Piegan

The Discovery Of This Continent, it’s Results To The Natives

Columbus Landing on Hispaniola

In the year 1470, there lived in Lisbon, a town in Portugal, a man by the name of Christopher Columbus, who there married Dona Felipa, the daughter of Bartolome Monis De Palestrello, an Italian (then deceased), who had arisen to great celebrity as a navigator. Dona Felipa was the idol of her doting father, and often accompanied him in his many voyages, in which she soon equally shared with him his love of adventure, and thus became to him a treasure indeed not only as a companion but as a helper; for she drew his maps and geographical charts, and also … Read more

Blackfoot Tribal Divisions

As previously stated, there are three political divisions of the Blackfoot Indians. These were definite when the tribes first came to our knowledge and their origins have long had a place in mythology. The genesis of these divisions must forever remain obscure, though there are a few suggestions as to what may have been the order of differentiation. While the term Blackfoot has been used by explorers from the very first, it seems also to have some general significance among the Indians themselves. Thus, a Piegan will tell you that he is a Piegan, but if asked who are the Piegan, … Read more

Treaty of October 17, 1855

Articles of agreement and convention made and concluded at the council-ground on the Upper Missouri, near the mouth of the Judith River, in the Territory of Nebraska, this seventeenth day of October, in the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty-five, by and between A. Cumming and Isaac I. Stevens, commissioners duly appointed and authorized, on the part of the United States, and the undersigned chiefs, headmen, and delegates of the following nations and tribes of Indians, who occupy, for the purposes of hunting, the territory on the Upper Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers, and who have permanent homes as follows: … Read more

Blackfeet Reservation

Piegan Chiefs and Headmen, Blackfeet Agency, Montana

Blackfeet Agency Report of Special Agent Horatio L. Seward on the Indians of the Blackfeet reservation, Blackfeet agency, Montana, January 1891: Names of Indian tribes or parts of tribes occupying said reservation Blackfoot, Blood, and Piegan. The unallotted area of this reservation is 1,760,000 acres, or 2,750 square miles, The reservation has not been surveyed or subdivided. It was established, altered, or changed by treaty of October 17, 1855 (11 U. S. Stats, p. 657); unratified treaties of July 18, 1866, and of July 13 and 15 and September 1, 1808; executive orders, July 5, 1873, and August 19, 1874; … Read more

Houses of the Blackfoot Confederacy

"Encampment of the Piekann Indians" Karl Bodmer 1833

The tribes forming this group are the Siksika, or Blackfeet proper, the Piegan, and the Kainah, or Bloods. Closely allied and associated with these were the Atsina, a branch of the Arapaho, but who later became incorporated with the Assiniboin. These tribes roamed over a wide territory of mountains, plains, and valleys. Early accounts of the manners and ways of life of the Blackfeet are to be found in the journals kept by traders belonging to the Hudson’s Bay Company, who penetrated the vast, unknown wilderness southwestward from York Factory daring the eighteenth century. Although the records are all too … Read more

Siksika Tribe

Siksika Indians. A tribe of the Siksika confederacy (see below). They now (1905) live on a reservation in Alberta, Canada, on upper Bow River, and are officially known as the Running Rabbit and Yellow Horse bands. They were divided into the following subtribes or bands: Aisikstukiks, Apikaiyiks, Emi-tahpahksaiyiks, Motahtosiks, Puhksinahmahyiks, Saiyiks, Siksinokaks,Tsiniktsistsoyiks. Pop. 942 in 1902, 795 in 1909. Siksika Confederacy Siksika Confederacy, (‘black feet’, from siksinam ‘black’, ka the root of ogkatsh ‘foot’. The origin of the name is disputed, but it is commonly believed to have reference to the discoloring of their moccasins by the ashes of the … Read more

Piegan Tribe

Piegan Indians (Pikuni, referring to people having badly dressed robes). One of the 3 tribes of the Siksika or Blackfoot confederacy. Its divisions, as given by Grinnell, are: Ahahpitape, Ahkaiyikokakiniks, Kiyis, Sikutsipmaiks, Sikopoksimaiks, Tsiniksistsoyiks, Kutaiimiks, Ipoksimaiks, Silkokitsimiks, Nitawyiks, Apikaiviks, Miahwahpitsiks, Nitakoskitsipupiks, Nitikskiks, Inuksiks, Miawkinaiyiks, Esksinaitupiks, Inuksikahkopwaiks, Kahmitaiks, Kutaisotsiman, Nitotsiksisstaniks, Motwainaiks, Mokumiks, and Motahtosiks. Hayden gives also Susksoyiks. In 1858 the Piegan in the United States were estimated to number 3,700. Hayden 3 years later estimated the population at 2,520. In 1906 there were 2,072 under the Blackfeet agency in Montana, and 493 under the Piegan agency in Alberta, Canada.

Blackfeet Religion

In ancient times the chief god of the Blackfeet their Creator was Na’pi (Old Man). This is the word used to indicate any old man, though its meaning is often loosely given as white. An analysis of the word Na’pi, however, shows it to be compounded of the word Ni’nah, man, and the particle a’pi, which expresses a color, and which is never used by itself, but always in combination with some other word. The Blackfoot word for white is Ksik-si-num’ while a’pi, though also conveying the idea of whiteness, really describes the tint seen in the early morning light … Read more

Blackfeet Medicine Pipes and Healing

The person whom the whites term “medicine man” is called by the Blackfeet Ni-namp’-skan. Mr. Schultz believes this word to be compounded of nin’nah, man, and namp’-ski, horned toad (Phrynosoma), and in this he is supported by Mr. Thomas Bird, a very intelligent half-breed, who has translated a part of the Bible into the Blackfoot language for the Rev. S. Trivett, a Church of England missionary. These gentlemen conclude that the word means “all-face man.” The horned toad is called namp’-ski, all-face; and as the medicine man, with his hair done up in a huge topknot, bore a certain resemblance … Read more

Blackfeet Hunting Customs

The Blackfoot country probably contained more game and in greater variety than any other part of the continent. Theirs was a land whose physical characteristics presented sharp contrasts. There were far-stretching grassy prairies, affording rich pasturage for the buffalo and the antelope; rough breaks and bad lands for the climbing mountain sheep; wooded buttes, loved by the mule deer; timbered river bottoms, where the white-tailed deer and the elk could browse and hide; narrow, swampy valleys for the moose; and snow-patched, glittering pinnacles of rock, over which the sure-footed white goat took his deliberate way. The climate varied from arid … Read more

Blackfeet of Today

In the olden times the Blackfeet were very numerous, and it is said that then they were a strong and hardy people, and few of them were ever sick. Most of the men who died were killed in battle, or died of old age. We may well enough believe that this was the case, because the conditions of their life in those primitive times were such that the weakly and those predisposed to any constitutional trouble would not survive early childhood. Only the strongest of the children would grow up to become the parents of the next generation. Thus a … Read more

Piegan Indian Bands, Gens and Clans

Many tribes have sub-tribes, bands, gens, clans and phratry.  Often very little information is known or they no longer exist.  We have included them here to provide more information about the tribes. Piegan Indian Bands, Gens and Clans Ekatopistaks (‘half-dead meat’- Morgan ; the band that have finished packing Hayden). A division of the Piegan tribe of the Siksika (q. v. ), probably extinct. Emitaks (E’-mi-taks, dogs) .A society of the Ikunuhkahtsi, or All Comrades, in the Piegan tribe; it is composed of old men who dress like, and dance with and like, the Issui, though forming a different society. … Read more