Great Plains Studies, Center for
Date of this Version
Fall 2001
Citation
Great Plains Quarterly Vol. 21, No. 4, Fall 2001, pp. 349.
Abstract
This is the first book outlining the nature of Native American cartography and synthesizing that information with Native American history and world views. The geographical knowledge brought together in one individual Native American's mind and expressed in graphic form is not often appreciated, even by serious scholars. Warhus reminds us that a single map, prepared by the Blackfoot Indian chief Ak ko mok ki, provides a detailed picture of more than 200,000 square miles of western North America, and the map by the Arapaho Gero-Schunu-wy-ha the entirety of the Central and Northern Plains. These examples could be multiplied many times, but the message is clear: Native Americans were accomplished geographers, their knowledge derived from wide-ranging travels by hunters, war parties, and traders. A continent-wide trading network was active in North America, through which every tribe exchanged goods with several of its neighbors. Native Americans were not narrow provincials (even the tribelets of California scarcely provide an exception), but far more cosmopolitan in outlook than many would believe.
However we may be impressed by the maps of famous explorers, it is undeniable that many of them were aided immeasurably by the geographic knowledge and cartographic skills of their Indian guides and informants. In 1796 John Evans returned from the Mandans with a map obtained from them of what amounts to the present state of Montana, and the indebtedness of Lewis and Clark to Native Americans is evident in Clark's maps; the narrow traverse of the continent by the Captains disguises the breadth of geography shown on the maps with which they returned.
A large percentage of the maps Warhus illustrates were made in response to ad hoc situations. They were neither intended to be preserved nor archived by indigenes. Unfortunately, these transient treasures were saved only when recorded or preserved by EuroAmericans. The small number we have today, consequently, is a very inadequate sample of those made for Indians by Indians, and for Euro-Americans by Indians-but the insights they provide are invaluable.
There is a good bibliography, and the maps are immaculately documented, though the book is marred by a total lack of in-text citations and by occasional lapses in fact: North America, for instance, was not settled by "Neolithic" peoples. Warhus nevertheless places the study of indigenous maps in the context of Native American geopolitics and indigenous-white interrelations and history. However commonplace it may be to say this is an important book, one that should be read by both scholars and lay readers, it bears repeating here.
Comments
Copyright 2001 by the Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln