Riku
Hämäläinen
Bear Power
Motifs
On Plains Indain Shield
The shield was the
most spectacular defensive weapon of the North American
Indians. At least as important as its material structure
was its spiritual meaning. Usually, a shield was
ritually decorated and consecrated in elaborate
ceremonies. Shield designs based very often on dreams
and visions as well as on intensive consultations with
and guidance by people who had close relations to
supernatural powers. The design’s effectiveness depended
on restrictions, taboos, prayers, and other rules. Many
shields had a cover which concealed the most powerful
design on the shield underneath. This painting was not
unveiled before the warrior went into battle.
The ritual shield design represents
a comprehensive and complicated ethnographic complex. In
this volume, the internationally known scholar,
Riku Hämäläinen
from the Department of
Comparative Religion of the University of Helsinki,
Finnland, documents in an exemplary manner one of the
strongest symbols of shield designs, the Bear Power
Motifs among North American Plains peoples.
This book is an
outstanding scholarly study, being the first of its
kind.
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