Section 4

SUN DANCE BUNDLES
A s the sun dance of the Crow Indians has been fully described l\ by Dr. Lowie in his paper. The Sun Dance of the Crow (Lowie, ^ JL1915), only such information as has not been incorporated in his paper will be presented here.^
ORIGIN OF THE SUN DANCE BUNDLE
The sun dance bundle is not only the most sacred bundle among the Crow Indians but it is also one of the oldest, its origin extending back many generations, if not centuries. The origin of this bundle at first appeared to the writer to be lost. A large num- ber of the oldest Crows were questioned about this but none could give a satisfactory answer.
Dr. Lowie presented as the story of the origin of the sun dance bundle an account given him by Bird- AU-Over-the- Ground in which a Crow named Four Dance {Andicicope) was credited with the discovery of the sun dance doll.^ This account is obviously erroneous in view of the following facts :
Four Dance was a comparatively recent individual. He died about 1870 and was well remembered by a few of the Crow Indians still Hving in 1927. He was said to have been an old man at the time of his death. If we estimate the date of his birth at approxi- mately 1800, it seems improbable that he would have received his vision of the sun dance doll until he was 20 to 25 years of age. This would bring the origin of the Crow sun dance well within the historic period. One sun dance bundle collected by the writer is undoubtedly of earHer origin. (See the account of the Sees-the- Tent-Ground bundle, and the color reproduction of the dolls in that bundle in Plate 2).
^ One of the best descriptions of the Crow sun dance in the literature is the one given to Lewis Henry Morgan by the Crow trader, Robert Meldrum, in 1862. (Morgan, 1959. pp. 183-188). Edward S.Curtis pubhshed an excel- lent description of the sun dance given by Big Shadow in 1844, as told to him by Hunts-to-Die. (Curtis, Vol. IV. 1909. pp. 67-80).
« Lowie (1915- PP- 13-14)-
20
SUN DANCE BUNDLES 21
Furthermore, the writer obtained the story of Four Dance's vision quest from Chief Two Leggings, who knew Four Dance. In this account it is related that when Four Dance fasted he took with him a sun dance effigy belonging to his grandmother which he hoped would aid him to obtain a vision. Two Leggings' account of Four Dance's experience is otherwise similar to the one published by Dr. Lowie, except that Four Dance, through his vision, was believed to have become invulnerable.
What appears to be an older Crow tradition of the origin of the sun dance bundle was related by Two Leggings, Chief of the River Crows. Two Leggings served me as a principal informant on Crow Indian religion for nearly five years prior to his death in April 1923.'
"Many years ago the Crows had no enemies. They never went on the warpath to kill members of other tribes. All lived in peace and were happy.
"One day a man whose real name I do not recall, but whom I shall call Prairie-Dog-Man, went on a deer hunt and took his little son with him. Some strange people emerged from the edge of the forest, ran to the Httle boy and killed him, and then disappeared. Prairie-Dog-Man was heartbroken. He went out into the hills, weeping and mourning. There he heard a voice from above saying to him. 'Build a structure for the sun. Those who killed your son are forest people.'
"Although Prairie-Dog-Man heard the voice clearly, he could not understand the meaning of these words. He did not know what a structure for the sun might be. He returned to his people and made many inquiries, hoping that someone could tell him about a structure for the sun. He also asked the forest people. But no one could give him any information.
"Disappointed, Prairie-Dog-Man again left his village and roamed about the country. In the neighborhood of Rosebud Creek he sat down by the edge of a prairie dog village. Then suddenly he heard a voice sa5dng, 'The structure I desire you to build for the sun is over there. The forest people will come to you and you will have your revenge.'
"Prairie-Dog-Man ceased weeping, stood up, and looked a-
' According to Curtis (Vol. IV. 1909. p. 207) Two Leggings was born about the year 1848. He was a member of the Not Mixed clan, and was a war leader. J. H. Sharp's oil portrait of Two Leggings, painted from life on the Crow Reservation, is in the U. S. National Museum. It is reproduced as Fig. I in this monograph.
22 CROW INDIAN MEDICINE BUNDLES
round. But he saw no one. So he sat down again and waited. Then he noticed that the prairie dogs were assembhng and that one of them was transformed into a human being. It spoke. 'There is a living being who has come to see us. All come and gather here for you have made the structure for the sun.'
*'The prairie dog village now became transformed into an Indian village. All the mounds became tipis, their sizes proportionate to those of the different mounds. While Prairie-Dog-Man looked at the structure for the sun he noticed a man and his wife walking toward it. But a voice within it said, 'Do not come yet. You have not brought the effigy you made.'
"Although he heard these words distinctly, Prairie-Dog-Man could not see the speaker. But again he heard the voice. 'Go and return from where the sun sets.'
"Then another person appeared canying a pine tree in his arms. And when the man and woman returned from the direction of the sunset he heard the unseen voice speak to them. 'Why did you forget this? This is the most important thing. Have pity upon that man over there and show him this/
"In the top of the pine tree was fastened a hoop made of willow and tied to it were seven eagle feathers spread out in a fan shape. The man carrying the pine tree handed it to the man and woman coming from the direction of the sunset and said, 'You have been waiting for this. Now is the time to show it to the man whose child has been killed.'
"Then the man and his wife sang a song and made a striking gesture. Suddenly there appeared a little screech owl of the kind that lives among the prairie dogs. It flew straight to the pine tree where the hoop was fastened. There it changed into an effigy. The man and his wife were nearing the structure when the voice from within, which represented the dancer, was heard to say, 'I have no skunk skin yet, nor any deerskin, nor a whistle, nor eagle plumes. '
"The man actually had these things, but he said this so that Prairie-Dog-Man might hear it. Prairie-Dog-Man also heard the sound of a rattle and was told that it represented the buffalo's genitals. Then he could see the dancer inside the structure. He had a plume fastened to his Httle finger and wore another around his neck and one on top of his head. The dancer sang a song. 'What you are going to dance has come now.' Prairie-Dog-Man had ceased mourning and watched the ceremony closely. He saw the various
SUN DANCE BUNDLES 23
facial paintings of the people inside the structure. And all the time the people were singing the same song.
"Finally Prairie-Dog-Man, feeling tired, fell asleep under a large sage brush. When he awoke next morning he found the people in the structure still singing the same song. Soon, however, he heard the camp crier calling: 'Aheal Ahea! Aheal Bring what you have. We will hold a ceremony over them all.'
"One man arose to his feet, and called out, 'I was a pipe-holder and I killed one of those who brought sorrow to you and I brought back his scalp.' He referred to the forest people. Then another rose and said, 'Down in the west there was a person killed, and when they killed him I struck him first and took his bow.'
"The men inside the structure all had feathers on their heads and their faces were painted in various designs. One after another they stood up, and each related what he had done to or taken from the enemy. Each direction was mentioned — north, south, east, and west.
"Finally the sun rose high in the sky. Prairie-Dog-Man opened his eyes wide and seemed to awake from a dream. Instead of seeing people and tipis, he saw only a field of skunk cabbage. Then he went home and told his people what he had seen. He told them to move camp to Bear Dance (a locality on Rosebud River) and there he would build a sun dance structure.
"Big Bird, a young man of small stature, fat, and an orphan, told Prairie-Dog-Man he wanted to join in the ceremony. He had always made fun of everything sacred. So the people were astonish- ed that he should want to take part in this performance. They were vStill more surprised to hear Big Bird say, 'You people should know that I am the originator of this ceremony. I have two friends who told me all about it.'^
"Before the camp arrived at Bear Dance, Big Bird told the people to gather buffalo tongues, saying that everything that lives eats. Before the structure was finished he also told them that after the ceremony they should move down the Rosebud and Tulloch Creek. 'There,' he said, 'are some people hunting buffalo, and they are the ones who are given to me.'
"After the camp arrived at Bear Dance, Big Bird took some ash wood and from it carved a doll and covered its body with deerskin.
® This reference is to two boys who, according to Crow mythology, were created by First Worker, and who became the first builders of a sweat lodge.
24 CROW INDIAN MEDICINE BUNDLES
This was the first sun dance effigy. On the cover of the effigy Big Bird painted crosses. Then he took some owl feathers and, after tying them in a bunch, fastened them to the head of the doll. All he would say was that he had been given these instructions by the two boys. And the Indians understood that he meant the two boys who had been given the sweat lodge by First Worker.
"Then Prairie-Dog-Man exclaimed, 'That is exactly the effigy I saw in my dream.'
"Big Bird then instructed the people to fetch him three poles. He tied them together at the top with rawhide ropes and inter- twined them with green-leaved willow stems. The fastened ends of the poles were raised some distance above the ground. (In later years four poles furnished the foundation of the Crow sun-dance lodge).
"In the morning," Big Bird said, 'we shall cut the other poles which are to be leaned against these three. But before doing so you must find me a virtuous woman.'
"Next day the virtuous woman was brought to the trees to be felled. Big Bird waited for her, holding a sharp-pointed antler with its point against one of the trees. He sang a song, after which the woman gave a blow with a stone axe against the other end of the antler causing the tree to fall. Big Bird then began to sing a song, and all the people gathered around struck the felled tree using the same expression as was employed in later years by a warrior when he counted coup — Ahea! The people wondered why this was necessary. Finally they said, Tt must be because some day we may go toward the forest people.'
"Then the other trees needed for the sun dance lodge were felled without ceremony. Big Bird told the people to get buffalo ropes, tie them to the poles, and drag them to the place where the structure was to be built.
"When Big Bird asked, Ts there a man among you who has a bird for a medicine?,' he received no reply. So Big Bird said he would do what his two friends had taught him. Taking an eagle wing in each hand he advanced toward the three poles that had been tied together. Moving his arms like the wings of a bird he walked up to the pole which was pointed toward the west. At the same time he sang a song, the words of which were. The buffalo are coming. '
"Then Big Bird took the effigy he had made and had Prairie- Dog-Man face the pine tree while he himself faced the sunrise. The
SUN DANCE BUNDLES 25
pine tree had been set in a large hole in the ground at the bottom of which live embers were placed and upon them a quantity of pine needles. As the incense rose toward the sky and enveloped the tree, Big Bird took the effigy and tied it with buffalo hair to the pine tree in front of the hoop with the seven feathers attached. He told Prairie-Dog-Man to look always in the face of the effigy and to dance toward it and when he came close to it to dance backward until he told him to stop. Prairie-Dog-Man was selected as the dancer because his son had been killed. And ever since that time, should a member of the tribe who is held in great esteem by his relatives be killed by an enemy, his chief mourner has been the dancer in this ceremony.
"Big Bird now sent for a rawhide. When it was brought to him he placed it on the ground in front of some of the men sitting in the structure and told them to take some sticks and beat upon it while he sang. He himself had a rattle in his hands. The words of his song were, 'BuUrushes will be your tipi poles.'
"The ceremony continued for two days. When the camp broke up Big Bird told the people that if they had any small buffalo calfskins, feathers, tails of birds, or moccasins they should tie them where the poles were fastened together or to the tops of the poles and leave them there as sacrifices to the sun. That is how sacrifices to the sun began.
"Now the camp was moved toward Tulloch Creek. There a herd of buffalo was discovered. When the hunters tried to kill some of them with their bows and arrows, they saw four people. Prairie- Dog-Man cried out, 'There are the forest people who killed my child.' The Crows all began shooting at these people and killed them. That was the first time the Crows ever killed, and the place where this happened is still known to us as 'where the first people were killed by the Crows.' After the forest people were killed, one of the Crows struck them and another took their bows and arrows. That is how the custom of counting coups originated."
NUMBER OF CROV^ SUN DANCE BUNDLES
Two Leggings named eleven Crows who had owned sun dance bundles that had been used in one or more ceremonies : With-His- Elder-Brother, Sleeps-With-Everything, Jack-Rabbit-Child, Yel- low Leggings, Somebody- Who- Gives-Food, Sore Tail, Crooked
26 CROW INDIAN MEDICINE BUNDLES
Arm, Wolf Gun, Sees-the-Living-BuU, Buffalo Horn, and Looks Under.^
Two Leggings said that he had witnessed seven Crow sun dance ceremonies. In some years several of these ceremonies were per- formed, in others none. The sun dance was not an annual cere- mony among the Crows as it was among other Plains Indian tribes.
TWO LEGGINGS SUN DANCE BUNDLE FIGURES 2, 3 AND 4
Chief Two Leggings recited the origin and described the con- tents of a sun dance bundle which was obtained from him for the museum collections shortly before his death in April 1923. This bundle is cat. no. 14/5470.
"The effigy used in the sun dance ceremony of Shows-his-Face came into my possession in later years. Having dreamed about a sun dance doll during one of my medicine fasts, I had acquired the right to possess one of these bundles. Instead of making one for myself, I bought this one from Goes- Around- All- the-Time, also known as Sees-the-Living-BuU. Soon after I came into possession of this bundle Crooked Arm told me its history. I no longer recall the name of the original owner, so I shall call him Has-No-Name :
''Near the present site of Hysham at a place they called 'the rimrock full of holes,' the Crows camped one day. Near their camp was an abandoned sun dance lodge which had been built one or two years before for Yellow Leggings. That ceremony had been the means of securing for him the revenge he desired upon his enemies.
"Has-No-Name went to fast in this old lodge, hoping to obtain a powerful medicine. He pierced his breast muscles with skewers, tied himself with thongs to one of the poles, and fasted thus. He heard voices singing, but he failed to obtain a vision. Has-No- Name again fasted in this lodge after the Crows, moved their camp up the Yellowstone. But again he saw no vision.
"Following the camp up the Yellowstone, he passed the
* Bear Crane told Lowie that he knew of six men who had owned distinct sun dance dolls. (Lowie, 1915. p. 12). However, Robert Meldrum, as early as 1862, told Morgan of eight of these images owned by Crows who loaned them to persons who made the sun dance lodge. (Morgan, 1959. pp. 185-186).
SUN DANCE BUNDLES 27
mouth of the Big Horn where he discovered the framework of an- other sun dance lodge. Again he determined to seek a vision by fasting in that abandoned lodge for several days. Once more he could hear voices singing, but he received no vision in which a supernatural appeared to him.