This site requires Javascript to be turned on. Please enable Javascript and reload the page.

Performing Archive Main Menu Visualizing the “Vanishing Race”: the photogravures of Edward S. Curtis Front Page for Visualizing the "Vanishing Race" path Curtis' Image and Life: The Network of The North American Indian, Inc. An experiment with data visualization approach to understand and contextualize Curtis' images and his life Media, Technology and Mediations Curtis's Technology, Relationships to Media and Style Contextualizing Curtis, The North American Indian, and Race the collection of essays from the contributors Consulting with Tribes as Part of Archive Development Introduction to Consulting with Tribes by Ulia Gosart Contributing Archives Information on how to participate in Performing Archive Browsing the Media A path of paths that allow users to cut through the collection in a variety of ways. Acknowledgements and Project Information Project Network

Sia buffalo dancer

29482 The Buffalo dance of the Keres is almost exactly the same as that of the Tewa. The performers are two young men with head-dresses of buffalo-hair and horns, and a girl wearing the usual female costume and a pair of small horns. The head of the hunters' society plays the part of guard. The dance is very strenuous, and the simulated actions of t he buffalo are quite realistic and readily comprehended by the spectator.

This page has paths:

Tewa Erik Loyer
Contents of this path:
1. Tewa girl
2. Chaiwa - Tewa
3. Chaiwa - Tewa, profile
4. Tewa girls
5. Sia buffalo dancer The Buffalo dance of the Keres is almost exactly the same as that of the Tewa. The performers are two young men with head-dresses of buffalo-hair and horns, and a girl wearing the usual female costume and a pair of small horns. The head of the hunters' society plays the part of guard. The dance is very strenuous, and the simulated actions of t he buffalo are quite realistic and readily comprehended by the spectator.
6. At the gateway - Acoma
7. Sentinel - San Ildefonso
8. Povi-Tamu
9. On the Rio Grande - San Ildefonso
10. Offering - San Ildefonso
11. Girl and jar - San Ildefonso
12. Ambrosio Martinez - San Juan
13. Oyi
14. Potter - Santa Clara
15. Pele - Tewa
16. Tsetsanu - Tewa
17. Shrine of Yellow Cloud Man on Tsikumupi - Tewa
18. Tewa dance - costume
19. Tewa war-god effigies
List of Large Plates Supplementing Volume Sixteen Erik Loyer
Contents of this path:
1. Taos water girls
2. Iahla
3. North pueblo at Taos
4. Walvia
5. Taos woman
6. Isleta man
7. Francisca Chiwiwi - Isleta
8. Jemez architecture On account of the comparative inaccessibility of its site on Rio Jemez, a westerly affluent of the Rio Grande, Jemez is annoyed by fewer white visitors than almost any other pueblo. The reticence and the mental sluggishness of its inhabitants do not encourage the ethnologist. The Jemez played a leading part in the rebellion of 1680 and were so severely punished by Vargas that their preference for isolation is comprehensible. They have long been intimate with the Navaho and considerable racial mixture has resulted.
9. Jemez fiscal The office of fiscal, like that of governor and alguacil, is of Spanish origin, and its incumbents are charged with the supervision of activities connected with the church, such as burial of the dead and physical care of the church building. In general the church is an institution superimposed on pueblo life: it has nowhere become an integral part of it. At Jemez several centuries of effort at Christianization have been without tangible result, except that the presence of missionaries has been a more or less beneficial object lesson in a better mode of life
10. Tuvahe - Jemez
11. Cochiti and Sia pottery
12. Ti'mu - Cochiti
13. Aiyowitsa - Cochiti
14. Lucero - Santo Domingo Photographing a native of Santo Domingo is comparable to hunting big game with a camera. This pueblo measures its contentment inversely to the extent of unavoidable contact with the hated white race. A guard is detailed to watch the Catholic priest when he visits the village, and the Government has pursued the wise policy of detailing Indian teachers to the local school. The Santo Domingans long resisted the gratuitous digging of wells to be equipped with windmills, continue to deny their sick children the services of the Government physician, and resist the activities of census enumerators. There is no doubt that the death sentence would be past on any individual found guilty of revealing native practices, and if the priestly authorities learned that Lucero sold his likeness to a white man he doubtless had an unpleasant half hour.
15. Kyello - Santo Domingo
16. On a Sia housetop
17. Sia buffalo dancer The Buffalo dance of the Keres is almost exactly the same as that of the Tewa. The performers are two young men with head-dresses of buffalo-hair and horns, and a girl wearing the usual female costume and a pair of small horns. The head of the hunters' society plays the part of guard. The dance is very strenuous, and the simulated actions of t he buffalo are quite realistic and readily comprehended by the spectator.
18. Shuati - Sia
19. Sia street scene Sia is situated on the north bank of Rio Jemez, a few miles below Jemez pueblo. Ancient Sia, having participated in the revolt of 1680, was completely destroyed and a large number of its inhabitants were killed by Governor Domingo de Cruzate in 1689. The pueblo was rebuilt, probably on nearly the same site, and during the remaining years of this troubled period Sia remained actively friendly with the Spaniards. Once a populous centre, it housed only one hundred and fifty-four persons in 1924.
20. Sia buffalo mask
21. Acoma belfry
22. Feast day at Acoma
23. Acoma from the south
24. Old trail at Acoma
25. Acoma water carriers
26. At the gateway - Acoma
27. Acoma roadway
28. At the old well of Acoma
29. Acoma woman
30. Acoma water girls
31. Paguate Paguate is the oldest and largest of ten villages subsidiary to Laguna, the patent pueblo of this group. It appears to have been founded about the middle of the eighteenth century. Laguna itself dates from 1699. The two-story structure at the right, one of the two oldest buildings at Paguate, was a watchtower erected for the defense of the farming population from the roving Navaho, who disputed possession of this locality.
32. Laguna architecture
33. Replastering a Paguate house
34. Laguna watchtower
35. Paguate entrance
36. Paguate watchtower
"Girl" Erik Loyer
Contents of this path:
1. Sigesh - Apache
2. Apache Nalin
3. Qahatika water girl
4. Qahatika girl
5. Mosa - Mohave
6. Hwalya - Yuma
7. Maricopa girl
8. Ogalala girls
9. Sioux girl
10. Arikara girl
11. Cheyenne girl
12. Mountain camp - Yakima
13. Nespilim girl In the early years of the nineteenth century various explorers noted that the bands dwelling along the upper course of the Columbia, among which the Nespilim were included, wore practically no clothing. Excepting as the cold made some protection necessary. The hair of the women was arranged in two knots at the sides of the face ? a method of hairdressing still in vogue among the Salish on Fraser river. Prior to the middle of the century the use of deerskin garments had become common, and gradually other customs such as the style of hairdressing here illustrated, were borrowed from the tribes east of the Rocky mountains
14. Kutenai girls
15. Fisherman - Wishham
16. Wishham girl The subject is clothed in a heavily beaded deerskin dress of the plains type. The throat is encircled by strands of shell beads of native manufacture, heirlooms which were obtained by the original Wishham possessor from the Pacific slope. Pendant on the breast are strands of larger beads of the same kind, as well as of various kinds brought into the country by the traders of the Hudson's Bay Company. An indispensable ornament of the well-born person was the dentalium-shell thrust through a perforation in the nasal septum; occasionally, as in this case, two such shells were connected by means of a bit of wood pushed into the hollow bases. Tied to the hair at each side of the face (see the following plate) is another dentalium-shell ornament, which is in reality an ear pendant transferred from the lobe of the ear (where its weight would be inconvenient) to the hair. The head-dress consists of shells, shell beads, commercial beads, and Chinese coins. The coins made their appearance in the Columbia River region at a comparatively early date. This form of head-dress was worn on special occasions by girls between the age of puberty and their marriage.
17. Wishham girl, profile
18. Wishham maid
19. Suquamish girl
20. Cowichan girl
21. Clayoquot girl
22. Hesquiat maiden
23. Loitering at the spring
24. Tewa girl
25. Watching the dancers
26. Hopi girl
27. East mesa girls
28. Tewa girls
29. Pomo girl Clam-shell beads of the kind here shown are still made by some of the old men. Fragments of shell are pierced and strung on a stem of the scouring-rush (Equisetum), which is then drawn backward and forward on a flat surface of sandstone until the fragments have become nearly circular. The feathered ornament is an ear-pendant, which in this case, because of its length and weight, is attached to a strand of hair. The large, dark-colored bead on one strand of the necklace is a cylinder of magnesite, a highly valued object
30. Coast Pomo girl
31. Taos water girls
32. Ti'mu - Cochiti
33. Sia buffalo dancer The Buffalo dance of the Keres is almost exactly the same as that of the Tewa. The performers are two young men with head-dresses of buffalo-hair and horns, and a girl wearing the usual female costume and a pair of small horns. The head of the hunters' society plays the part of guard. The dance is very strenuous, and the simulated actions of t he buffalo are quite realistic and readily comprehended by the spectator.
34. Acoma water girls
35. Povi-Tamu
36. Girl and jar - San Ildefonso
37. Tesuque buffalo dancers The Buffalo dance is performed, though the original object of exerting prenatural influence on the abundance and accessibility of the buffalo no longer prevails. The two male dancers are accompanied by the Buffalo Girl, who is fully clothed in native costume and has a pair of small horns on the head. These three give a very striking and dramatic performance under the watchful eye of the head of the hunters' society.
38. Zuni girls at the river
39. Zuni girl
40. Apache girl
41. Yuma girl
42. Sholya - Mohave girl
43. Yaqui girl
44. Maricopa water girl
45. Mandan girl
46. Piegan girls
47. Arapaho water girl
48. Young Kalispel girl
49. Kutenai girls at the lake-shore
50. Nez Perce girl
51. Umatilla girl
52. Cayuse girl
53. Wishham girls
54. Quinault girl
55. Quilliute girl
56. Tsawatenok girl
57. Hesquiat girl in cedar-bark costume
58. Hano and Walpi girls wearing atoo
59. An East Mesa girl.
60. Sherwood Valley girl - Pomo
61. A Pomo girl
62. An Isleta girl
63. A Taos girl
64. Boy and girl columns at Corn Mountain -
65. A Zuñi girl
66. A Nambe girl
67. A Cree girl
68. A Comanche girl
69. Girl's costume, Nunivak
70. Diomede girl
71. Selawik girl.
"Dance" Erik Loyer
Contents of this path:
1. Woven Sash
2. Bear Song, Winter Dance
3. Sun dancer "As they dance, the performers never leave the spot on which they stand, the movement consisting in a slight upward spring from the toes and ball of the foot; legs and body are rigid. Always the right palm is extended to the yellow glaring sun, and their eyes are fixed on its lower rim. The dancer concentrates his mind, his very self, upon the one thing that he desires, whether it be the acquirement of powerful medicine or only success in the next conflict with the enemy." - Volume III, pages 95-96.
4. Arikara medicine ceremony - Dance of the fraternity
5. Arikara medicine ceremony - Dance of the black-tail deer
6. Arikara medicine ceremony - The Ducks
7. Sun dance encampment - Piegan
8. Grizzly-bear brave - Piegan At least two of the Piegan Warrior societies (the Braves and the All Brave Dogs) included in their membership two men known as Grizzly-bear Braves. It was their duty, at the time of the society dances, to provide their comrades with meat, which they appropriated wherever they could find it. Their expression and demeanor did justice to their name, and in their official capacity they were generally feared by the people. See Volume VI, pages 20-21.
9. Bringing the sweat-lodge willows - Piegan
10. Porcupine - Cheyenne
11. Flathead chief Through the medium of their annual incursions into the buffalo plains east of the Rocky mountains, the Flatheads adopted much of the plains culture. Not only their domicile (the tipi), their garments, weapons, and articles of adornment, came from this source, but many of their dances were in imitation of similar ceremonies practised by the prairie tribes. Prominent features of the accoutrement of this Flathead chief are his war-club of the plains type, and an eagle-bone whistle, such as was used in the Sun Dance. The Flatheads however never acquired the sun rite
12. Flathead dance
13. Masked dancer - Cowichan
14. Kotsuis and Hohhuq - Nakoaktok
15. Coming for the bride
16. Wedding party - Qagyuhl
17. Group of winter dancers - Qagyuhl
18. Nimkish village at Alert Bay The figure at the bottom of the column in the foreground, with the painting on the front of the house, represents a raven. When a feast or a dance is to be held in this house, the guests enter through the raven's beak, the lower mandible of which swings up and down on a pivot. When a guest steps beyond the pivot, his weight caused the beak to clap shut, and thus the mythic raven symbolically "swallows" the tribesman one by one. A view from the other end of this street is shown in the illustration facing page 8, Volume X.
19. Masked dancers in canoes - Qagyhl, A
20. Dancing to restore an eclipsed moon - Qagyuhl
21. Masked dancers - Qagyuhl The plate shows a group of masked and costumed performers in the winter ceremony. The chief who is holding the dance stands at the left, grasping a speaker's staff and wearing cedar-bark neck-ring and head-band and a few of the spectators are visible at the right. At the extreme left is seen a part of the painted mawihl through which the dancers emerge from the secret room; and in the centre, between the carved house-posts, is the Awaitlala hams'pek, showing three of the five mouths through which the hamatsa wriggle from the top to the bottom of the column. See page 175 and footnote.
22. Bridal group
23. Masked dancers in canoes - Qagyuhl, B
24. Buffalo dance at Hano
25. Antelopes and snakes at Oraibi
26. Watching the dancers
27. Honovi - Walpi snake priest, with Totokya Day painting
28. Snake priest
29. Snake dancers entering the plaza
30. Snake dancer in costume
31. Flute dancers at Tureva Spring The Flute dance is a religious ceremony concerned with bringing rain. It represents the legendary arrival of the Flute people in the Hopi country, their friendly encounter with the clans already there, and the rain-making rites subsequently performed by them for the common good. The episode here represented was photographed at Middle mesa. The individual seated near the right end is an albino, not a white man.
32. Hupa jumping dance costume The Jumping dance was an annual ceremony for averting pestilence. The head-dress worn by the dancers was a wide band of deerskin with rows of red woodpecker crests and a narrow edging of white deer-hair sewn on it. A deerskin robe was worn as a kilt, and each performer displayed all the shells and beads he possessed or could borrow. In the right hand was carried a straw-stuffed cylinder with a slit-like opening from end to end, an object the significance of which is unknown to the modern Hupa.
33. Klamath lake marshes
34. Sia buffalo dancer The Buffalo dance of the Keres is almost exactly the same as that of the Tewa. The performers are two young men with head-dresses of buffalo-hair and horns, and a girl wearing the usual female costume and a pair of small horns. The head of the hunters' society plays the part of guard. The dance is very strenuous, and the simulated actions of t he buffalo are quite realistic and readily comprehended by the spectator.
35. Tablita dancers and singers - San Ildefonso The ceremony called Koheye-hyare ("tablita dance"), occurring in June and again in September, is characterized by public dancing and singing for the purpose of bringing rain-clouds. The name refers to wooden "tablets" worn by female dancers. (See Volume XVII, illustrations facing pages 56,60,62,64,66,68.) In the plate the performers are dancing in to the plaza, men and women alternating in pairs. At the right is the group of singers, their aged leader slightly in advance and the drummer at one side.
36. Tesuque buffalo dancers The Buffalo dance is performed, though the original object of exerting prenatural influence on the abundance and accessibility of the buffalo no longer prevails. The two male dancers are accompanied by the Buffalo Girl, who is fully clothed in native costume and has a pair of small horns on the head. These three give a very striking and dramatic performance under the watchful eye of the head of the hunters' society.
37. Corner of Zuni
38. Cheyenne sun-dance lodge
39. Hotamitaye Society, Cheyenne sun-dance
40. Water rite purification, Cheyenne animal dance
41. At the pool, animal dance - Cheyenne
42. Yebichai dancers - Navaho
43. The sun dancer - Apsaroke
44. The sun dance votary - Apsaroke
45. Buffalo dance costume - Mandan
46. Ready for Okipe buffalo dance - Mandan
47. Buffalo dancer - Mandan
48. Atsina scalp dance
49. Atsina fly dance
50. Atsina fly dance : "Robes outstretched"
51. Atsina crazy dance : A dancer kisses the grandfather
52. Atsina crazy dance : The flight of arrows
53. Atsina crazy dancers
54. Singing in the crazy dance - Atsina
55. Piegan dancers
56. Sun dance pledgers - Cheyenne
57. Crazy dancers - Cheyenne
58. Animal dance - Cheyenne
59. Sun dance in progress - Cheyenne
60. A dance in the forest - Flathead
61. Masked dancer - Cowichan
62. Grizzly-bear dancer - Qagyuhl
63. An incident of the winter dance - Nakoaktok
64. Sisiutl dancer - Qagyuhl
65. Spectators at the snake dance
66. Snake dancer and "hugger"
67. Oraibi snake dance
68. Flute dancers dressing at Kuchina house
69. Flute dancers approaching the spring
70. Entering the spring, Walpi flute dance
71. Offering sacred meal, Mishongnovi flute dance
72. Buffalo dance at Hano
73. Flute dancers returning to Walpi
74. White deerskin dance costume - Hupa
75. Dancer with black deer effigy - Hupa
76. Obsidian bearer, White deerskin dance - Hupa
77. Pomo dance costume
78. Picuris harvest dance
79. Sia war-dancer
80. Good luck dance by San Juan hunters
81. Tewa dance - costume
82. Eagle dancer - San Ildefonso
83. Tablita woman dancer - San Ildefonso
84. Tablita dance - San Ildefonso - A
85. Tablita dance - San Ildefonso - B
86. Tablita dance - San Ildefonso - C
87. Tablita dancers returning to the kiva - San Ildefonso
88. Tablita dancers at the kiva - San Ildefonso
89. Tablita dancers - San Ildefonso
90. Frame of the sponsor's tipi, Cree sun-dance
91. The dance - Wichita
92. Dancers - Wichita
93. A Wichita dancer
94. Skidi and Wichita dancers
95. Modern dance costume - Pawnee
96. Chiefs in the sun dance parade - Cheyenne
97. Hivihhnihpoih Society, Cheyenne sun dance
98. Hefatyu Society, Cheyenne sun dance
99. Preparatory lodge, Cheyenne sun dance
100. Sun dance lodge - Cheyenne
101. Interior of sun dance lodge - Cheyenne
102. Sun dancers - Cheyenne
103. Buffalo society, animal dance - Cheyenne
104. Buffalo dancers, animal dance - Cheyenne
105. Animal dance - Cheyenne
106. Brush huts, animal dance encampment - Cheyenne
107. The clowns, animal dance - Cheyenne
108. The wolf, animal dance - Cheyenne
109. Deer society, animal dance - Cheyenne
110. Healing rite of the Deer society, animal dance - Cheyenne
111. A Ponca dancer
112. Curtis and His Collaborators
113. Grass Dance - Atsina Gros Ventres
114. Seven Girl Dance Sung in Plaza
115. Seven Girl Dance When Woman Whips
116. Snake Dance - Nambe Pueblo
117. Squaw Dance - Atsina Gros Ventres
118. The Hopi Maiden and Watching the Dancers
119. Chief Josef –Nez Perce
120. Vanishing Race and Cañon de Chelly
121. Upshaw – Apsaroke
122. At the Old Well and A Zuni Woman
123. Princess Angeline
124. Watching the Dancers