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omnipoetics:winter_count [2025/04/01 17:34] – [Recordkeeping of Plains Tribes] maryomnipoetics:winter_count [2025/04/24 00:46] (current) – joshua
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-====== Winter Count (485) ======+====== Winter Count ====== 
 + 
 +<WRAP center round info 60%> 
 +**//The Serpent and the Fire// (pp. 485)** \\ 
 +</WRAP> 
 Author: Battiste Good (1821 - 1908) Author: Battiste Good (1821 - 1908)
 Location: Dakota, USA Location: Dakota, USA
 +====== Battiste Good ======
  
 +Battiste Good was a Brulé Dakota who lived at the Rosebud Agency in South Dakota. His winter count is speculated as being created around the turn of the twentieth century.
 ===== Format ===== ===== Format =====
  
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 ===== Waniyetu Wowampi (Winter Count) ===== ===== Waniyetu Wowampi (Winter Count) =====
 +{{ :omnipoetics:battiste_good_winter_count.webp|Battiste Good (1821–ca. 1907). [Winter Count, 1230–1907]. Enlargement. Pictograph watercolor on paper panels, ca. 1907. Manuscript Division, Library of Congress}}
  
-The Waniyety Wowampi, also known as the winter count,  is a pictorial calendar and history that is usually drawn on a hide that depicts a memorable event(s) of a given year. They are linked closely with oral traditions and storytelling as a way to keep historical records. Usually, a tribal elder would be responsible for making the winter count, being named the Keeper of the Count. The winter counts were therefore named after the keeper responsible.+The Waniyety Wowampi, also known as the winter count,  is a pictorial calendar and history that is usually drawn on a hide that depicts a memorable event(s) of a given year. They are linked closely with oral traditions and storytelling as a way to keep historical records. Usually, a tribal elder would be responsible for making the winter count, being named the Keeper of the Count. 
 ==== Recordkeeping of Plains Tribes ==== ==== Recordkeeping of Plains Tribes ====
 The winter count was a form of historical storytelling used by many Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains and Canadian Prairies. Tribes like the Blackfeet, Mandan, Kiowa, Lakota, Nakota, and Dakota relied upon these pictographs as a medium for remembering cultural moments, making them mnemonic devices that act as forms of recordkeeping. They were also arranged in chronological order. The winter count was a form of historical storytelling used by many Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains and Canadian Prairies. Tribes like the Blackfeet, Mandan, Kiowa, Lakota, Nakota, and Dakota relied upon these pictographs as a medium for remembering cultural moments, making them mnemonic devices that act as forms of recordkeeping. They were also arranged in chronological order.
  
-A standard winter count, depicts the most memorable event of a year rather than the most important. This decision is made by tribal elders and the keeper who will then proceed to create an image to memorialize the event. While in some tribes, like the Kiowas, more than one pictograph was recorded every year, most Plain tribes illustrated only one memorable event yearly. The years depicted in the winter count usually were recorded between the first snowfall to the first snowfall. The time that elapsed between these two events was considered a full year, and the events occurring between were therefore subject for the pictograph.+A standard winter count depicts the most memorable event of a year rather than the most important. This decision is made by tribal elders and the keeper who will then proceed to create an image to memorialize the event. While in some tribes, like the Kiowas, more than one pictograph was recorded every year, most Plain tribes illustrated only one memorable event yearly. The years depicted in the winter count usually were recorded between the first snowfall to the first snowfall. The time that elapsed between these two events was considered a full year, and the events occurring between were therefore subject for the pictograph.
  
 Similarities also occur between winter counts across the Great Plain region, which implies possible interband relations existing between indigenous people. Some winter counts like those produced by Long Dog, The Flame, The Swan, and Major Bush are described as being so alike due to their close proximity to one another. So rather than just communicate individual tribal memories, these winter counts demonstrated a communal indigenous history. Because of this, winter counts can account for the movement of settlers into the Great Plains as well as the political and social relationships between various tribes. Similarities also occur between winter counts across the Great Plain region, which implies possible interband relations existing between indigenous people. Some winter counts like those produced by Long Dog, The Flame, The Swan, and Major Bush are described as being so alike due to their close proximity to one another. So rather than just communicate individual tribal memories, these winter counts demonstrated a communal indigenous history. Because of this, winter counts can account for the movement of settlers into the Great Plains as well as the political and social relationships between various tribes.
  
 ==== The Keeper ==== ==== The Keeper ====
 +The keeper was known as the person who painted a new pictograph every year. They were responsible for both the commemoration of the memorable event and also its communication. Acting as a cultural historian, the keeper’s told the story of winter count to their people.
 +
 +Being a keeper was a role traditionally associated with a patrilineal line. So as one keeper died, a living son would come to replace him. Keepers were often buried with their winter counts after their death, but their winter counts were usually copied beforehand by their apprentice. 
 +
 +Winter counts were usually named after the keeper who created them.
 +
 ==== Material and Dyes ==== ==== Material and Dyes ====
 +Winter counts are normally inscribed on buffalo hides, but they have also been known to appear on rocks (paintings found on cave walls, canyons, mountains, etc), on deer and cow hides, and when animal populations were scare, on paper and muslin. 
  
 +The dyes used to create the pictographs varied upon resources available, ranging from berries, clay, plants, roots, liver bile, blood, and stomach. 
  
 ==== Additional Resources ==== ==== Additional Resources ====
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-==== The "Poem" ====+====== The "Poem" ======
  
 This was prefaced with the following personal account:  This was prefaced with the following personal account: 
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 __ //(Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888)//__ __ //(Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888)//__
  
-These winter counts mean a lot to the natives of the plains who used the method to keep records. +In Battiste Good's winter count, he accounts for various illnesses that took his people such as smallpox, deaths from childbearing as well as contact with white men and women. Winter counts are not traditionally considered poems or visual-verbal epics, but Good's winter count, according to Rothenberg, includes a "cyclical & mythic section covering the years 901 to 1700, after which the counting by year-names begins" (487). It therefore appears that the first part of Good's winter count is where the visual-epic occurs, but the latter half seems to take on a more traditional form. From the pictures found on Battiste Good's winter count (found in the figure above), there doesn't appear to be any written language compared to what is featured in //SAF//. It is therefore difficult to classify this particular visual work as poetry. 
 + 
 +====== Sources ======
  
 +Good, Battiste. "Winter Count." //The Serpent and the Fire//, edited by Jerome Rothenberg and Javier Taboada, University of California Press, 2024.
  
  

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