Part 20
The names of Indians as formerly adopted or bestowed among themselves were and still remain connotive, when not subjected to white influence. They very often refer to some animal, predicating an attribute or position of that animal. On account of their objective, or at least ideographic, character, they almost invariably admit of being expressed in sign-language; and for the same reason they can with the same ease be portrayed in pictographs. Abundant proof of this is given in two collections _infra_, viz., the Ogalala Roster and the Red-Cloud Census. The device generally adopted by the Dakotas to signify that an object drawn in connection with a human head or figure was a name totem or a personal name of the individual, is to connect that object with the figure by a line drawn to the head or more frequently to the mouth of the latter. The same tribes make a distinction in manifesting that the gesture-sign for the object gestured is intended to be the name of an individual, by passing the index forward from the mouth in a direct line after the conclusion of the sign for the object. This signifies, “that is his name,”--the name of the person referred to.
A similar designation of an object as a name by means of a connected line is mentioned in Kingsborough’s Mexico, Vol. I, Plate 33, part 4, and text, Vol. VI, page 150. Pedro de Alvarado, one of the companions of Cortez, was red-headed. Because of this the Mexicans called him _Tonatihu_, the “Sun,” and in their picture-writing his name was represented by a picture of that luminary attached to his person by a line.
As a general rule Indians are named at first according to a clan or gentile system, but in later life one generally acquires a new name, or perhaps several names in succession, from some special exploits or adventures. Frequently a sobriquet is given which is not complimentary. All of the names subsequently acquired as well as the original names are so connected with material objects or with substantive actions as to be expressible in a graphic picture, and also in a pictorial sign. The determination to use names of this connotive character is shown by the objective translation, whenever possible, of such European names as it became necessary for them to introduce frequently into their speech. William Penn was called _Onas_, that being the word for feather-quill in the Mohawk dialect. The name of the second French governor of Canada was Montmagny, erroneously translated to be “great mountain,” which words were correctly translated by the Iroquois into _Onontio_, and this expression becoming associated with the title has been applied to all successive Canadian governors, though the origin having been generally forgotten, it has been considered to be a metaphorical compliment. Governor Fletcher was named by the Iroquois _Cajenquiragoe_, “the great swift arrow,” not because of his speedy arrival at a critical time, as has been supposed, but because they had somehow been informed of the etymology of his name, “arrow-maker” (_Fr. fléchier_). A notable example of the adoption of a graphic illustration from a similarity in the sound of the name to known English words is given in the present paper in the Winter Count of American-Horse for the year 1865-’66, page 144, where General Maynadier is made to figure as “many deer.”
While, as before said, some tribes give names to children from considerations of birth and kinship according to a fixed rule, others confer them after solemn deliberation. They are not necessarily permanent. A diminutive form is frequently bestowed by the affection of the parent. On initiation a warrior always assumes or receives a name. Until this is established he is liable to change his name after every fight or hunt. He will generally only acknowledge the name he has himself assumed, perhaps from a dream or vision, though he may be habitually called by an entirely different name. From that reason the same man is sometimes known under several different epithets. Personal peculiarity, deformity, or accident is sure to fix a name, against which it is vain to struggle. Girls do not habitually change names bestowed in their childhood. It may also be remarked that the same precise name is often given to different individuals in the same tribe, but not so frequently in the same band, whereby the inconvenience would be increased. For this reason it is often necessary to specify the band, sometimes also the father. For instance, when the writer asked an Indian who Black-Stone, a chief mentioned in the Dakota winter counts, was, the Indian asked, first, what tribe was he; then, what band; then, who was his father; and, except in the case of very noted persons, the identity is not proved without an answer to these questions. A striking instance of this plurality of names among the Dakotas was connected with the name Sitting-Bull, belonging to the leader of the hostile band, while one of that name was almost equally noted as being the head soldier of the friendly Dakotas at Red-Cloud Agency. The present writer also found a number of Dakotas named Lone-Dog when in search of the recorder of the winter count above explained. The case may be illustrated by christian names among civilized people. At the time when a former President of the United States was the leading topic of conversation, nearly any one being asked who bore the name of Ulysses would be able to refer to General Grant, but few other christian names would convey any recognized identity. Indeed, the surname may be added and multiplicity with confusion still remain. Very few men have names so peculiar as not to find them with exact literation in the directories of the large cities.
Among the many peculiarities connected with Indian personal names, far too many for discussion here, is their avoidance of them in direct address, terms of kinship or relative age taking their place. Major J. W. Powell, in some remarks before the Anthropological Society of Washington, on the functions performed by kinship terms among Indian tribes, stated that at one time he had the Kaibab Indians, a small tribe of northern Arizona, traveling with him. The young chief was called by white men “Frank.” For several weeks he refused to give his Indian name, and Major Powell endeavored to discover it by noticing the term by which he was addressed by the other Indians; but invariably some kinship term was employed. One day in a quarrel his wife called him “Chuarumpik (Yucca-heart.)” Subsequently Major Powell questioned the young chief about the matter, who explained and apologized for the great insult which his wife had given him by stating that she was excused by great provocation. The insult consisted in calling the man by his real name.
The following is quoted for comparison with the name-system of the Indians of Guiana, from Everard F. im Thurn, _op. cit._, p. 219, _et seq._:
The system under which the Indians have their personal names is intricate, and difficult to explain. In the first place, a name, which may be called the proper name, is always given to a young child soon after birth. It is said to be proper that the peaiman, or medicine-man, should choose and give this name; but, at any rate now, the naming seems more often left to the parents. The word selected is generally the name of some plant, bird, or other natural object. Among Arawak proper names may be mentioned _Yambenassi_ (night-monkey) and _Yuri-tokoro_ (tobacco-flower), and among Macusi names _Ti-ti_ (owl), _Cheripung_ (star?), and _Simiri_ (locust-tree). But these names seem of little use, in that owners have a very strong objection to telling or using them, apparently on the ground that the name is part of the man, and that he who knows the name has part of the owner of that name in his power.
To avoid any danger of spreading knowledge of their names, one Indian, therefore, generally addresses another only according to the relationship of the caller and the called, as brother, sister, father, mother, and so on; or, when there is no relationship, as boy, girl, companion, and so on. These terms, therefore, practically form the names actually used by Indians amongst themselves. But an Indian is just as unwilling to tell his proper name to a white man as to an Indian; and, of course, between the Indian and the white man there is no relationship the term for which can serve as a proper name. An Indian, therefore, when he has to do with a European, asks the latter to give him a name, and if one is given to him, always afterwards uses this. The names given in this way are generally simple enough--John, Peter, Thomas, and so on. But sometimes they are not sufficiently simple to be comprehended and remembered by their Indian owners, who therefore, having induced the donor to write the name on a piece of paper, preserve this ever after most carefully, and whenever asked for their name by another European, exhibit the document as the only way of answering. Sometimes, however, an Indian, though he cannot pronounce his English names, makes it possible by corruption. For instance, a certain Macusi Indian was known to me for a long time as Shassapoon, which I thought was his proper name, until it accidentally appeared that it was his ‘English name,’ he having been named by and after one Charles Appun, a German traveler.
The original of Figure 76 was made by Lean-Wolf, second chief of the Hidatsa, for Dr. W. J. Hoffman in 1881, and represents the method which this Indian has employed to designate himself for many years past. During his boyhood he had another name. This is a current, or perhaps it may be called cursive, form of the name, which is given more elaborately in Figure 74.
Figure 77 is taken from the winter count of Battiste Good for the year 1841-’42. He calls the year “Pointer-made-a-commemoration-of-the-dead winter.” Also “Deep-snow winter.”
The extended index denotes the man’s name, “Pointer,” the ring and spots, deep snow.
The spots denoting snow occur also in other portions of this count, and the circle, denoting _quantity_, is also attached in Figure 141, p. 219, to a forked stick and incloses a buffalo head to signify _much meat_. That the circle is intended to signify quantity is probable, as the gesture for “much” or “quantity” is made by passing the hands upward from both sides and together before the body, describing the upper half of a circle, _i. e._, showing a heap.
Figure 78 is also from the winter count of Battiste Good for the year 1785-’86. This year he calls “The-Cheyennes-killed-Shadow’s-father winter.”
The umbrella signifies Shadow; the three marks under the arrow, Cheyenne; the blood-stained arrow in the man’s body, killed; Shadow’s name and the umbrella in the figure intimates that he was the first Dakota to carry an umbrella. The advantages of the umbrella were soon recognized by the Dakotas, and the first they obtained from the whites were highly prized.
In the record prepared by Battiste Good this is the only instance where the short vertical lines below the arrow signify Cheyenne. In all others these marks are numerical, and denote the number of persons killed. That these short lines signify Cheyenne may be attributable to a practice of that tribe, to make transverse cuts in the forearm after or before going into a conflict, as an offering or vow to the Great Spirit for success. Cheyennes are thus represented in the winter count of Cloud-Shield for 1834-’35 (see page 139) and 1878-’79 (see page 146.)
Mr. P. W. Norris has presented a buffalo robe containing a record of exploits, which was drawn by Black-Crow, a Dakota warrior, several years ago. The peculiarity of the drawings is, that the warrior is represented in each instance in an upright position, the accompanying figure being always in a recumbent posture, representing the enemy who was slain. Instead of depicting the personal name above the fallen personage with a line connecting the two, the name of the enemy is placed above the head of the victor in each instance, a line extending between the character and the speaker or warrior whose exploits the characters represent. The latter seems to proclaim the name of his victim. A pipe is also figured between the victor and the vanquished, showing that he is entitled to smoke a pipe of celebration.
A copy of the whole record was shown to the Mdewakantawan Dakotas, near Fort Snelling, Minnesota, in 1883, and the character reproduced in Figure 79, about which there was the most doubt, was explained as signifying “many tongues,” _i. e._, Loud-Talker, being the name of the person killed.
The circle at the end of the line running from the mouth contains a number of lanceolate forms, the half of each of which is black, the other white. They have the appearance of feathers. These figures signify voice, the sounds as issuing from the mouth, and correspond in some respect to those drawn by the Mexicans with that significance. The considerable number of these figures, signifying intensity, denotes loud voice, or, as given literally, “loud talker,” that being the name of the victim.
It is however to be noted that “Shield,” an Oglala Dakota, says the character signifies Feather-Shield, the name of a warrior formerly living at the Pine Ridge Agency, Dakota.
AN OGALALA ROSTER.
Plates LII to LVIII represent a pictorial roster of the heads of families, eighty-four in number, in the band or perhaps clan of Chief Big-Road, and were obtained by Rev. S. D. Hinman at Standing Rock Agency, Dakota, in 1883, from the United States Indian agent, Major McLaughlin, to whom the original was submitted by Chief Big-Road when brought to that agency and required to give an account of his followers.
Chief Big-Road and his people belong to the Northern Ogalala (accurately Oglala), and were lately hostile, having been associated with Sitting-Bull in various depredations and hostilities against both settlers and the United States authorities. Mr. Hinman states that the translations of the names were made by the agency interpreter, and although not as complete as might be, are, in the whole, satisfactory. Chief Big-Road “is a man of fifty years and upwards, and is as ignorant and uncompromising a savage, in mind and appearance, as one could well find at this late date.”
The drawings in the original are on a single sheet of foolscap paper, made with black and colored pencils, and a few characters are in yellow ocher--water-color paint. On each of the seven plates, into which the original is here divided from the requirements of the mode of publication, the first figure in the upper left-hand corner represents, as stated, the chief of the sub-band, or perhaps, “family” in the Indian sense.
On five of the plates the chief has before him a decorated pipe and pouch, the design of each being distinct from the others. On Plates LIV and LV the upper left hand figure does not have a pipe, which leads to the suspicion that, contrary to the information so far received, the whole of the figures from Nos. 11 to 45 inclusive, on Plates LIII, LIV, and LV, constitute one band under the same chief, viz., No. 11. In that case Nos. 23 and 36 would appear to be leaders of subordinate divisions of that band. Each of the five chiefs has at least three transverse bands on the cheek, with differentiation of the pattern.
It will be noticed that each figure throughout the plates, which carries before it a war club, is decorated with three red transverse bands, but that of No. 30, on Plate LIV, and No. 48 on Plate LVI, have the three bands without a war club.
The other male figures seem in some instances to have each but a single red band; in others two bands, red and blue, but the drawing is so indistinct as to render this uncertain.
It will be observed, also, that in four instances (Nos. 14, 44, 45, and 72) women are depicted as the surviving heads of families. Their figures do not have the transverse bands on the cheek.
Also that the five chiefs do not have the war club, their rank being shown by pipe and pouch. Those men who are armed with war clubs, which are held vertically before the person, indicate (in accordance with a similar custom among other branches of the Dakota Nation, in which, however, the pipe is held instead of the club) that the man has at some time led war parties on his own account. See pages 118 and 139.
_English names of the figures in the Ogalala Roster._
No. 1. Big-road. 2. Bear-looking-behind. 3. Brings-back-plenty. 4. White buffalo. 5. The-real-hawk. 6. Shield-boy. 7. The-bear-stops. 8. Wears-the-feather. 9. Dog-eagle. 10. Red-horn-bull. 11. Low-dog. 12. Charging-hawk. 13. White-tail. 14. Blue-cloud (woman). 15. Shield. 16. Little-eagle. 17. Spotted-skunk. 18. White-bear. 19. White-hair. 20. His-fight. 21. Center-feather. 22. Kills-Crows (Indians). 23. The-bear-spares-him. 24. White-plume. 25. Fears-nothing. 26. Red-crow. 27. The-last-bear. 28. Bird-man. 29. Horse-with-horns. 30. Fast-elk. 31. Chief-boy. 32. Spotted-elk. 33. Carries-the-badger. 34. Red-earth-woman. 35. Eagle-clothing. 36. Has-a-war-club. 37. Little-buffalo. 38. Has-a-point (weapon.) 39. Returning-scout. 40. Little-killer. 41. Whistler. 42. Tongue. 43. Black-elk. 44. Lone-woman. 45. Deaf-woman. 46. Long-dog. Erroneously printed Wall dog on Plate LVI. 47. Iron-hawk. 48. Pretty-weasel. 49. Short-buffalo. 50. Bull-with-bad-heart. 51. Four-crows. 52. Tall-white-man. 53. Eagle-hawk. 54. Lone-man. 55. Causes-trouble-ahead. 56. Makes-dirt (“foul”). 57. Black-road. 58. Shot-close. 59. Iron-crow. 60. Running-horse. 61. Owns-an-animal-with-horns. 62. Blue-cloud-man. 63. Fingers. 64. Sacred-teeth. 65. Searching-cloud. 66. Female-elk-boy. 67. Little-owl. 68. Pretty-horse. 69. Running-eagle. 70. Makes-enemy. 71. Prairie-chicken. 72. Red-flute-woman. 73. Little-hawk. 74. Standing-buffalo. 75. Standing-bear. 76. Iron-white-man. 77. Bear-whirlwind. 78. Sacred-crow. 79. Blue-hawk. 80. Hard-to-kill. 81. Iron-boy. 82. Painted-rock. 83. Yellow-wolf. 84. Made-an-enemy.
The information yet obtained from the author of the pictograph concerning its details is meager, and as it will probably be procured no unimportant conjectures are now hazarded. It is presented for the ideography shown, which may in most cases be understood from the translation of the several names into English as given in the preceding list. A few remarks of explanation, occurring to the writer, may be added:
No. 34, on plate LIV, with the translation Red-earth-woman, appears from the scalp-lock and the warrior’s necklace to be a man, and Red-earth-woman to be his name.
No. 62 on Plate LVII, probably refers to an Ogalala who was called Arapaho, the interpretation, as well as the blue cloud, being in the Dakota language “Blue cloud,” a term by which the Arapaho Indians are known to the Dakotas, as several times mentioned in this paper. In No. 65, Plate LVII, the cloud is drawn in blue, the _searching_ being derived from the expression of that idea in gesture by passing the extended index of one hand (or both) forward from the eye, then from right to left, as if indicating various uncertain localities before the person, _i. e._, searching for something. The lines from the eyes are in imitation of this gesture.
In No. 77, Plate LVIII, is a reproduction of the character given in Red-Cloud’s Census, No. 133. See Plate LXVII. The figure appears, according to the explanation given by several Ogalala Dakota Indians, to signify the course of a whirlwind, with the transverse lines in imitation of the circular movement of the air, dirt, leaves, etc., observed during such aërial disturbances.
In No. 78 of the same plate the lines above the bird’s head again appear to signify _sacred_, _mystic_, usually termed “medicine” in other records. Similar lines are in No. 64, Plate LVII.
RED-CLOUD’S CENSUS.
The pictorial census, shown in Plates LIX to LXXIX, was prepared under the direction of Red-Cloud, chief of the Dakota at Pine Ridge Agency, Dakota Territory, about two years ago. The individuals referred to and enumerated are the adherents of Red-Cloud, and do not represent all the Indians at that Agency. Owing to some disagreement the agent refused to acknowledge that chief as head of the Indians at the agency, and named another as the official chief. The Indians under Red-Cloud exhibited their allegiance to him by attaching, or having their names attached, to seven sheets of ordinary manilla paper, which were sent to Washington and, while in the custody of Dr. T. A. Bland, of that city, were kindly loaned by him to the Bureau of Ethnology to be copied by photography. The different sheets were apparently drawn by different persons, as the drawings of human heads vary enough to indicate individuality.