Details

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Collection Summary
Collection: 00086 - Paul Ewald Photograph Collection
Folder: 0001
Item: 00031
Title: Indian pictographs and carvings on rock walls
Date: Circa 1915
Inscription/Marks: On the back: col. 86-31, "110..", and "G. O. Will (Jr) Bismarck, N.D."
Summary: The quality of the image is not very good, but it shows the rough face of a rock wall, presumably on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation, on which Hidatsa pictographs are visible. The location is not identified. It is possible to distinguish several carvings. The footprint of a buffalo is clearly recognizable on the right side of the rock surface. A number of incised lines and chiseled dots are present. Most intriguing are the two circular pictographs, very similar to each other. These are most likely to be Thunderbirds, an icon used in many ways within a number of Native American cultures, including the Hidatsa. It is said that the Thunderbird brought the sacred pipe to the Hidatsa people.
Red ID: PH_I_145398 Image ID: 106437 Image Notes: 00086-00031

Collection: 00086 Digitized Images from Collection
Title: Paul Ewald Photograph Collection
Date: 1875-Circa 1960

Summary: Consists of prints and some copy negatives of several photographers on the Fort Berthold Reservation, primarily Gilbert L. Wilson, and also including Frances Densmore, Frank Fiske, Fred Olson, Sumner Matteson, and several unidentified photographers. Ewald wrote identification of many photographs in his collection based upon suggestions from the people of Fort Berthold. Images include celebrations and gatherings, dances, sweat lodges, Little Missouri camps, cradles, portraits, Buffalo Bird Woman, Wolf Chief, Goodbird, Indian crafts and skills, artifacts, wood gathering, gardening, food processing and cooking, earth lodges, bullboats, travois, and Indian cowboys.

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