FA: NATIVE AMERICAN (Indians)
Oeonus
Peter J. Powell: SWEET MEDICINE - The Continuing Role of the Sacred Arrows, the
Sun Dance, and the Sacred Buffalo Hat in Northern Cheyenne History. Norman:
University of Oklahoma Press, 1969. Stated first edition. Two volumes,
hardcovers in slipcase, 468 pp. and 560 pp., heavily illustrated in color and
black&white (photographs and artwork by Dick West, Alex Brady, Albert Tall Bull
and others), maps, appendices, bibliography, index. Books are in Fine condition
-- unread, virtually As New: bright, fresh and tight, with just a touch of
bumping to the spine ends of Vol. I -- in a Very Good slipcase with some
general rubbing/shelfwear, bumping and wear to the corners. From the slipcase:
"Volume 100 in The Civilization of the American Indian Series, this account
contains the most comprehensive record ever made of the unique ceremonies of
the Northern Cheyennes. Volume I recounts tribal history against the background
of the two great spiritual tragedies in Cheyenne life, the loss of thr Sacred
Arrows and the desecration of the Sacred Buffalo Hat. Indian Wars battles are
described from Cheyenne sources, with much new material, and episodes from 1880
to 1965 point up the Cheyennes' determination to maintain their tribal identity
through preservation of traditional rites. Volume II records the contemporary
Sacred Arrow and Sun Dance ceremonies in their entirety. The author, who has
observed and partcipated in the rites many times, was given special permission
to record them in words and photographs..." An attractive example of an
important and handsomely printed work, uncommon in a first edition in this
condition.
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Helen H. Blish: A PICTOGRAPHIC HISTORY OF THE OGLALA SIOUX. Drawings by Amos
Bad Heart Bull, Introduction by Mari Sandoz. Lincoln: University of Nebraska
Press, 1967. First trade edition. Large-format (12.25" x 9.25"), massive (5
lbs.) hardcover, 530 pp. with 32 additional pages of full-page color plates and
more than 400 black&white drawings. The pictographs and script notations made
by Amos Bad Heart Bull between 1890 and 1913, here beautifully reproduced and
interpreted and annotated by Helen Blish, form a record of all
aspects--military and peaceful--of Sioux life. More than 60 drawings and 18
color plates cover the Battle of the Little Bighorn, with particular emphasis
on the Reno phase, and Blish relied heavily on Sioux informants He Dog and
Short Bull in preparing her text. Tal Luther High Spot105. Fine. Lacking the
original slipcase, but otherwise an almost immaculate copy of a handsome book
"considered by many Plains Indian specialists to be the most important single
publishing venture [dealing with] the Great Plains."
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Clyde Kluckhohn, W. W. Hill, Lucy Wales Kluckhohn: NAVAHO MATERIAL CULTURE.
Cambridge: Belknap Press of the Harvard University Press, 1971. First edition.
Large (10.5" x 8.5"), massive (4+ lbs) hardcover, 488 pp., profusely
illustrated with black&white photos and drawings. A stunningly comprehensive
survey of "material culture traits," the stuff of everyday Navajo life, past
and present, from sweathouses and saddles to tobacco pouches and menstrual
pads, in each case describing the history, manufacture, and use of the object
and its association with Navajo knowledge and beliefs. Organized into five
major categories: Subsistence (Hunting, Weapons, Agriculture, Horse Equipment,
Food, etc.); Shelter (Housing, Fire Making, Bedding, etc.); Clothing (Apparel,
Ornamentation, Hygiene, etc.); Ritual (Ceremonies and Curing, Musical
Instruments, Warfare); and Recreation (Games, Toys, Smoking). A colossal study,
over thirty years in the making, it was begun by noted Southwestern
anthropologist Clyde Kluckhohn and, after his death, finished by Hill and Lucy
Kluckhohn, with the help of more than twenty research workers. VG/VG. An
important and astonishingly scarce book -- I could find only ONE other copy in
the various online book databases, in inferior condition to this, and selling
at a considerably (to put it mildly) higher price than the opening bid.
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Father Berard Haile: NAVAHO SACRIFICIAL FIGURINES. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1947. First edition. Softcover in tan, stiff wraps, 100 pp.,
with many black&white illustrations. An important, comprehensive, and
apparently quite scarce study of Navajo ceremonial figurines and the rites
associated with them, largely the product of research conducted at Lukachukai,
Arizona, in 1934. Father Haile was at St. Michael Indian School (on the Navajo
Indian Reservation in northeastern Arizona) from its founding in 1902 until
1954, and began its tradition of Navajo-speaking Anglo priests. In addition, he
published a dictionary of the Navajo language, and wrote or helped write
twenty-two books on the Navajo people, their language, and their ceremonials. A
nice, crisp copy. I can find no copy listed in the Library of Congress' online
catalogue, and only two others in any online bookdealers' databases (both
selling for considerably more than my starting bid).
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1549931017
Elsie Clews Parsons: TAOS TALES. NY: American Folk-Lore Society, 1940. First
edition. Volume XXIV of the Memoirs of the American Folk-Lore Society.
Hardcover, 183 pp., with an appendix by George L. Trager of Yale University. An
important collection of lore and folktales (and their variants) from the Taos
Pueblo. Features such tales as: Seed-marked Boy Destroys the Giant, Snake Wife,
Bat and Magpie Twit Each Other, Nighthawk's Cradle, The Apache Youth Takes a
Redhead Scalp, many Coyote tales, etc. VG. A solid copy.
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Elsie Clews Parsons: TEWA TALES. NY: Kraus Reprint Co., 1969. Facsimile
reprint of the 1926 addition, Volume XIX of the Memoirs of the American
Folk-Lore Society. Hardcover, 304 pp. Important collection of the lore and
tales (and their variants) of the Hopi-Tewa of First Mesa in Arizona and
the Rio Grande Tewa-speaking Pueblos of New Mexico. Features such tales as:
The Hopi Ghost Kills and Gambles, Towa'e Hunt Rabbits, Yellow Corn Girls
Marry Coyote, Snake Story, etc. NF+. A
nice fresh copy.
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Edward W. Gifford and Gwendoline Harris Block: CALIFORNIAN INDIAN NIGHTS
ENTERTAINMENTS - Stories of the Creation of the World, of Man, of Fire, of the
Sun, of Thunder, etc., of Coyote, the Land of the Dead, the Sky Land, Monsters,
Animal People, etc. Glendale: Arthur H. Clark Co., 1930. First editionHardcover
w/o dj, original burgundy cloth over boards, gilt spine titles, top page edges
gilt, 323 pp., with black&white photographic plates and illustrations
(including a frontispiece photo of a "Medicine Man, or Shaman, of the Pomo
Indians"), and a fold-out map of the "Location of Native Tribes, Groups,
Dialects and Families of California in 1770." A compilation of stories, tall
tales, legends, and creation myths as told at night in the assembly houses and
around the campfires of the pre-Caucasian natives of the Golden State (Pomo,
Miwok, Chumash, Yuki, etc.). Defects: corners and extremities bumped/worn with
some shallow fraying, rubbing to edges with one short closed tear to cloth
along rear spine hinge, dent and closed horizontal crack to spine cloth, long
crease to rear cover and rear pastedown, front flyleaf creased... That said,
the contents are in Very Good-Near Fine condition -- text and plates clean,
fresh and exceptionally tight, all plates present with their tissue guards
intact. A sound copy of an important work on Native American traditions, not
common in the first edition.
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Harold S. Gladwin, Emil W. Haury, E. B. Sayles, Nora Gladwin: EXCAVATIONS AT
SNAKETOWN - Material Culture. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1965. First
reprint of the scarce and much sought-after 1938 edition published as one of
the Gila Pueblo Medallion Papers. Large (11.5" x 8.5"), heavy (3.5+ lbs)
hardcover, 305 pp., profusely illustrated with black&white photos, drawings,
charts, graphs and maps, color frontispiece. A massive, comprehensive survey of
the Snaketown settlement in the Gila River Basin that tries to reconstruct the
history of its inhabitants through objects of material culture: stone
implements, bowls, shell rings and bracelets, ornaments, effigies, clay
figurines, pottery, etc. Book is ex-lib, but the library markings are not
especially heinous: small patch of label residue at base of spine, remains of
removed library cards on front and rear flyleaves, some crossed-out ink
markings on title and copyright pages -- otherwise text and illustrations are
clean and fresh, corners lightly bumped, covers lightly soiled/rubbed, but
binding is tight. Not perfect, but a very sound copy of an important work in
the field of Southwestern prehistory.
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Thomas E. Mails: THE PEOPLE CALLED APACHE. Englewood Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice-Hall, 1974. First edition. Large (12.5" x 9.5"), massive (approx.
5 lbs) hardcover, 447 pp., profusely illustrated with color and black&white
paintings and drawings by Mails, and black&white photos. A monumental
portrait of the Apaches of Arizona and New Mexico (Western Apache,
Chiricahua, Mescalero and Jicarilla). "Every aspect of their individual
life-ways is examined here in detail: history, social structure, warfare,
housing, dress, food, arts, crafts, games, birth, courtship, and death."
More than a coffee table book, it's clearly a labor of passion and love by
Mails, a renowned artist and depicter of Native American life. NF/VG. A nice
first edition of this handsome work, reprinted many times in cheaper editions.
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A. M. Gibson: THE KICKAPOOS - Lords of the Middle Borders. Norman:
University of Oklahoma Press, 1975. Second printing. One of the
Civilization of the American Indian Series. Hardcover, 391 pp., illustrated
in black&white. "Describes in detail a colorful epic of pride and violence"
-- the Kickapoos' 300-year battle against white settlement -- their active
and imaginative forms of warfare, their resistance to acculturation, their
role as "merchants" of the Southwest ("whose most succesful 'goods' were
white captives whom they bought from the Comanches and others and ransomed
at considerable profit"). As New/NF. A very nice copy of a surprisingly
uncommon book. Sections include: Onontho's Children, The Chickasaw-Osage
Campaigns, Tecumseh's Minions, Massacre at Pigeon Roost, A Home In Missouri,
Kansas Land Sharks, The Pawnee Hunters, Texas' Greatest Enemy, Raiders from
Remolino, The Miles Mission, The Mackenzie Raid, Cold War on the Deep Fork, The
Bentley-Thackeray War, The Shawnee Wolves, etc.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1549638428
Edward Everett Dale & Gaston Little: CHEROKEE CAVALIERS - Forty Years of
Cherokee History as Told in the Correspondence of the Ridge-Watie-Boudinot
Family. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1969. Third printing. One of
the Civilization of the American Indian Series. Hardcover, 319 pp.,
illustrated in black&white. Of particular interest is the light these
letters shed on the Cherokee Nation's involvement in the Civil War and
their difficulties during Reconstruction. Brigadier General Stand Watie,
for example, around whom the correspondence is centered, was "the last
Confederate general to surrender his sword," and E. C. Boudinot was a
Cherokee delegate to the Confederate Congress. VG/VG-. A sound copy of this
fascinating look at a rarely examined area of Western history.
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TIXIER'S TRAVELS ON THE OSAGE PRAIRIES. Edited by John Francis McDermott;
Translated from the French by Albert J. Salvan. Norman: University of
Oklahoma Press, 1940. Stated first edition (originally published in 1844 in
a small edition in France, this is the first printing of the first English
translation). Hardcover, 309 pp., illustrated with black & white photos and
five red & white reproductions of drawings by Tixier himself, two fold-out
maps, an Osage glossary, bibliography and index. "A journal of high
adventure -- the narrative of a young Frenchman of good family, Victor
Tixier, a physician and artist, who travelled up the Mississippi River from
Louisiana in 1840 and joined the Osage for their summer buffalo hunt... Not
only a penetrating and sympathetic study of the Osage tribe and country,
but also a most iilluminating description of life on the Creole plantations
of the lower Mississippi when slavery still flourished." Tixier's elegant
and sensitive drawings are a delightful complement to the text. NF/VG.
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Laura Gilpin: THE ENDURING NAVAHO. Austin and London: University of Texas Press
(1968). First edition. Large-format (11.25" x 8.5") hardcover, 263 pp.,
profusely illustrated with full-page color and black&white photos by Gilpin,
"one of the foremost women photographers of our time," and a map of Navaholand.
A handsome book and "the defining work on Navajo culture," in which Gilpin,
through her photography and text, captures a way of life that is now lost
forever. Sections include: The Creation Story (Maize, The Four Sacred
Mountains); Habitation (Trading Posts, Farming, The Landscape, etc.); Crafts
(Weaving, Silversmiths, Pottery, Basketmaking, etc.); Tribal Government; The
Enduring Way (The Mountainway, Blessingway, Enemyway, Nightway, etc.). NF+/VG+.
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Morris E. Opler: AN APACHE LIFE-WAY - The Economic, Social, and Religious
Institutions of the Chiricahua Indians. NY: Cooper Square, 1965. First
edition of this handsome reprint of the 1941 University of Chicago edition.
Hardcover, 500 pp., with black&white photos and illustrations. Fine.
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