 |
IX. Southern Ute Indian art and material culture Among the Southern Utes Ten Kate made many observations on their material culture. Ute men wore skin leggings and moccasins, the former beautifully decorated with beadwork, and with broad flapping panels along the seams. The moccasins were decorated with blue and white beads. In addition the Southern Utes dressed in western-style shirts and waistcoats, worn hanging loose. Some men wore small medicine bags as amulets, pinned to their clothes not far from their armpits (near the heart?). Some wore western-style hats. The women dressed in long robes, extending to mid-calf. Occasionally these were still made from leather, but increasingly from cotton and linen. Underneath the women wore plain leather leggings and undecorated moccasins. The men wore their hair parted in the middle or on the side in two long braids. The ends of the braids were wrapped with otter fur or red ribbons. The hair parting was often painted red or yellow. The women wore their hair loose on their back, shoulders and chest, usually parted in the middle and shorter than the men wore theirs. Most Ute men, especially the young generation, painted their entire faces with red and yellow pigment. They also plucked their eyebrows and eyelashes. The pigments were kept in a long flat skin bag decorated with glass beads. Their jewellery consisted of breastplates, necklaces made from beads and seashell (plastrons), finger rings, earrings and bracelets made of sterling silver or "Berlin silver", a low-grade zinc-silver alloy. The beads and ground shells were sold at the trader's store. The seashells were white, and reminded Ten Kate of the shells used on wampum belts he had seen. The valuable seashells were collected and fashioned for this purpose in the eastern United States and sent to trader's stores all across the American West. The Navajos made silver jewellery for the Utes using the American silver dollars the Utes gave them. For their horses the Southern Utes also had harnesses and saddles decorated with silverwork, provided by Navajo silversmiths. The saddles, made of wood and covered with rawhide, were used only by women. The saddles had a large knob at the front and back decorated with long fringes of soft white leather. Most Utes still lived in tipis. These were no longer made from buffalo hide, because the Indians were no longer allowed to hunt buffalo. The conical tents were now made from white or yellow canvas received from the US government. Utes still painted their kani (tipis) with war and hunting scenes, and signs that could only be interpreted by insiders. Smoke rose from the open tops into the mountain air. In the tipis Ten Kate saw Navajo and American blankets, animal hides, items of dress, weapons, household goods, and food all stored around the perimeter, while a fire burned in the centre. He mentions the use of brightly painted "parflèches" (rectangular rawhide containers) for storing dried meat and parflèche cylinders for storing small and ceremonial items. He also saw baskets and basketry water jars, which reminded him of Apache basketry. Babies and small children were carried around in cradle boards made of a wooden backboard, covered with leather. The headboard was wide to protect the child's head, and gave the cradle a bulky appearance. Outside each tipi stood a tripod on which the owner usually kept his best clothes and equipment, to avoid soiling and damage. Among the Utes Ten Kate observed the use of the "calumet", the Indian pipe. According to his informants the Utes used to make their pipe bowls from a soft stone found near the Cimarron River in New Mexico. However, this practice was discontinued, since it was much easier to obtain pipe bowls through trade with the Comanches, who in turn received them through intertribal trade from their original source, the catlinite pipestone quarries of the Sioux in southwestern Minnesota. The pipes were valued possessions. When Ten Kate tried to buy a pipe, pipe bag and beaded tobacco pouch from a Ute man, the owner wanted a horse in exchange, a price the anthropologist could not afford, much to his regret.
Among the Southern Utes Ten Kate collected a wheaten loaf and five artifacts: a purse, an awl case, a paint bag, a parflèche, and a tubular rawhide case. All were decorated with either beadwork or paint, and the specimens exemplify the strong Plains influence on the material culture of the Southern Utes. The Utes closest to the Spanish settlements in the northern Rio Grande Valley had begun to acquire horses before the mid-seventeenth century, and used these initially as beasts of burden. After the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 the number of Ute horses increased as the result of trade. In the course of the next century the most easterly of the Ute groups became equestrian nomads, living in tipis, hunting buffalo on the Plains, raiding for horses, and racing horses as a favourite pastime. However, after 1830 they were pushed back to the west by High Plains tribes, but in their way of life they continued the Plains pattern of equestrian nomadism as far as possible. Increasingly they hunted elk and deer, kept up a reputation as fierce warriors, and retained the Plains type of material culture. [27] The awl case (RMV 362-20) Ten Kate collected in 1883 at the Southern Ute Indian Agency was unfortunately stolen in 1964 during an exhibition on the Plains Indians at the Leiden museum. It was beaded in white, yellow, blue, green and red, and a snake design ran down both sides, outlined once in red, once in black beads, oppositional colours in Ute colour symbolism. Red is associated with protection, represented in animal life by the weasel, while black stands for the negative power of the rattlesnake, and symbolizes the underworld. [28] The Southern Ute "purse" (RMV 362-19) Ten Kate acquired is much too small and tight to hold coins or ration tickets, and the small bag, made of thick hide was probably used to hold bone needles. Ten Kate's original handwritten label has survived and reads PanáKoroKonoï, which makes its identification as an awl case more probable. The front panel is covered in white beads, and the small rectangular designs are executed in black and red, always in opposition towards each other, and in yellow, blue and pink. RMV 362-21 is a large paint bag which still holds some yellow ochre. The background is beaded in white, and the rectangular and triangular designs are in red and blue. Tassels of tiny brass chains decorate the top and bottom. Ten Kate labels the parflèche as "leather travel bag" (RMV 362-202). It measures 95 by 40 centimetres, and is painted with geometric designs in green, red and black. Ten Kate applied the same label to the painted tubular case, noting the cylindrical shape. It is 38 centimeters long (RMV 362-203). [29] Ten Kate was an avid collector, and this is reflected by a number of specimens in his 1882-83 collection. These included hair samples taken from Pueblo Indians, a typical source of data for contemporary physical anthropologists engaged in the classification of physical types. Also represented were raw materials used by Indians for the manufacture and decoration of garments: sinew, porcupine quills, pigments, and raw turquoise. Among the specimens brought back from the Great Basin was a loaf of wheaten bread which the Utes had baked. When searching the Leiden collection, a shallow rectangular box was located, less than half an inch in height, with the correct label: RMV 362-204. In it were the sorry remains of what had once been satisfying nourishment, which time had transformed into a jumble of dehydrated flakes and crumbs. After more than a century of preservation it is currently scheduled for de-accession. | |
