beaded balls - Northern Plains tribes, 19th century

[Californian]

beaded ball, Lakota, late 19th century, likely from Pine Ridge Agency. Several were collected by battlefield scavengers after the Wounded Knee massacre - one is displayed at the small museum at Fort Robinson. Such beaded balls (in earlier times these were quilled) likely figured either in the Lakota ritual game, "The Throwing of the Ball," or in the puberty ceremony for a girl coming of age. Anyone that can offer more insights into the meaning and purpose of these beaded balls would be greatly welcomed

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[Californian]

Lakota beaded ball, ca. 1870's to 1890's, native-tanned bison hide, stuffed with bison hair, glass beads, sinew sewn.
The Throwing of the Ball ceremony – Tápa Waŋkáyeyapi. As described in "The Sacred Pipe: Black Elk’s Account of the Seven Rites of the Oglala Sioux", recorded and edited by Joseph Epes Brown, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman OK, 1953.

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