Medicine or Shamanism? Only your local AmerInd knows for sure.

[Guest Planewalker]

For the start of the topic of Indian "Craft", I'll start by defining some terms and provide some history of my other nation.

 

Your probably wondering why I'm referencing nation not tribe. That's always the first WTF moment for you palefaces. Which just gave you your second WTF moment because we never said "palefaces. I will now give you so many WTF moments that your heads may explode. The Iroquois tribe did not exist. Some 25% of 17th & 18th century Europeans were darker skinned than Indians. About 10% of NE Indians had blue eyes. The Indians had no "Wam-pum", they were a moneyless society. Indians were not environmentally superior to anybody else, anywhere else in the world of their time. Indian Medicine does NOT heal the body.

 

The Iroquois was the name of the confederated nation that had the Mohawk, Onondaga, Onieida, Cayuga, Seneca and Tuscarora Tribes as it's members. Their Articles of Confederation were used as the basis of the American Constitution. They were a representative.republic. The tribes each had their own tracts of land for hunting, fishing and farming. Another WTF(arming) moment. The Iroquois nation was made up of settled people with towns and cities. Because of the terrain the largest were only 6 to 7,000. The cities of the mound builder culture in the Mississippi Valley were as large as London and Paris of the same period. The genetic make up of the NE Indians had a large component of Solutrean DNA. Wam=pum were belts woven with tiny fresh water shells to maker ornate gifts to cement treaties as Europeans did by signing papers. The economy was fully socialist. The only reason it looked like the Indians didn't pollute was because of the people to area ratio and there was no coal mining or smelting.

 

Now the maximum WTF - It is Shaman that care for what we would think of as medical situations. It was the Medicine Chief who did Craft type workings as well as other duties.

 

I'll leave this open for a few days before answering specific questions. Most of the time the questions from a modern view can stay separate. Sometimes they run together and end up Bass-ackwards.