The Sacred Hoop: Recovering the Feminine in American Indian Traditions

Black Hills country. Revealed to him at this place were the
religion of the Sacred Arrows, the religious and political
organization the Cheyenne would adopt, the proper marriage
ritual, the correct way to trap eagles to obtain the emblem
feathers the chiefs wore, and many other things. “There was no
end to all the things the people learned from him.” 8 Sweet
Medicine lived to be very old, outlasting four generations of
Cheyenne. At his death he told the people how they must live if
they wanted to be sure of plenty of game and other food; he
prophesied their future, telling them of the coming of the whites
and of the horse, the disappearance of the buffalo, and the
ultimate loss of the true Cheyenne way. After he died, his body
was said to have disappeared. All that remained was the tipi he
had died in. The spot was marked with a stone cairn, the
historical marker of the Cheyenne. 9
Sweet Medicine came to the Cheyenne “many centuries ago”;
a more recent example of the visionary source of a myth is found
in the life and experience of Black Elk. Ultimately, I suppose,
Black Elk will be seen as a prophet and a savior of his people,
just as Sweet Medicine is seen by his. Presently Black Elk is
considered a sage, a prophet, and healer, a wicasa wakan,
sacred or holy man. The fact that he has heirs to his visionary
power attests to the enormity of his gift.
Black Elk was a very young boy when his vision came to him.
The Oglala, along with many eastern, midwestern, northwestern,
southwestern, and southern Indians actively seek visions. The
ability to achieve a vision is a mark of maturity, a kind of rite of
passage. Usually a man or woman goes after a vision by
performing a particular ritual called hanblecheya or Lamenting
for a Vision. (Actually, there are two separate rituals involved
in this rite as purification—inipi—precede the vision quest.) 10
But Black Elk was much younger than the age when hanblecheya
is practiced. He was called by the powers that are usually