The Witch's Bandolier

by Alanson Skinner

"From the Winnebago is a witch medicine ... of a type commonly heard of, but rarely seen, among the Central tribes. It is composed of a bandolier of blue strouding on which is sewn a narrow strip of tanned deerskin, bearing claws of the black bear, a lynx paw, beards and feathers of the wild turkey, a horned owl's head, a bullfrog skin stuffed with down, and numerous bullets and packets of medicine.

The witch or wizard (Indians make no distinction in sex, but call all persons suspected of black magic "witches") strips himself naked and puts on the bandolier. He can then, at will, take the form of any of the animals shown on its circumference, and thus is able to travel at great speed and noiselessly to the residence of the person whom he wishes to destroy, and shoot into him a fiendish charm which will cause him to waste away and die. He can travel immense distances to do his work, taking first the form of the frog and hopping until tired, then that of the turkey, flying on his way until fatigue causes him to become a horned owl; a bear; a bullet; or a ball of fire, and so on.

Such medicines have been recorded by the writer as being found among the Sauk, Menomini, Ojibway, Potawatomi, Winnebago, and others, but he has never before been privileged to see one, much less collect a specimen, in spite of offering enormous prices. Should the members of any tribe learn for certain that any Indian possessed such a charm, his life would be in great danger, for even today the belief in the evil powers of witches is firmly established among most Indian peoples."¹

Commentary

Metropolitan Museum, Ralph T. Coe Collection • CCO		© National Museum of the American Indian, NMAI_165953		NMAI_7509
Bandolier Bag		Shoulder/Bandolier Bag, Obtained ca. 1909		Shoulder/Bandolier Bag, Obtained in 1930

"bandolier" — around 1870, the bandolier replaced an original shot-pouch which contained musket balls, flints, and other utilitarian items.

Bandolier bags had a wide strap worn over one shoulder and across the chest, with the pocket resting on the opposite hip. Women decorated both the pocket and the strap with intricate beadwork. The bags quickly became classic symbols for Great Lakes and Prairie tribes, each with their own distinct bandolier style. Native men would wear the bags for social dances or powwows and for meetings with government authorities, thereby appearing in elegant dress while broadcasting their tribal identities to anyone who understood the intricate bead work on their bag.

Ho-Chunk beadwork tends to be dramatically different from that of the surrounding Ojibwe (Chippewa) people in Minnesota and Wisconsin. Salient features of a Ho-Chunk bag include the use of loom beading (the beads are never sewn directly to the cloth); the same designs repeated throughout the strap and on the bag; straps that usually are sewn to the bag along the inside edge of the pocket; and rigidly bilateral symmetrical geometric designs against a white background. The aversion to the curvilinear, asymmetrical motifs found in later Ojibwe beadwork link the Ho-Chunk style more closely to Prairie than Woodlands arts.²

Apparently, the bandolier secured by Skinner had an addendum of buck hide with the tools needed for the possessor's nefarious activities.

Comparative Material. "Such medicines have been recorded by the writer as being found among the Sauk, Menomini, Ojibway, Potawatomi, Winnebago, and others."³

Links: Witches.

Stories: mentioning witches or warlocks: The Witch Men's Desert, The Thunder Charm, The Wild Rose, The Seer, Turtle and the Witches, Great Walker and the Ojibwe Witches, The Claw Shooter, Mijistéga’s Powwow Magic and How He Won the Trader's Store, Migistéga’s Magic, Mijistéga and the Sauks, Migistéga's Death, The Mesquaki Magician, Whiskey Making, The Tap the Head Medicine, Keramaniš’aka's Blessing, Battle of the Night Blessed Men and the Medicine Rite Men, The Magical Powers of Lincoln's Grandfather, The Hills of La Crosse, The Shawnee Prophet — What He Told the Hocągara (v. 2), Įcorúšika and His Brothers, Thunder Cloud Marries Again, Paint Medicine Origin Myth, The Woman's Scalp Medicine Bundle, Potato Magic, Young Rogue's Magic.

Themes: someone traveling long distances assumes successive animal forms as each becomes fatigued, until he finally reaches his destination: The Thunderbird, Spear Shaft and Lacrosse, Witches, The Journey to Spiritland.

Notes

¹ Alanson Skinner, "Some Unusual Ethnological Specimens," Yearbook of the Public Museum of the City of Milwaukee, 3 (1923): 103-109 [109]; Lance Michael Foster, "Sacred Bundles of the Ioway Indians" (1994). Retrospective Theses and Dissertations (1994) #321: 105.
² Leah Bowe, "Bandolier Bags," Curator's Choice, Minnesota History, v. 65, #4 (Winter, 2016-17). For bandoliers of Wisconsin tribes, see: Marcia Anderson and Kathy Hussey-Arnston, “Ojibwe Bandolier Bags in the Collections of the Minnesota Historical Society,” American Indian Art Magazine 11:4 (1986): 46-57; Beverly Gordon, “The Great Lakes Indian Bandolier Bag: Cultural Persistence and Elaboration, Dress 19 (1992): 69-81; Benson L. Lanford, “Winnebago Bandolier Bags, ” American Indian Art Magazine (Summer 1984): 30-37; Richard Pohrt Jr., Bags of Friendship: Bandolier Bags of the Great Lakes Indians (Santa Fe, NM: Morning Star Gallery, 1996); Daniel Swan, “Forms and Acts: Beaded Shoulder Bags from the Great Lakes Region,” Gilcrease Journal 6:1 (1998): 48-57; Andrew Hunter Whiteford, “The Origins of Great Lakes Beaded Bandolier Bags,” American Indian Art Magazine 11:3 (1986): 32-43.
³ Skinner, "Some Unusual Ethnological Specimens," 105.