Native American Unit Home - Regalia
My Regalia
My regalia
is like a dress. It has fringe along the bottom and fringe on the sleeves. The
fringe along the sleeves are strung with beads. The fabric that I used feels
like bison skin and has odd patterns on it. The headband has a sun on it. The
sun is made out of leather. My dad cut the sun shape out of a piece of leather
and put it on a strap with a pheasant feather.
The Sioux would make clothes out of bison skin. They sew the skin together and cut the fringe. The clothes would be brown or light brown.
In the winter the Sioux would make bison skin robes. When you would put the fur on the inside you would be warmer and when you put the part that was inside the bison it would probably be cooler. This is because the fur is warmer than the inside. If you had a fluffy fur coat and you turned it inside out and put it on it would be warmer.
Usually the Sioux would dry the bison skin before they made it into clothes. To do this project you would only need three things: 1. soft ground; 2. strong sticks; 3. bison skin. First you would cut the bison skin into any shape. Then you would put the skin shape on the ground. Next you would put the sticks facing upward into the skin so it would not blow away.
The Sioux
The Sioux lived on the Great Plains for hundreds of years. They lived in Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. Some of the Sioux tribe lived along the Mississippi river. Others lived in Manitoba, Canada.
The Sioux Nation was very large. A nation is a group of people that have similar language, customs, and government. Seven tribes make up the Sioux Nation. They are Mdewakanton, Sisston, Teton, Wahpekute, Wahpeton, Yankton, and Yanktotonai.
Sometimes the Sioux would fight with other nations. Another nation gave them the name Sioux, which means snake, or enemy.
Today the Sioux live on reservations. A reservation is a piece of land set aside for Native Americans.
The Sioux lived on the Great Plains where there were a lot of bison. They would hunt the bison for food and other materals fo their way of life. The Sioux would dry bison meat and call it pemmican. It is something like we call jerky. The pemmican is crushed and mixed with melted fat berries.
The Sioux lived in houses made of bison skin. The houses are called tipis. Tipis have a flap at the top so when it was a clear night the flap would be open so you wold be able to see the stars.
If you lived on the Great Plains you would travel a lot because you would follow the bison. That is another reason why you would live in a tipi. A tipi could be takin apart in about an hour.
[Caption] The horse helped the Sioux to cover much farther distances
in their search for bison.
[Caption] Often the Sioux painted their tipi coverings with scenes from their
daily life.
If you were a Sioux boy or girl you would have take a test. The test for a boy is to sit upon a hill for four days without any food or water. The girls would not have to sit on a hill with no food or water. They would have to make clothes, bake bison, take down tipis, and learn how to sew.
The Sioux made star quilts for special occsions. A star quilt is a quilt made out of many pieces. The pieces are sewn together with thread. Star quilts are made out of many colors.
You would live with your family, but if you were in the middle of your village and you said you were hungry or sleepy the in the nearest tipi would let you in to take a nap or eat. If you were a man you could have two wives. The wives would become sisters.
The Sioux would write stories on bison hide. One story that
I know is…
when the grass was tall (summer)
,
a man
,
left his tipi
,
to go hunting
deer
.
He cross the mountains
,
swam the river
,
camped under the stars
,
and stayed three days
.
It is said that the Sioux began many years ago. The Great Spirit is a god the Sioux believed in. He sent a great flood. Everyone died except one woman. She went to the top of a huge hill. She called out to the Great Spirit to save her. The Great Spirit sent a huge eagle to her. She grabbed the eagle’s feet, and it flew her to the Black Hills of South Dakota. When it landed it turned into a man. The man and woman had children. The children became the Sioux nation.
Bibliography
Lund, Bill. The Sioux Indians. Mankato: Capstone Press, 1998.
Landau, Elaine. The Sioux. New York: Franklin Watts, 1989.
Katz, Jane B. We Rode the Wind.
Minneapolis: Runestone Press, 1995.