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Pipe bag

Arapaho pipe bag
ca. 1885
Wyoming or Oklahoma
Deer hide, pigment, glass beads, feathers, brass bells
74 x 16 cm
Joseph W. Keppler Collection
2/9707

The painted stars and beaded birds on this pipe bag suggest it may have been associated with the Ghost Dance religion, which began in 1889 when a northern Paiute holy man named Wovoka experienced a revelation. The new religion spread rapidly among Plains Indians, and by 1890, Ghost Dance ceremonies were practiced by the Lakota, Cheyenne, Comanche, Shoshone, Assiniboine, Arapaho, and other tribes.

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