Many topics that Black Elk discusses in his narrative are of ethnographic interest: they provide readers with detailed cultural information that could otherwise be obtained only through careful anthropological research. His description of the sun dance is such a topic. The sun dance, which continues to be performed by the Sioux in the present day, is a deeply sacred ritual performed around a tree placed at the center of an area representing the nation’s hoop. The dancers’ flesh is pierced, usually on the chest and/or back, and rawhide thongs are drawn through the piercings and attached to the tree. The dancers dance around the tree, sometimes for hours, pulling on the thongs until they break through the flesh. In a related sun dance ritual, men would carve small pieces of flesh from their bodies as an offering to the Great Spirit, an act called leaving a piece of flesh. (At least one-account reports that Sitting Bull left 100 pieces of flesh at the sun dance Black Elk describes here.) The dance is performed during the full moon in June or July, when it is often quite hot, and the dancers undergo purification rituals and do not eat or drink during the dance. Thus, the sun dance is partly a test of physical endurance, but more importantly it symbolizes the dancers’ desire to break the bonds of flesh in order to access the spirit.
Some of the symbology of the sun dance is similar to that of Black Elk’s earlier vision (see Chapter 3) because both rely on traditional Sioux imagery. The flowering tree of the sun dance creates a representation of the original state of the innocence and prosperity of all things and is similar to the flowering stick of Black Elk’s vision. The circular path of the dancers around the tree invokes the powers of the four quarters of the earth. Pregnant women and nursing mothers represent fertility as well.
The battle with General Crook that is reported here took place on June 17, 1876, just eight days before the Battle of Little Bighorn (Custer’s Last Stand). The Indians are increasingly threatened; they are not only being displaced and contained, they are being assaulted. The attitude of the U.S. Government is that national prosperity and expansion can be bought at the expense of the Indian population—highly ironic in a country that fought to free itself from the dominion of another nation exactly 100 years before.
