The Black Hills

Tracing the Sacred Landscape of the Lakota by the Night Sky

“Devil’s Tower”

Lakota religious resurgence

Climbing the Tower

Religion at Devil’s Tower

Sacred Hoop

• Red clay valley which surrounds the Black Hills corresponds with a large circle of stars– Cosmomagical thinking– Microcosm duplicates

Macrocosm

The Stars

• “The stars were called, ‘The holy breath of the Great Spirit,’ the woniya of Wakan Tanka. Thus, when the Lakota observed the movement of the sun through their constellations, they were receiving spiritual instruction. Their observations when interpreted by Lakota Oral Tradition and their star and earth maps, told them what to do, where to do it and when.” (1)

Connection of Stars and Land

• Specific star constellations associated with features of the landscape– For example Harney Peak is associated with the

Pleiades (Seven Little Girls)– Sun moves into the Pleiades in the Spring and

directs the people to move there

Ceremonies

• Ceremonies performed at these places by Lakota people are also performed simultaneously in the sky by spirit beings

• Results in a “hierophany” – Drawing down of power from the sky to attune

the group to Wankan Tanka

Freedom of Religion

• Associated with the freedom of movement on the Great Plains

• Red Cloud’s last speech in 1903– Need for freedom of country and buffalo– Not just economic but religious

Buffalo

• Embodiment of the power of the sun• Following the buffalo meant following the

sun• Harmony between human beings and powers

of the universe

Why write this book?

• For Lakota young people and for non-Indians• “…so that they (through learning how the Lakota

experience the earth’s sacredness) will be inspired to seek out and recover their own traditional ways of knowing the earth--not as dead matter spinning in empty space--but rather, as our very mother, a living and a holy being.” (2)

Fallen Star

• Messiah, Saviour, Holy One• Oral Tradition received on 4 levels– Physical, emotional, intellectual, spiritual– Childhood, youth, adult, elder

Dried Willow Constellation

• Red Willow bark used in Pipe

• Gathered in Spring before Thunders

• As Sun enters Dried Willow marks the end of Winter– Horizon Astronomy

Big Dipper

• Associated with the wooden spoon used by shamans/medicine men to carry live coals of fire

• Live coal of macrocosm is the Sun– As it moves into Dried Willow constellation it

lights the cosmic pipe

Rekindling Life in Spring

• “It was a cosmic ritual to rekindle the sacred fire of life on earth. The higher powers, using the stars and the sun, performed a celestial Pipe ceremony to regenerate the earth. This cosmic ritual was mirrored by the People still in their winter camps, performing the same ceremony at the same crucial time, participating thereby in the renewal of temporality, in the regeneration of the new and living earth.” (7)

Other Constellations

• Seven Little Girls (Pleiades)– Tied to Harney Peak

• The Race Track– Tied to Black Hills– Site of a race between 4

and 2 legged

• Bear’s Lodge– Tied to Devil’s Tower

Spring Journey to the Black Hills

• Sacred Hoop– Everything contained

inside

• Between Spring Equinox and Summer Solstice

Sacred Journey

Freedoms: of Religion and Movement

• Calculating the first Spring Journey– 1000-100 BC[E]– Procession– Correlating dawn at

Spring Equinox with Celestial Pipe ceremony• Summer Solstice with

Devil’s Tower Constellation