$14.00

BEAR BULL Blackfoot Niitstapi

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The Blackfoot Confederacy or Niitstapi (meaning "original people"; c.f. Ojibwe: Anishinaabeg and Quinnipiac: Eansketambawg) is the collective name of three First Nations in Alberta and one Native American tribe in Montana.

The Blackfoot Confederacy consists of the North Peigan (Aap�tohsipik�ni), the Blackfeet or South Piegan (Aamsskpipikani), the Kainai Nation (Knaa: "Blood"), and the Siksika Nation ("Blackfoot") or more correctly Siksik�wa ("Blackfoot people"). The South Peigan are located in Montana, and the other three are located in Alberta. Together they call themselves the Niits�tapi (the "Original People"). These groups shared a common language and culture, had treaties of mutual defense, and freely intermarried.

Blackfoot elders wore their long hair in a tradional arrangement, twisting it into a coil projection 7 or 8 inches from the forehead and smearing it with red earth. There were 11 Blackfoot military societies, progressing in order from the Mosquitoes to the Bulls. Traditionally, a man spent about 4 years in each society, then sold his membership to a younger man and bought one from an older man in the next society.

Photograph by Edward S. Curtis 1926 & hand oil tinted by artist Margaret A. Rogers

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