mallert.] CORBUSIER WINTER COUNTS. 129 



vices also serve a mnemonic purpose. The Counts were formerly exe- 

 cuted in colors on the hides of animals, but the present recorders make 

 use of paper, books, pens, pencils, and paints obtained from the whites. 

 The alignment of the ideographs depends to some extent upon the ma- 

 terial on which they are depicted. On robes it is spiral from right to 

 left and from the center outward, each year being added to the coil as 

 the snail adds to its whorl. The spiral line, frequently seen in etchings 

 on rocks, has been explained to me as indicating a snail shell. On 

 paper they are sometimes carried from right to left, sometimes from left 

 to right, and again the two methods are combined as in Battiste Good's 

 winter-count, which begins at the back of the book and is carried for- 

 ward, i. e., from right to left, but in which the alignment on each page 

 is from left to right. The direction from right to left is that followed 

 in many of their ceremonies, as when tobacco is smoked as incense to 

 the sun and the pipe is passed around, and when the devotees in the 

 dance to the suu enter and leave the consecrated lodge in which they 

 fulfill their vows. 



Among theOglalasand the B rules there are at least five of these counts 

 kept by as many different men, each man seeming to be the recorder 

 for his branch of the tribe. I obtained copies of three of them in 1879 

 and 1880, while stationed at Camp Sheridan, Nebraska, near the Pine 

 Bidge Agency, Dakota. One winter count was made forme by Bat- 

 tiste Good, a Brule" Dakota, at the Rosebud Agency, Dakota, being a 

 copy of the one of which he is the recorder. He explained the meaning 

 of the pictographs to the Rev. William J. Cleveland, of the Rosebud 

 Agency, to whom I am indebted for rendering his explanations into 

 English. Several Indians and half-breeds had informed me that his 

 count formerly embraced about the same number of years as the other 

 two, but that Battiste Good gathered the names of many years from the 

 old people and placed them in chronological order as far back as he was 

 able to learn them. 



Another winter count is a copy of the one in the possession of 

 American-Horse, an Oglala Dakota, at the Pine Ridge Agency, who 

 asserts that his grandfather began it, and that it is the production of 

 his grandfather, his father, and himself. I received the explanations 

 from American Horse through an interpreter. 



A third winter count is a copy of one kept by Cloud-Shield, ne is 

 also an Oglala Dakota at the Pine Ridge Agency, but of a different 

 band from American-Horse. I also received his explanations through 

 an interpreter. The last two counts embrace nearly the same number 

 of years. I have added the dates to both of them, beginning at the last 

 year, the date of which was known, and carrying them back. Two 

 dates belong to each figure, as a Dakota year covers a portion of two of 

 our calendar years. 



I have seen copies of a fourth winter count which is kept by White- 

 4 eth 9 



