Describes the customs and manners of five Missouri Indian tribes by the author who was a fur trader in Missouri for more than twenty years.

Edwin Thompson Denig was assigned as the post bookkeeper at Fort Union on the Upper Missouri in 1837 by the American Fur Company. He spent close to two decades there and married into the Assiniboine. In the summer of 1851, Father Pierre Jean de Smet spent two weeks at Fort Union. He encouraged Denig to write a number of sketches of the manners and customs of the Assiniboine and neighboring tribes. Denig compiled additional information in response to queries by early ethnographers, including Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, who were collecting ethnological information about Indian tribes in the United States.

A thriving fur trade post between 1830 and 1860, Fort Clark, in what is today western North Dakota, also served as a way station for artists, scientists, missionaries, soldiers, and other western chroniclers traveling along the Upper Missouri River. The written and visual legacies of these visitors—among them the German prince-explorer Maximilian of Wied, Swiss artist Karl Bodmer, and American painter-author George Catlin—have long been the primary sources of information on the cultures of the Mandan and Hidatsa Indians, the peoples who met the first fur traders in the area. This book, by a team of anthropologists, is the first thorough account of the fur trade at Fort Clark to integrate new archaeological evidence with the historical record. The Mandans built a village in about 1822 near the site of what would become Fort Clark; after the 1837 smallpox epidemic that decimated them, the village was occupied by Arikaras until they abandoned it in 1862. Because it has never been plowed, the site of Fort Clark and the adjacent Mandan/Arikara village are rich in archaeological information. The authors describe the environmental and cultural setting of the fort (named after William Clark of the Lewis and Clark expedition), including the social profile of the fur traders who lived there. They also chronicle the histories of the Mandans and the Arikaras before and during the occupation of the post and the village. The authors conclude by assessing the results—published here for the first time—of the archaeological program that investigated the fort and adjacent Indian villages at Fort Clark State Historic Site. By vividly depicting the conflict and cooperation in and around the fort, this book reveals the various cultures’ interdependence.

Military institutions and methods of warfare in the non-Western world from antiquity through the early 20th century provide the chief subjects of this annotated bibliography of works published before 1967, supplementing an earlier volume covering works published 1967–1997.

Employing innovative research and unique interpretations, these essays provide a fresh perspective on Native American history by focusing on how Indians lived and helped shape each of the United States. Native America: A State-by-State Historical Encyclopedia comprises 50 chapters offering interpretations of Native American history through the lens of the states in which Indians lived or helped shape. This organizing structure and thematic focus allows readers access to information on specific Indians and the regions they lived in while also providing a collective overview of Native American relationships with the United States as a whole. These three volumes synthesize scholarship on the Native American past to provide both an academic and indigenous perspective on the subject, covering all states and the native peoples who lived in them or were instrumental to their development. Each state is featured in its own chapter, authored by a specialist on the region and its indigenous peoples. Each essay has these main sections: Chronology, Historical Overview, Notable Indians, Cultural Contributions, and Bibliography. The chapters are interspersed with photographs and illustrations that add visual clarity to the written content, put a human face on the individuals described, and depict the peoples and environment with which they interacted.

Recently revealed truths and deconstructed myths are woven together in this fascinating account to form an unforgettable tale of political corruption, assassins, forged documents, and skeletal remains.

A survey of Native American earthlodge research from across the Great Plains. This collection explores current research in the ethnography and archaeology of Plains earthlodges, and considers a variety of Plains tribes, including the Mandan, Hidatsa, Cheyenne, and their late prehistoric period predecessors.