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Ojibwa Shaman's Ritual Material

Currency:USD Category:Art Start Price:5,000.00 USD Estimated At:20,000.00 - 40,000.00 USD
Ojibwa Shaman's Ritual Material
<B>Ojibwa Shaman's Ritual Material</B></I><BR>Circa 1880<BR><BR>This group contains an assortment of ceremonial regalia and associated artifacts including a hand drum, several rattles, pipes, charms, herbal medicines, weasel skins, and a series of native pen drawings. This collection was acquired in the 1920s by Alfred A. Allorecht from Johnny Martin at the Plains Ojibwa community of Swan Lake in southern Manitoba. This was during a period when the Canadian government suppressed native religious ceremonials, and when many elderly Indians discarded their ceremonial regalia. This collection consists of at least two groups of objects, each associated with a different religious cult. The heavily fringed costume and the mask with its long crooked nose is the typical outfit of a <I>Windigokan,</B></I> aka Cannibal, Clown, or Fools dancer. The <I>Windigokanek</B></I> was a society of masked dancers who represented cannibalistic ice giants, believed to live in the far north, and prominent in Plains Ojibwa folklore. The leaders of this cult were people who had dreamed of these giants or of thunderbirds, the latter referred to by the large crooked nose of their masks. By means of their dance this cult group was believed to exorcise the demons of disease, who used to invade the Indian camps in wintertime. The <I>Windigokan</B></I> also used their herbal medicines in curing sick people. The many small moccasins attached to this particular costume may refer to success in curing children. This costume, made of tanned and smoked hide, may pre-date the late nineteenth century, since when <I>Windigokan</B></I> costumes were commonly made of old pieces of canvas. Part of this group of objects is an additional long-nosed mask made of canvas, the drum with its cloth cover, the bulbous rattles, and perhaps some of the herbal medicines. The second group of artifacts consists of some beadwork decorated charms or scapulars, the wea