural meaning.

It has become a study of a world that passed away over one hundred years ago.

The Pawnee culture is still alive, however it has dramatically been changed as a result of their relocation and the cultural forces that have influenced the younger generations.

In the past ten years there has been a cultural resurgence and an effort to preserve what elements remain. The Pawnee language has finally been transcribed into a written form that can be taught. In 2010 the first Earthlodge in 150 years was built in Nebraska.

The relationship between the Pawnee nation and the local government of Genoa,

Nebraska (the site of the largest Pawnee villages) has been re-established and is growing.

The city hosted a Pow-Wow a couple of years ago and for the first time since 1875,

Pawnee families were able to swim in the Loup River, an acknowledgement of the life that was once sustained by those waters.

Fig. 13 “The Breath of Heaven, the Vault of Heaven”

Fig. 14 “The Great Cleansing Ceremony”

Notes

1. Basso, Keith H., Wisdom Sits in Places, (Albuquerque, University of New Mexico Press, 1996), 79.

2. Chapman, William, Preserving the Past, (London, Comaroff, J., 1979)

3. Frink, Maurice, Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk-Tales, (Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press, 1961), v – vi.

4. Dodd, Elizabeth, “Constellation”, Ascent, (Concordia College Online Journal, 2012).

Bibliography

Basso, Keith H., Wisdom Sits in Places, Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1996.

Chamberlain, Von Del, When Stars Came Down to Earth: Cosmology of the Skidi Pawnee Indians of North America, Los Altos: Ballena Press, College Park: University of Maryland Center for Archaeoastronomy, 1982.

Dodd, Elizabeth, “Constellation”, Ascent, Concordia College Online Journal, 2012.

Dorsey, George A., The Pawnee Mythology, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997.

Grinnell, George Bird, Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk-Tales, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1961.

Appendix A: Pawnee Stories

A Story of Faith (Loup River)

When the Skidi band of Pawnee were living on the Loup River, the other three bands lived near the mouth of the Platte River. A child was born in the Skidi village and as he grew he developed many mysterious ways and acted peculiarly. He would not play with the other children but would wander off by himself and play “medicine-man”.

It became obvious that the boy had a gift when he began to heal sick people in the village. He did not make a practice of curing the sick, but only at times when mysterious influences came over him.

The people, on their hunts, met the other band of Skidi, and they told them of the wonderful boy. The Skidi men who were told of this boy went home and told their band that the lower band had a medicine-child who was wonderful and had the power to cure the sick. The most powerful medicine man heard this and decided to pay the boy a visit to learn what powers he possessed and see from where the boy gained his power.

During his visit, the two spoke of the mysteries of a medicine man, of the heavens, and of the animals. The last night of the visit the two smoked tobacco from the medicine man’s pipe. The next morning he left and went back to his village.

Over time, the boy grew very sick. He knew that the medicine man had poisoned him. This was a disgrace, and the boy did not know how to get out of it. He would go off and cry, and pray to Tirawa, and sometimes would stay away for three to four days without anything to eat. Eventually, he felt so terrible that he went off to kill himself.

He wandered for several days until he finally found a place to lie down. He stopped, feeling very badly, having been in mourning the entire time. He was there several days, and one night it happened that he fell asleep (fainted), for he was exhausted with much weeping and praying. Something spoke to him and said, “What are you doing here?” He woke up and looked around but saw no one. It was only a voice. Another night when he was asleep a voice asked him, “What are you doing here?” He awoke and looked around but saw no one. A third night the same thing happened and he began wondering what it meant. Then he answered, “ Whomever you are who speaks to me, look at me and you will see that I am poor in mind. I am a boy, and yet I am in a condition that no boy was ever in before. I am here only to suffer and die. Whoever you are who speaks to me, take pity on me and help me.” He received no answer.

The fourth night something touched him. The boy awoke to see a whitish elk. The boy sat up and the elk began to speak. “I have heard of your condition, and I am here to tell you that we all know of your trouble. Right here, under you, is the home of the

Nahu’rac (animals). I can only help you so far as to take you to the place the animals are.

If it is impossible for the animals to help you, we still have the One above to look to.” As soon as he had said this he vanished like a wind.

The boy fell asleep again, with his mind full of these things. In his sleep, something spoke to him, saying, “ I know you feel badly and your mind is poor. I have passed you many times and have heard your crying. Those who command me have told me to bring you to them.” The boy awoke to find a small bird sitting next to him. “I feel pleased that you understand my poor mind”, the boy said, “ now take pity on me and help

32 me.” The bird said to him, “ you must not talk this way to me. I am but only a servant.

Tomorrow night I will come this way and I will show you what to do. Tomorrow night I will come this way and whatever you see me do, you do the same thing. Then he disappeared.

The next night the bird was flying about him, waiting for the right time. When the time came, the bird flew close to the boy and said, “Come, let’s go to the edge of the bank.” When they had come to the edge of the bank above the water of the river, the bird said, “Now friend you are poor of mind. What I do, you do. When I dive off this bank, you follow me.” So when the bird dove off the bank the boy followed. He cared for nothing he did except to follow the bird. As he sprang it seemed to him he felt as if he could sail through the air. Just as he reached the surface of the water, it seemed to him that he was standing at the entrance of a lodge. He could look into it and see a fire burning in the middle of the lodge.

He entered the lodge to ask the animals for their help. After many days of deliberation the animals decided they could help the boy. They put him to sleep and devoured the parts of his body that were sick. The ground dogs mainly did this because they eat men when other food is scarce. They emptied his body out because his illness had taken over his body. The boy was asleep for many days, but since he was a gifted healer he knew how to heal himself from the injuries inflicted by the animals. Eventually, the boy awoke and was grateful to the animals. He spent more time in the Animal Lodge learning their ways. After several nights he was sent home, but before he left he promised to practice their ways among his people and to respect the animals with ceremony. White

Beaver, the head of the animals, also instructed him to pay a visit to the doctor who gave him the illness.

The boy was welcome home with a big celebration because all thought he was dead. After a few weeks he went to visit the Medicine Man who had given him the illness.

The Medicine Man wasn’t worried about the boy’s visit because he thought no one could overtake him. The two met and smoked all night. While they smoked they boy moved his mouth as if eating, but did not open his mouth. As the sun rose the boy said he should return home. He left the Medicine Man’s lodge and when he got down to the river, he blew strongly upon the ice, and immediately the water in the river was full of blood. It was the blood of the Medicine Man. It seems the ground dogs had taught the boy how to do their things.

When the people found the Medicine Man he was dead, and his body was all hollow. All his blood, and the inside of him had gone into the river, and had gone down to feed the animals. So the boy kept his promise to the animals and had revenge on the

Medicine Man.

Dispersion of the gods and the First People

Told by Roaming Scout

In the beginning heaven and earth were unseparated. Tirawa, chief of deities, stations the gods in the sky, as Stars, Sun, and Moon; toward the western paradise, as ministers of Evening Star, he places Cloud, Wind, Lighting, and Thunder; by these, in tempest, the earth is animated. Of the evening and Morning Stars is born a girl, and of the Sun and Moon, a boy; these are put on earth, receive intelligence from the spirits of the storm, cohabit, and give birth to the first man; for the sake of the infant they begin to study clothing, food, and shelter; the boy makes arrows in imitation of those carried by his grandfather the Sun; in vision, the Evening Star gives directions for preparing a sacred bundle. The people multiply, and discover the existence of other peoples, who have also received sacred bundles, the use of which they do not yet know. All the peoples are brought together for a great ceremony, their camps being arranged according to the relative celestial positions of the particular stars on which they severally depend; rites are communicated after the revelation of the Evening Star. The first man dies, and his skull is placed in the bundle; after a time it is accidentally broken, and replaced by the skull of a successor.

Origin of the Chaui

After Tirawa had created the sun, moon, stars, the heavens, the earth, and all things upon the earth, he spoke, and at the sound of his voice a woman appeared on the surface of the earth. Tirawa spoke to the gods in the heavens and asked them what he should do to make the woman happy and that she might give increase. The moon spoke and said, “All things you have made, you have made in pairs, as the heavens and earth, sun and moon. Give a mate to the woman so that they might live together and help one another in life.” Tirawa made a man and sent him to the woman; then he said: “Now I will speak to both of you. I give you the earth. You shall call the earth “mother”. The heavens you shall call “father”. You shall also call moon “mother” because she rises in the east; and you shall call the sun “father”, for he rises in the east. In time you, woman, shall be known as “mother”, and the man shall be known as “father”. I give you the sun to give you light. The moon will also give you light. The earth I give you, and you are to call her mother, for she gives birth to all things. The timber that shall grow on the earth you shall make use of in many ways. Some of the trees shall have fruit upon them.

Shrubs will grow from the ground and they will have berries on them. All these things I give you, and you shall eat them. Never forget to cal the earth “mother”, for you are to live upon her. You must love her, for you must walk upon her. I will now show you how to build a lodge, so that you will not get cold, or wet from the rain. Go and get timber.

Cut ten forked sticks and set them in a circle. Cut some poles to lay across the forks. Four of the upright forks must form a parallelogram, with the longest sides extending east and west. The posts that are set in the ground to uphold the lodge represent the four Gods who hold up the heavens in the northeast, northwest, southwest, and southeast. There are minor Gods between these, with powers that connect the power of the one God to another. There is also an outer circle of many Gods, and you shall cut poles to represent them; their power also extends from one God to another. The south side of the lodge will be for men, for the men will be strong, so they must be on the right. The north side shall be for the women, for they are not as strong as the men, so they should be on the left. The entrance for the lodge shall always face east, for the lodge you are to build shall breathe as if human. Five posts are on the south side representing the five branches of the man, two leg, two arms, and a head. The five forks on the north side also stand for the five branches of the woman. You shall net willows together. These shall be thrown upon the east side of the four posts that stand for the gods in the heavens. These willows will represent the ribs of the four gods that the posts represent. When the lodge is complete, dig in the center for the fireplace and I will give you fire-sticks so that you can make your fire. These fire-sticks belong to the sun. When you make the fireplace, dig up the dirt in the enter of the lodge and take it out and place it in front of the lodge in the form of a mound, so that when the sun shall rise in the east he will see that mound. Fire will do many things for you.