INTRODUCTION

AGE OF ABORIGINAL AMERICAN RECORDS

The desire to preserve to future ages the memory of past achievements is a universal human instinct, as witness the clay tablets of old Chaldea, the hieroglyphs of the obelisks, our countless thousands of manuscripts and printed volumes, and the gossiping old story-teller of the village or the backwoods cabin. The reliability of the record depends chiefly on the truthfulness of the recorder and the adequacy of the method employed. In Asia, the cradle of civilization, authentic history goes back thousands of years; in Europe the record begins much later, while in America the aboriginal narrative, which may be considered as fairly authentic, is all comprised within a thousand years.

ABORIGINAL AMERICAN CALENDARS

The peculiar and elaborate systems by means of which the more cultivated ancient nations of the south recorded their histories are too well known to students to need more than a passing notice here. It was known that our own tribes had various ways of depicting their mythology, their totems, or isolated facts in the life of the individual or nation, but it is only within a few years that it was even suspected that they could have anything like continuous historical records, even in embryo.

The fact is now established, however, that pictographic records covering periods of from sixty to perhaps two hundred years or more do, or did, exist among several tribes, and it is entirely probable that every leading mother tribe had such a record of its origin and wanderings, the pictured narrative being compiled by the priests and preserved with sacred care through all the shifting vicissitudes of savage life until lost or destroyed in the ruin that overwhelmed the native governments at the coming of the white man. Several such histories are now known, and as the aboriginal field is still but partially explored, others may yet come to light.

THE WALAM OLUM OF THE DELAWARES

East of the Mississippi the most important and best known record is the Walam Olum or "red score" of the Delawares, originally discovered in 1820, and published by Dr D.G. Brinton in 1885. It consists of a series of pictographs designed to fix in memory the verses of a genesis and migration chant which begins with the mythic period and comes down to the advent of the whites about the year 1610. It appears to be genuine and ancient, although the written chant as we find it contains modern forms, having of course been reduced to writing within a comparatively recent period.

It is said that the Cherokee seventy years ago had a similar long tribal tradition which was recited by the priests on ceremonial occasions. If so, it was probably recorded in pictographs, but tradition and record alike are now lost.

THE DAKOTA CALENDARS

West of the Mississippi the first extended Indian calendar history discovered was the "Lone-dog winter count," found among the Dakota by Colonel Garrick Mallery, and first published by him in 1877. This history of the Dakota was painted on a buffalo robe by Lone-dog, of the Yanktonai tribe of that confederacy, and extends over a period of seventy-one years, beginning in 1800. Subsequent investigation by Colonel Mallery brought to light several other calendars in the same tribe, some being substantially a copy of the first, others going back, respectively, to 1786, 1775, and the mythic period.

In all these Dakota calendars there is only a single picture for each year, with nothing to mark the division of summer and winter. As they call a year a "winter," and as our year begins in the middle of winter, it is consequently impossible, without some tally date from our own records, to know in which of two consecutive years any event occurred, i.e., whether before or after New Year. In this respect the Kiowa calendars here published are much superior to those of the Dakota.

OTHER TRIBAL RECORDS

Clark, in his book on Indian sign-language, mentions incidentally that the Apache have similar picture histories, but gives no more definite information as concerns that tribe. He goes on to say that the Santee Sioux claim to have formerly kept a record of events by tying knots in a string, after the manner of the Peruvian quipu. By the peculiar method of tying and by means of certain marks they indicated battles and other important events, and even less remarkable occurrences, such as births, etc. He states that he saw among them a slender pole about 6 feet in length, the surface of which was completely covered with small notches, and the old Indian who had it assured him that it had been handed down from father to son for many generations, and that these notches represented the history of his tribe for more than a thousand years, going back, indeed, to the time when they lived near the ocean (Clark, 1).1 In this case the markings must have been suggestive rather than definite in their interpretation, and were probably used in connection with a migration chant similar to that of the Walam Olurn.

THE KIOWA CALENDARS

THE ANNUAL CALENDARS OF DOHÁSÄN, POLÄÑ´YI-KATÓN, SET-T'AN, AND ANKO

So far as known to the author, the Dakota calendars and the Kiowa calendars here reproduced are the only ones yet discovered among the prairie tribes. Dodge, writing in 1882, felt so confident that the Dakota calendar of Mallery was the only one ever produced by our Indians that he says, "I have therefore come to the conclusion that it is unique, that there is no other such calendar among Indians.... I now present it as a curiosity, the solitary effort to form a calendar ever made by the plains Indians" (Dodge, 1). Those obtained by the author among the Kiowa are three in number, viz: the Sett'an yearly calendar, beginning with 1833 and covering a period of sixty years; the Anko yearly calendar, beginning with 1864 and covering a period of twenty-nine years; and the Anko monthly calendar, covering a period of thirty-seven months. All these were obtained in 1892, and are brought up to that date. The discovery of the Anko calendars was an indirect result of having obtained the Sett'an calendar.

A fourth Kiowa calendar was obtained in the same year by Captain H. L. Scott, Seventh cavalry, while stationed at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, on the Kiowa reservation, and was by him generously placed at the disposal of the author, together with all his notes bearing on the subject. This calendar was procured from Dohásän, "Little-bluff," nephew of the celebrated Dohásän who was head chief of the Kiowa tribe for more than thirty years. The nephew, who died in 1893 at an advanced age, told Captain Scott that the calendar had been kept in his family from his youth up, having originally been painted on hides, which were renewed from time to time as they wore out from age and handling. The calendar delivered by him to Scott is drawn with colored pencils on heavy manila paper, as is also the Sett'an calendar obtained by the author. In both, the pictographs are arranged in a continuous spiral, beginning in the lower right-hand corner and ending near the center, the rows of pictographs being separated from each other by a continuous spiral. In both, the winter is designated by means of an upright black bar, to indicate that vegetation was then dead, while summer is represented by means of the figure of the medicine lodge, the central object of the annual summer religious ceremony. The leading event of the season is indicated by means of a pictograph above or beside the winter mark or medicine lodge. In a few instances, in the earlier years, when the medicine dance was omitted, the event recorded for the summer is placed between the consecutive winter marks, without anything to show the season, but toward the end, when the medicine dance had been practically discontinued, the summer is indicated by the figure of a tree in foliage.

The general plan of the Anko calendar is the same, excepting that the winter pictographs are below the winter marks, with which they are connected by lines, the winter marks forming a single row across the page, with the center pole of the medicine lodge, the summer pictographs above and the winter pictographs below. This calendar was originally drawn with a black pencil in a small notebook, and afterward, by direction of the author, redrawn in colored inks on buckskin. A comparison of the three justifies the assertion that the Kiowa have a recognized system of calendar pictography. In artistic execution the Sett'an calendar ranks first.

Still another calendar, thought to have dated farther back than any of those now under consideration, was kept by an old man of the Kiowa Apache named Polä´ñyi-katón, "Rabbit-shoulder," and is supposed to have been buried with him at his death, a few years ago.

From the evidence it is probable that the first calendar within the present knowledge of the Kiowa was kept by the old chief Doha´sän, whose hereditary tipi occupied the first place in the camp circle of the tribe, and in whose family certain priestly functions in connection with the medicine dance descended in regular succession. After his death in 1866 it was continued and brought down to date by his nephew and namesake, whose last revision is now in possession of Captain Scott.

The Sett'an calendar is an inspiration, but not a copy, from the Dohásän calendar, of which it is almost an exact duplicate, but with the addition of one or two pictographs, together with greater skill and detail in execution. Sett'an stated that he had been fourteen years drawing it; i. e., that he had begun work on it fourteen years before, noting the events of the first six years from the statements of older men, and the rest from his own recollection. He knew of the Dohásän calendar, although he claimed never to have seen it, but from internal evidence and from the man's general reputation for untruthfulness it is probable that he had seen it sufficiently often to be able to reproduce it from memory.

This will be understood when it is explained that it is customary for the owners of such Indian heirlooms to bring them out at frequent intervals during the long nights in the winter camp, to be exhibited and discussed in the circle of warriors about the tipi fire. The signal for such a gathering takes the form of an invitation to the others to "come and smoke," shouted in a loud voice through the camp by the leader of the assemblage while standing in front of his tipi, or even without passing outside, his voice easily being heard through the thin walls and the smoke-hole of the lodge. At these gatherings the pipe is filled and passed around, and each man in turn recites some mythic or historic tradition, or some noted deed on the warpath, which is then discussed by the circle. Thus the history of the tribe is formulated and handed down.

Sett'an, "Little-bear," who is a cousin of the old war-chief, in whose family the author makes his home when with the tribe, voluntarily brought in and presented the calendar without demanding any payment in return, saying that he had kept it for a long time, but that he was now old and the young men were forgetting their history, and he wanted it taken to Washington and preserved there with the other things collected from the tribe, that the white people might always remember what the Kiowa had done.

THE ANKO MONTHLY CALENDAR

The original monthly calendar of Anko (abbreviated from Ankopaá-iñgyadéte, "In-the middle-of-many-tracks") was drawn in black pencil in a continuous spiral, covering two pages of the notebook in which his yearly calendar was recorded, and was redrawn by him in colored inks, under the inspection of the author, on the same buckskin on which the other was reproduced. It begins in the lower left-hand corner. Each moon or month is represented by a crescent, above which is a pictograph to indicate the event, or the name of the moon, and sometimes also straight tally marks to show on what day of the month the event occurred or the picture was drawn. So far this is the only monthly calendar discovered among North American tribes, but since the original was obtained, Anko has made another copy for his own use and continued it up to date. His young wife being far advanced in consumption, he spends most of his time at home with her, which accounts in a measure for his studious habit. On the later calendar he has noted with anxious care every hemorrhage or other serious incident in her illness and every occasion when he has had ceremonial prayers made for her recovery.

COMPARATIVE IMPORTANCE OF EVENTS RECORDED

An examination of the calendars affords a good idea of the comparative importance attached by the Indian and by the white man to the same event. From the white man's point of view many of the things recorded in these aboriginal histories would seem to be of the most trivial consequence, while many events which we regard as marking eras in the history of the plains tribes are entirely omitted. Thus there is nothing recorded of the Custer campaign of 1868, which resulted in the battle of the Washita and compelled the southern tribes for the first time to go on a reservation, while the outbreak of 1874, which terminated in their final subjugation, is barely noticed. On the other hand, we find noted such incidents as the stealing of a horse or the elopement of a woman. The records resemble rather the personal reminiscences of a garrulous old man than the history of a nation. They are the history of a people limited in their range of ideas and interests, such materials as make up the chronicles of the highland clans of Scotland or the annals of a medieval barony.

It must be remembered, however, that an Indian tribe is simply a large family, all the members being interrelated; this is particularly true of the Kiowa, who number only about 1,100. An event which concerns one becomes a matter of gossip and general knowledge in all the camps and is thus exalted into a subject of tribal importance. Moreover, an event, if it be of common note in the tribe, may be recorded rather for its value as a tally date than for its intrinsic importance.

On this point Mallery says, speaking of the Lone-dog calendar, that it "was not intended to be a continuous history, or even to record the most important event of each year, but to exhibit some one of special peculiarity.... It would indeed have been impossible to have graphically distinguished the many battles, treaties, horse stealings, big hunts, etc, so most of them were omitted and other events of greater individuality and better adapted for portrayal were taken for the year count, the criterion being not that they were of historic moment, but that they were of general notoriety, or perhaps of special interest to the recorders" (Mallery, 1).

A brief interpretation of the calendars here described was obtained from the original owners in 1892. To this was added, in the winter of 1894—95, all that could be procured from T'ébodal, Gaápiatañ, ´dalpepte, Set-ĭmkía, and other prominent old men of the tribe, together with Captain Scott's notes and the statements of pioneer frontiersmen, and all available printed sources of information, including the annual reports of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs for more than sixty years. The Dohásän calendar is still in possession of Captain Scott. The Sett'an and Anko calendars are now deposited in the Bureau of American Ethnology.

METHOD OF FIXING DATES

A few examples will show how the Kiowa keep track of their tribal and family affairs by means of these calendars. Sett'an was born in "cut-throat summer" (1833), and his earliest recollection is of the "head-dragging winter" (1837—38). Set-ĭmkía, better known as Stumbling-bear, was about a year old in "cut-throat summer" (1833). He was married in "dusty medicine dance" summer (1851). His daughter Virginia was born in the summer of "No-arm's river medicine dance" (1863), and her husband was born a little earlier, in "tree-top winter" (1862—63). Gruñsádalte, commonly known as Cat, was born in the "winter that Buffalo-tail was killed" (1835—36); his son Angópte was born in "muddy traveling winter" (1864—65), and his younger son Másép was born in "bugle scare winter" (1869—70). Paul Setk'opte first saw light among the Cheyenne the winter after the "showery medicine dance" (1853), and joined the Kiowa in the autumn after the "smallpox medicine dance" (1862).

SCOPE OF THE MEMOIR

As the Kiowa and associated Apache are two typical and extremely interesting plains tribes, about which little is known and almost nothing has been printed, the introductory tribal sketch has been made more extended than would otherwise have been the case. As they ranged within the historic period from Canada to central Mexico and from Arkansas to the borders of California, they came in contact with nearly all the tribes on this side of the Columbia river region and were visitors in peace or war at most of the military and trading posts within the same limits. For this reason whatever seemed to have important bearing on the Indian subject has been incorporated in the maps with the purpose that the work might serve as a substantial basis for any future historical study of the plains tribes.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Acknowledgments are due to Captain H. L. Scott, Seventh cavalry, U. S. A., Fort Sill, Oklahoma, for much valuable material and friendly assistance; to ex-agent Lawrie Tatum, Springdale, Iowa, for photographs and manuscript information; to Thomas C. Battey, Mosk, Ohio, former Kiowa teacher, and to Mrs Elizabeth Haworth, Olathe, Kansas, widow of former agent J. M. Haworth, for photographs; to Caroline M. Brooke, Washington Grove, Maryland, for assistance in correspondence; to Philip Walker, esquire, Washington, D. C., for translations; to De Lancey W. Gill and assistants of the division of illustrations in the United States Geological Survey; to Andres Martinez and Father Isidore Ricklin, of Anadarko, Oklahoma, for efficient aid in many directions; to Timothy Peet, Anadarko, Oklahoma, to L. A. Whatley, Huntsville, Texas, and to my Kiowa assistants, Setk'opte, Setĭmkía, ´dalpepte, Tébodal, Gaápiatañ, Sett'an, Anko, and others.