The Paiute tradition that led to the Ghost Dance began in the 1870s in the Western Great Basin from the visions of Wodziwob (Gray Hair) concerning earth renewal and the reintroduction of the spirits of ancient Numu (Northern Paiute) ancestors into the contemporary day to help them.

A late-nineteenth-century American Indian spiritual movement, the ghost dance began in Nevada in 1889 when a Paiute named Wovoka (also known as Jack Wilson) prophesied the extinction of white people and the return of the old-time life and superiority of the Indians.

Jack Wilson

The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) eventually banned the Ghost Dance, because the government believed it was a precursor to renewed Native American militancy and violent rebellion. Non-Indians often called the Ghost Dance the Messiah Craze.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs attempted to ban the Ghost Dance, also contributing to the idea that it had ended. But in fact the Ghost Dance ceremony continued to be performed into the early 20th century and some of the songs are preserved in the traditions of Indians today.

The Lakota Ghost Dancers and their families died in battle with the U.S. government at Wounded Knee Creek. 13. The Dawes Act gave Native Americans a lot of land and citizenship if they lived on them for 25 years.

Oglala Lakota County, contained entirely within the boundaries of the Pine Ridge Reservation, has the lowest per capita income ($8,768) in the country, and ranks as the “poorest” county in the nation.

1876 Battle of Little Bighorn

The Ghost Dance was associated with Wovoka’s prophecy of an end to white expansion while preaching goals of clean living, an honest life, and cross-cultural cooperation by Native Americans. Practice of the Ghost Dance movement was believed to have contributed to Lakota resistance to assimilation under the Dawes Act.

The name “Ghost Dance” is actually the name given to it by white settlers who were frightened by this spiritual dance, saying that it had a “ghostly” aura around it. This started the push to bring US troops into the Dakotas where the Sioux were most prominent and where the Ghost Dance was being practiced the most.

Some historians speculate that the soldiers of the 7th Cavalry were deliberately taking revenge for the regiment’s defeat at the Little Bighorn in 1876. Whatever the motives, the massacre ended the Ghost Dance movement and was the last major confrontation in America’s deadly war against the Plains Indians.

Sun Dance, most important religious ceremony of the Plains Indians of North America and, for nomadic peoples, an occasion when otherwise independent bands gathered to reaffirm their basic beliefs about the universe and the supernatural through rituals of personal and community sacrifice.

Banning the Sun Dance While some communities continued to perform the ceremony in secrecy, others upheld the prohibition in fear of government persecution. The pass system and other policies of assimilation helped to enforce the Indian Act and prevent Indigenous peoples from gathering in large groups

The purpose of the sun dance is to reunite and reconnect with the earth and the spirits. It calls for a renewal of life and a prayer for life. A large part of the sun dance is sacrifice. Sacrifice also allows for the dancer to give up a piece of his body for this good of his people.

1904

The Sun Dance is a ceremony practiced by some Native Americans and Aboriginal Canadians, primarily those of the Plains cultures. It usually involves the community gathering together to pray for healing. Individuals make personal sacrifices on behalf of the community.

The Southern Arapaho of Oklahoma celebrated the sun dance among their northern kin. The Ponca sun dance was a four-day ceremony of dancing, fasting, and prayer held in mid-summer when the corn was in silk. The event was held in a newly built, circular, enclosed arbor partially open to the sky.

Since 1878, the Northern Arapaho have lived with the Eastern Shoshone on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming and are federally recognized as the Arapahoe Tribe of the Wind River Reservation. The Southern Arapaho live with the Southern Cheyenne in Oklahoma.

The Kiowa considered the Kado to be their most important ceremony, the whole tribe participating therein. It was a religious drama, the ceremonial worship of the Sun in his vernal splendor, as the creator and regenerator of the world.

The Comanche were valued as trading partners since 1786 via the Comancheros of New Mexico, but were feared for their raids against settlers in Texas.

Shakopee Mdewakanton

Colonel Mackenzie

Yet on some occasions, we know that Apaches resorted to scalping. More often they were the victims of scalping — by Mexicans and Americans who had adopted the custom from other Indians. In the 1830s, the governors of Chihuahua and Sonora paid bounties on Apache scalps

The Comanche were famous for their horsemanship. When the US Army invaded northern Mexico in 1846 during the Mexican–American War, the region was devastated. The largest Comanche raids into Mexico took place from 1840 to the mid-1850s, when they declined in size and intensity.

Tribal History The Mescalero roamed freely throughout the Southwest including Texas, Arizona, Chihuahua, México and Sonora, México. Today, three sub-tribes, Mescalero, Lipan and Chiricahua, make up the Mescalero Apache Tribe.

Mexican Indian Wars

The Navajo and the Apache are closely related tribes, descended from a single group that scholars believe migrated from Canada. Both Navajo and Apache languages belong to a language family called “Athabaskan,” which is also spoken by native peoples in Alaska and west-central Canada.