In the first record of European contact in 1738, La Vérendrye, reported nine villages of Mandan People living near the Heart River in present-day North Dakota.[2]Frederick Webb Hodge, Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, Vol. 2 (Washington: Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology, Government Printing Office, 1910), 797. When Lewis and Clark passed that river, they saw only the ruins of those villages. After the 1781 smallpox epidemic, the Mandan had moved into to a more defensible position in two villages immediately south of the Hidatsas at the Knife River. The Mandan-Hidatsa alliance had developed many years prior, and the two tribes previously shared their large hunting territory to the west.[3]W. Raymond Wood and Lee Irwin, Handbook of North American Indians: Plains Vol. 13, ed. Raymond J. DeMallie (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 2001), 349.

Prolific Traders

These Siouan-speaking people practiced horticulture and hunting in the manner of the Plains Village tradition. They were also prolific traders, exchanging their garden produce and acting as middlemen between European traders and other tribes including Assiniboines, Blackfeet, Crees, Crows, Pawnees, and—writes trader Pierre-Antoine Tabeau in one of his characteristic hyperboles—”an infinity of others.”[4]Pierre-Antoine Tabeau, Tabeau’s Narrative of Loisel’s Expedition to the Upper Missouri River, ed. Annie Heloise Abel, translated from French by Rose Abel Wright, (Norman: University of … Continue reading

When Lewis and Clark arrived in the fall of 1804, Mandan trade with Canadian-based commerce had long been established. For at least two decades European traders had intermarried and raised families in Mandan villages.[5]The Souris River route connected the Mandan villages with the English trading posts on the Assiniboine River. For more, see on this site, Souris River Trade Route. One notable trader living at the Knife River Villages, was Toussaint Charbonneau who joined the expedition as an interpreter and who more famously brought along his Lemhi Shoshone wife, Sacagawea.

Ceremonial and Religious Life

The Mandan people possessed a deep mythology and religious life. Lewis, Clark, and the others of the expedition glimpsed only a small portion, and understood even less.[6]For a fuller exploration into Mandan mythology and religion and the expedition members’ understandings of them, see Thomas P. Slaughter, Exploring Lewis and Clark: Reflections of Men and … Continue reading

During the cold January days at Fort Mandan, the journalists tried to explain the Buffalo Dance and the Mandan practice of gaining power from elders by having them sleep with the younger man’s wife. On 5 January 1805, Clark says they sent one of the men to such a ceremony and that he was given four girls. On the 20th of that month, Patrick Gass and Joseph Whitehouse record a ritual of offering food to a buffalo head. Gass wrote, “Their superstitious credulity is so great, that they believe by using the head well the living buffaloe will come and that they will get a supply of meat.” Whitehouse also added:

The party who was at this Village also say that those Indians, possess very strange and uncommon Ideas of things in general, They are very Ignorant, and have no Ideas of our forms & customs, neither in regard to our Worship or the Deity &ca.

On 25 October 1804, Clark records the Mandan custom of cutting the first joint of a finger when mourning the loss of a relative. On 21 February 1805, the captains are told about the Mandan medicine stone, and on their return to St. Louis, Clark records the Mandan creation story (see 18 August 1806). Notably missing from the journalists accounts are personal and tribal bundles, the Okipa ceremony, Turtle Drums and a multitude of sacred beings.[7]The journalists’ role as ethnographers in the context of their stay at the Mandan villages is explored in James P. Ronda, Lewis and Clark among the Indians, Bison Book ed. (Lincoln: University … Continue reading

The Mythic Madoc Indians

In the years 1795–1797, James Mackay and John Evans explored the Missouri River between St. Louis and the Mandan Villages. Their supporter, the Spanish government, was eager to establish trade. Evans’s motivation was in search for the mythic Madoc Indians, but he also made maps. Traveling the same waterway in 1804, the captains continually confirmed the accuracy of the Evan’s maps and would not contribute significant geographic knowledge until after they left Fort Mandan on 7 April 1805.[8]For a comparison of Evans’ and Clark’s maps, see on this site, Clark’s Fort Mandan Maps.

Perhaps the Mandan people had difficulty understanding the Euro-American search for a North American tribe that was descended from Welsh Prince Madog—the mythic Madoc Indians. Jefferson specifically asked Lewis to look for such a tribe, and at the time of the expedition, the prime candidates were the Mandans. The people did have a genetic predisposition for premature graying, but little else to support the theory. The captains took a vocabulary of their language, but gave no opinion. The other journalists reporting hearing a brogue or seeing light complexions among various tribes they encountered. The Mandan connection may have faded away, but after his 1832 visit with the Mandan, artist George Catlin renewed the myth. Despite there being no solid archaeological, linguistic, or genetic evidence, many people today think the lost tribe has been, or will be, found.[9]Wood and Irwin, 350; Aaron Cobia, “Prince Madoc and the Welsh Indians: Was there a Mandan Connection?,” We Proceeded On, August 2011, Vol.37 No. 3, Page 16. Available at … Continue reading

After the Expedition

In 1837, the Mandans were nearly destroyed when the steamboat St. Peters brought smallpox to the Fort Clark village. In 1845, the Knife River Mandan and Hidatsa made a historic move to the Like-a-Fishook village, and the Fort Berthold trading post was soon built nearby. Years later, an American military post was added, and the Fort Berthold Reservation was established.

Today, the Mandan are part of the Three Affiliated Tribes also known as the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation. Stories of notable members can be viewed on the page Meet the Three Affiliated Tribes. For a geo-political analysis of traditional land holdings, see Fort Berthold Reservation.

Synonymy

This limited synonymy is meant to help the Lewis and Clark reader. Spellings from the journals are enclosed in brackets.[10]Moulton, Journals, 3:201n5 and 202, fig. 4. For a full synonymy, see Douglas R. Parks, Handbook of North American Indians: Plains Vol. 13, 362–64.

Mandan People: Mandane, Mantannes, Mantons, Mendanne, Mandanne, Mandians, Mandols

Mututahank village: [Matootonha, Ma-too-ton-ka, Mar-too-ton-ha], Mih-Tutta-Hangkusch, Métutahanke, Mitutahankish, Mitutanka, enumerated as First Mandan Village

Ruptáre village: [Roop-tar-hee, Roop-tar ha], Ruhpatare, Rùptari, Ruptadi, Nuptadi, Posecopsahe (Black Cat), East Village, enumerated as Second Mandan Village

 

Selected Pages and Encounters

Notes

Notes
1 “Mih-Tutta-Hangkusch, Mandan Dorf. Mih-Tutta-Hangkusch, village Mandan. Mih-Tutta-Hangjusch, a Mandan village.” New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed 12 June 2019. http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47da-c441-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99.
2 Frederick Webb Hodge, Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, Vol. 2 (Washington: Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology, Government Printing Office, 1910), 797.
3 W. Raymond Wood and Lee Irwin, Handbook of North American Indians: Plains Vol. 13, ed. Raymond J. DeMallie (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 2001), 349.
4 Pierre-Antoine Tabeau, Tabeau’s Narrative of Loisel’s Expedition to the Upper Missouri River, ed. Annie Heloise Abel, translated from French by Rose Abel Wright, (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1939), 161.
5 The Souris River route connected the Mandan villages with the English trading posts on the Assiniboine River. For more, see on this site, Souris River Trade Route.
6 For a fuller exploration into Mandan mythology and religion and the expedition members’ understandings of them, see Thomas P. Slaughter, Exploring Lewis and Clark: Reflections of Men and Wilderness (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003), ch. 1.
7 The journalists’ role as ethnographers in the context of their stay at the Mandan villages is explored in James P. Ronda, Lewis and Clark among the Indians, Bison Book ed. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1984), 129–132. For ceremonies, see Wood and Irwin, 356–359. For more on the Medicine Stone, see Clay S. Jenkinson, A Vast and Open Plain: The Writings of the Lewis and Clark Expedition in North Dakota, 1804–1806 (Bismarck, North Dakota: State Historical Society of North Dakota, 2003), 222–23.
8 For a comparison of Evans’ and Clark’s maps, see on this site, Clark’s Fort Mandan Maps.
9 Wood and Irwin, 350; Aaron Cobia, “Prince Madoc and the Welsh Indians: Was there a Mandan Connection?,” We Proceeded On, August 2011, Vol.37 No. 3, Page 16. Available at https://lewisandclark.org/wpo/pdf/vol37no3.pdf#page=18.
10 Moulton, Journals, 3:201n5 and 202, fig. 4. For a full synonymy, see Douglas R. Parks, Handbook of North American Indians: Plains Vol. 13, 362–64.

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  • The Lewis and Clark Expedition: Day by Day by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2018). The story in prose, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
  • The Lewis and Clark Journals: An American Epic of Discovery (abridged) by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 2003). Selected journal excerpts, 14 May 1804–23 September 1806.
  • The Lewis and Clark Journals. by Gary E. Moulton (University of Nebraska Press, 1983–2001). The complete story in 13 volumes.