Sunday, September 22, 2013

The Crow Tribe



Sam Lao

Sophomore

Native American Culture

21 September 2013

 

Crow Tribe

 

Crow is the name that is translated in English, what they call them self is Apsaalooke, which is their native language Siouan and the meaning of this word

is children of the "large-beaked bird." The Crow since they have horses they travel to many places as a residential, and mostly are in the place around Montana and Wyoming, which is call today. The Crow tribe also creates their own language and writing. Here are some of the words. "kahe" (pronounced similar to "ka-hay") is a friendly greeting, and "ah" means "thank you" (Laura Redish and Orrin Lewis, Crow Indian Fact Sheet).

 

 
History

Apart from the Crow Indians now, their ancestral tribe was live around the Headwater, which is in the Mississppi River. The next place they remove to is the Devil's Lake and it is a North Dakota region. They choose to move their settlement is mostly because of Sioux Indians invading their hometown. Then they finally reach the Valley of the Yellow River on the Great plain Montana and Wyoming, which is where they were living now. There are three areas divided the Crow, just like a little village, and it is evenly separated in those places, they are Mountain Crow, River Crow, and Kicked in the Bellies. (Migration onto the Northern Plains)

 

 

Culture

 

The Crow have a lot of traditional culture, such as their shelter, they use bison skin and stretch them around the wood poles, they known as Teepee. The difference of their Teepee to other tribes is they have the largest Teepee. A short brief of what is inside the Teepee is; mattresses they put on the floor are made of buffalo- hide and it with the seats and in the center there will be a fireplace that the smoke could come out from the hole at the top of the Teepee. Now the Crow known as the largest gather of Teepee in the world, because they still use them a lot for traveling nowadays. (Crow Indians)

 

The Crow's clothing are divide into two different kinds, one is for man and another is for women. What women would dress is cloth that made out of deer and buffalo skins the decoration is using elk teeth. When the weather got cooler, they will cover their legs with moccasins, and they tie their hair in to two braids. For man's clothing they wore shirt, trimmed leggings with a belt, a robe, and moccasins, they grow their hair very long almost to the ground. (Crow Indians)



Buffalo are the Crow Indian's main source; all part of their body could be use such as their bone could use to make weapon and tools, their bladder could be use as a water bottle and even their died meat could fertilize their crops. (Crow Indians)
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


 

 

Horses occurs the most in the Crow tribe; "in 1914 they numbered approximately thirty to forty thousand head. By 1921 the number of mounts had dwindled to just one thousand" (Crow Indians).

 

The Crow have a special system name Matrilineal, which is when the couple married the husband have to live with the wife side. And which carry a important role of the tribe. (Crow Indians)

 

Myth and Religion

In Crow mythology, they have many hero and character that represent the nature or the emotion of them and which they would worship to them.

The shaman was known as an Akbaalia.

Mannegishi are those tiny human like fairies.

Cirape is a trickster.

Awakkule is a trickster but he helps people instead.

Baaxpee is a spiritual that have power to force someone into mature.

Andiciopec that is a warrior hero and bullets will not work to him.

(Crow Indians)

 
 

Creation Stories


These are the Creation story between two tribes and they both have differences and similarities with each other.

 


Creation Story of the Crow

The Creation story of the Crow it start like this, there is nothing but water in the world and it is very dark. Then an old man appears and he is from the Crow, he is looking for anything expects the water. Two ducks swim by and the old man ask them is there anything but the water and they answer there is something under the water and they dive under the water. Once pick up a root and another pick up a mud then the old man put them together. After a while, it form into an earth, this is how the earth created for the Crow tribe. (©1997 StoneE Producktions)

 

Sioux Creation Story

This how the Sioux believe how the world created, the creator of the world we told to hide it from the human. The "it" stand for people create their own reality. Moreover, many other animals give the suggestion of where to hide the it, for instance, the eagle tell the creator to put the it up in the moon but he have been refuse, others like the fishes they the creator to put it inside the water then the creator tell him human will easy to find them there. At the end the grandmother, tell the creator to put it inside human and the creator do so. (Native American Creation Mythology)


 


 

 

Bibliography:

 

l  Laura Redish and Orrin Lewis, "Crow Indian Fact Sheet" (http://www.bigorrin.org/crow_kids.htm)

 

l  Crow Indians, " Crow Indians" (http://www.crystalinks.com/crow.html)

 

l  "Handbook of American Indians, 1906" (http://www.accessgenealogy.com/native/tribes/crow/crowhist.htm)

 

l  ©1997 StoneE Producktions, "Old Man at the Beginning Crow" (http://www.ilhawaii.net/~stony/lore121.html)

 

l  "Sioux Creation Story" (http://nativeamericancreationmythology.weebly.com/sioux-creation-myth.html)

 

l  "Native American Creation Mythology" (http://nativeamericancreationmythology.weebly.com/sioux-creation-myth.html)

 

 

 

Image site:

http://www.ani-kutani.com/nativeamericanfacts/logo's%20seal's%20and%20emblem's.htm

 

http://www.crystalinks.com/crow.html

 

http://www.realmagick.com/buckskin-dress

 

http://www.sd4history.com/Unit3/buffalouses.htm

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