Fig. 706, drawn by the Dakota Indians, near Fort Snelling, Minnesota, exhibits the use as a charm or talisman of an instrument fashioned in imitation of a war club, though it is not adapted to offensive employment. The head of the talisman is a grooved stone hammer from an inch and a half to 5 inches in length. A withe is tied about the middle of the hammer, in the groove binding on a handle of from 2 to 4 feet in length. The latter is frequently wrapped with buckskin or rawhide to strengthen it, as well as for ornamental purposes. Feathers attached bear designs indicating marks of distinction, perhaps sometimes fetichistic devices not understood.
It is believed that these objects possess the charm of warding off an enemy’s missiles when held upright before the body, as shown in the pictograph. The interpretation was explained by the draftsman himself.
Fig. 707.—Medicine bag as worn.
“Medicine bags,” as they are termed by frontiersmen, are worn as amulets. They are sometimes filled by the owner in obedience to the suggestions of visions, but more frequently are prepared by the shaman. They are carried suspended from the neck by means of string or buckskin cords, as shown in Fig. 707, drawn in 1889 by I-teup'-de-tĭ, No-Shin-Bone, a Crow Indian, to represent himself with his insignia, and was extracted from a record kindly communicated by Dr. R. B. Holden, physician at the Crow Agency, Montana.
Fig. 708.—Medicine bag hung up.
Fig. 708, drawn by the same hand, shows the same medicine bag temporarily hung on a forked stick. When the bag is carried on a war party it is never allowed to touch the ground. Also among the Ojibwa some of the bags which are considered to have the greatest fetichistic power are not kept in the lodges, as too dangerous, but are suspended from trees.
Capt. Bourke (d) gives the following account of the medicine hat of the Apache: