Abstract
Because Plains Indians, as well as some other groups of Native Americans, generally perceived people and animals as closely related, medical therapies and preventive regimes in human and veterinary medical practice often overlapped. The sense of partnership that mounted people shared with their horses dictated that it was appropriate for certain equine remedies to be similar to those used for themselves. Horses, as well as people, could possess useful knowledge in the realm of curing. Reciprocity between humankind and nature was expressed by the interactive healing powers of people and horses as well as by recorded examples of the connection that existed between human and equine health maintenance measures and medical procedures.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Buikstra, Jane (ed.) (1993). Newsletter of the National Center for Science Education, Inc. September.
Clark, LaVerne Harrell (1966). They Sang for Horses. Tucson, AZ: University of Arizona Press.
DeMallie, Raymond J. (ed.) (1984). The Sixth Grandfather: Black Elk's Teachings Given to John G. Neihardt. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.
Ewers, John C. (1969). The Horse in Blackfoot Indian Culture With Comparative Material From Other Western Tribes. Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 159. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press.
Grinnell, George Bird (1915). The Fighting Cheyennes. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.
Grinnell, George Bird (1923). The Cheyenne Indians: Their History and Ways of Life, 2 volumes. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Kluckhohn, Clyde and Dorothea Leighton (1962). The Navajo. Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company.
Lawrence, Elizabeth Atwood (1985). Hoofbeats and Society: Studies of Human-Horse Interactions. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
Lewis, Thomas H. (1990). The Medicine Men: Oglala Sioux Ceremony and Healing. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.
Linderman, Frank B. (1930). American: The Life Story of A Great Indian. New York: John Day Company.
Lowie, Robert H. (1924). “Minor ceremonies of the Crow Indians,” Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History 2(5).
Neihardt, John G. (ed.) (1991). Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.
Opler, Morris Edward (1965). An Apache Life-Way. New York: Cooper Square Publishers, Inc.
Powers, William K. (1986). Sacred Language: The Nature of Supernatural Discourse in Lakota. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
St. Pierre, Mark and Tilda Long Soldier (1995). Walking in the Sacred Manner. New York: Simon and Schuster.
Standing Bear, Luther (1978). Land of the Spotted Eagle. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.
Stands In Timber, John and Margot Liberty (1969). Cheyenne Memories. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Vogel, Virgil J. (1970). American Indian Medicine. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
Walker, James R. (1980). Raymond DeMallie and Elaine A. Jahner (eds.), Lakota Belief and Ritual. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.
Wilson, Gilbert L. (1924). “The horse and dog in Hidatsa culture,” Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History 15(2): 125–311.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Lawrence, E.A. Human and horse medicine among some Native American groups. Agriculture and Human Values 15, 133–138 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007435127529
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007435127529