Abstract
Archaeological and ethnohistorical evidence of “buffalo jumping” is concentrated in Blackfoot (Nitsitapi) territory. Although the “hardware” of buffalo jumps has been documented extensively, little is known of the “software,” in particular the skills required to drive stampeding herds of bison over long distances to the deadfall, on foot, and often for days. The origins and nature of bison driving knowledge is explored on the basis of ethnohistory as well as Blackfoot chronicles, philosophy, and linguistics, and compared with the findings of recent field studies on the relationships between bison and wolves in the northern Great Plains. Blackfoot explanations of bison driving as knowledge learned from wolves are entirely plausible, and shed light on Blackfoot ecological methodology, as well as the development of human–canid hunting relationships generally.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Agenbroad, L. D. (1978). Buffalo jump complexes in Owyhee County, Idaho. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 213–221.
Arthur, G. W. (1975). An Introduction to the Ecology of Early Historic Communal Bison Hunting Among the Northern Plains Indians, Archaeological Survey of Canada Paper No. 37, National Museum of Man, Ottawa.
Bamforth, D. B. (1987). Historical documents and bison ecology on the Great Plains. Plains Anthropologist 32(1): 1–16.
Barsh, R. L. (1986). The nature and spirit of North American political systems. American Indian Quarterly 10(3): 181–198.
Barsh, R. L. (1990). The substitution of cattle for bison on the Great Plains. In Olson, P. A. (ed.)The Struggle for the Land, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, pp. 103–126.
Barsh, R. L. (1997a). Fire on the land. Alternatives Journal 23(4): 36–40.
Barsh, R. L. (1997b) The epistemology of traditional healing systems. Human Organization 56(1): 28–37.
Barsh, R. L. (1999). Taking indigenous science seriously. In Bocking, S. (ed.)Biodiversity in Canada; Ecology, Ideas, and Action, Broadview Press, Toronto, pp. 153–174.
Basso, K. H. (1996). Wisdom Sits in Places; Landscape and Language Among the Western Apache, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.
Bemant, L. C., and Buehler, K. J. (1994). Preliminary results from the certain site: A late archaic bison kill in western Oklahoma. Plains Anthropologist 39(148): 173–177.
Berger, J., Swenson, J. E. and Persson, I.-L. (2001, February 9). Recolonizing carnivores and naïve prey: Conservation lessons from pleistocene extinctions. Science 291: 1036–1039.
Blumenschine, R. J. (1991). Hominid carnivory and foraging strategies, and the socio-economic function of early archaeological sites. In Whiten, A., and Widdowson, E. M. (eds.), Foraging Strategies and Natural Diet of Monkeys, Apes and Humans, The Clarendon Press, Oxford, pp. 211–221.
Brink, J. (1992). Blackfoot and buffalo jumps; native people and the Head-Smashed-In project. In Forster, J. E., Harrison, D., and MacLaren, I. S. (eds.), Buffalo, University of Alberta, Edmonton, pp. 19–35.
Carbyn, L. N. (1992). Wolves and bison in Wood Buffalo National Park—Past, present, and future. In Forster, J. E., Harrison, D., and MacLaren, I. S. (eds.), Buffalo, University of Alberta, Edmonton, pp. 167–178.
Carbyn, L. N., Oosenbrug, S. M., and Anions, D. W. (1993). Wolves, Bison and the Dynamics Related to the Peace–Athabasca Delta in Canada's Wood Buffalo National Park, Canadian Circumpolar Institute, Edmonton, Alberta.
Carbyn, L. N., and T. Trottier (1987). Responses of bison on their calving grounds to predation by wolves in Wood Buffalo National Park. Canadian Journal of Zoology 65: 2072–2078.
Carbyn, L. N., and Trottier, T. (1988). Descriptions of wolf attacks on bison calves in Wood Buffalo National Park. Arctic 41(4): 297–302.
Catlin, G. (1973). Letters and Notes on the Manners, Customs, and Conditions of the North American Indians, Written During Eight Years Travel (1832–1839) Amongst the Wildest Tribes of Indians in North America, Dover, New York. (Original work published 1844)
Chatters, J. C., Campbell, S. K., Smith, G. D., and Minthorn, P. E., Jr. (1995). Bison procurement in the far west: A 2,100-year-old kill site on the Columbia Plateau. American Antiquity 60(4): 751–763.
Coppedge, B. R., and Shaw, J. H. (1998). Bison grazing patterns on seasonally burned tallgrass prairie. Journal of Range Management 51(3): 258–264.
Corbett, L. K. (1995). The Dingo in Australia and Asia, Comstock and Cornell University Press, Ithaca.
Davis, L. B. (1978). The 20th century commercial mining of northern plains bison kills. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 254–286.
Dempsey, H. A. (1965) A Blackfoot Winter Count, Glenbow Foundation, Calgary, Alberta.
Dyck, I. G. (1977). The Harder Site; A Middle Period Bison Hunters' Campsite in the Northern Great Plains, Archeological Survey of Canada Paper No. 67, National Museum of Man, Ottawa.
Epp, H. T. (1988). Way of the migrant herds: Dual dispersion strategy among bison. American Anthropologist 33(121): 309–321.
Ewers, J. C. (1958). The Blackfeet: Raiders on the Northwestern Plains, University of Oklahoma, Norman. Press.
Fabian, S. M. (1992). Space–Time of the Bororo of Brazil, University Press of Florida, Gainesville.
Fisher, J. W. (1992). Observations on the late pleistocene bone assemblage from the lamb spring site, Colorado. In Stanford, D. J., and Day, J. S. (eds.), Ice Age Hunters of the Rockies, University of Colorado Press, Niwot, pp. 51–81.
Fox, M. W. (1971). Behaviour of Wolves, Dogs and Related Canids, Jonathan Cape, London.
Fox, M. W. (1978). Man, wolf, and dog. In Hall, R. L., and Sharp, H. S. (eds.) Wolf and Man; Evolution in Parallel, Academic Press, New York, pp. 19–30.
Fox, M. W. (1992). The Soul of the Wolf; a Meditation on Wolves and Man, Lyons & Burford, New York.
Frantz, D. G., and Russell, N. J. (1989). Blackfoot Dictionary of Stems, Roots, and Affixes, University of Toronto Press, Toronto.
Frison, G. C. (1978). Prehistoric Hunters of the High Plains, Academic Press, New York.
Frison, G. C. (1998). Paleoindian large mammal hunters on the plains of North America. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 95(24): 14576–14583.
Hanks, L. M., Jr., and Hanks, J. R. (1950). Tribe Under Trust; a Study of the Blackfoot Reserve in Alberta, University of Toronto Press, Toronto.
Harris, R. C., (ed.)(1987). Historical Atlas of Canada, Volume I: From the Beginning to 1800, University of Toronto Press, Toronto.
Hayes, R. D., and Harestad, A. S. (2000). Demography of a recovering wolf population in the Yukon. Canadian Journal of Zoology 78(1): 36–48.
Hovens, J. P. M., Tungalaktuja, K. H., Todgeril, T., and Batdorj, D. (2000). The impact of wolves Canis lupus (L., 1758) on wild ungulates and nomadic livestock in and around the Hustain Nuruu Steppe Reserve (Mongolia). Lutra 43(1): 39–50.
Huffman, M. A. (1997). Current evidence for self-medication in primates: A multidisciplinary perspective. Yearbook of Physical Anthropology 40: 171–200.
Ingold, T. (1994). From trust to domination; an alternative history of human–animal relationships. In Manning, A., and Serpell, J. (eds.), Animals and Human society: Changing Perspectives, Routledge, London, pp. 1–22.
Kehoe, T. F. (1967). The Boarding School bison drive site. Plains Anthropologist 12(35, Pt. 2, Memoir 4).
Kehoe, T. F. (1978). Paleo-Indian bison drives: Feasibility studies. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 79–83.
Kelsall, J. P. (1968). The Migratory Barren Ground Caribou of Canada, Queen's Printer for Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Canadian Wildlife Service, Ottawa.
Kenyon, D. (1997). Large kill sites and the potential for illuminating provisioning behavior: Preliminary thoughts and expectations. In Jackson, L. J., and Thacker, P. T. (eds.), Caribou and Reindeer Hunters of the Northern Hemisphere, Avebury, Aldershot, UK, pp. 1–26.
Knapp, A. K., Blair, J. M., Briggs, J. M., Collins, S. L., Harnett, D. C., Johnson, L. C., and Towne, E. G. (1999). The keystone role of bison in North American Tallgrass Prairie. BioScience 49(1): 39–50.
Kunkel, K. E., Ruth, T. K., Pletscher, D. H., and Hornocker, M. G. (1999). Winter prey selection by wolves and cougars in and near Glacier National Park, Montana. Journal of Wildlife Management 63(3): 901–910.
Larter, N. C., and Gates, C. C. (1994). Home-range size of wood bison: Effects of age, sex, and forage availability. Journal of Mammalogy 75(1): 142–149.
Laundre, J. W., Hernandez, L., and Altendorf, K. B. (2001). Wolves, elk, and bison: Reestablishing the “landscape of fear” in Yellowstone National Park, U.S.A. Canadian Journal of Zoology 79(8): 1401–1409.
Lewis, M. E. (1997). Carnivoran paleoguilds of Africa: Implications for hominid food procurement. Journal of Human Evolution 32(2/3): 257–288.
Maffi, L. (ed.)(2001). On Biocultural Diversity: Linking Language, Knowledge, and the Environment, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
Malainey, M. E., and Sherriff, B. L. (1996). Adjusting our perceptions: Historical and archaeological evidence of winter on the plains of Western Canada. Plains Anthropologist 41(158): 333–357.
Mallery, G. (1893). Picture-writing of the American Indians. In Tenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Director of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888–89, Government Printing Office, Washington, DC.
Martin, P. S., and Szuter, C. R. (1999). War zones and game sinks in Lewis and Clark's west. Conservation Biology 13(1): 36–45.
McClintock, W. (1910). The Old North Trail; or Life, Legends and Religion of the Blackfeet Indians, MacMillan, London.
McClintock, W. (1923). Old Indian Trails, Houghton Mifflin, Boston.
McNulty, D. R., Varley, N., and Smith, D. W. (2001). Grizzly bear, Ursus arctos, usurps bison calf, Bison bison, captured by wolves, Canis lupus, in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. Canadian Field Naturalist 115(3): 495–498.
Meagher, M. (1997). Recent changes in Yellowstone bison numbers and distribution. In Irby, L. R., and Knight, J. E. (eds.), International Symposium on Bison Ecology and Management in North America, Montana State University, Bozeman, pp. 107–112.
Mech, L. D. (1981). The Wolf; the Ecology and Behavior of an Endangered Species, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis
Mech, L. D. (1988). The Arctic Wolf; Living With the Pack, Toronto. Key Porter Books.
Medicine Crow, J. (1978). Notes on crow Indian buffalo jump traditions. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 249–253.
Meggitt, M. J. (1965). The association between Australian aborigines and dingoes. In Leeds, A., and Vayda, A. P. (eds.), Man, Culture, and Animals; the Role of Animals in Human Ecological Adjustments, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Washington, DC, pp. 7–26.
Morris, B. (1998). The Power of Animals; an Ethnography, Berg, Oxford.
Mudrooroo (1983). Doctor Wooreddy's Prescription for Enduring the Ending of the World, Hyland House, Melbourne, Australia.
Nicholson, B. A. (1988). Modelling subsistence strategies in the forest/grassland transition zone of western Manitoba during the late prehistoric and early historic periods. Plains Anthropologist 33(121): 351–365.
O'Connell, J. F., Hawkes, K., and Blurton-Jones, N. G. (1999). Grandmothering and the evolution of Homo erectus. Human Evolution 36(5): 461–485.
Okarma, H. (1995). The trophic ecology of wolves and their predatory role in Ungulate communities of forest ecosystems in Europe. Acta Theriologica 40(4): 335–386.
Olsen, S. J. (1985). Origins of the Domestic Dog; the Fossil record, University of Arizona Press, Tucson.
Olson, R. L. (1936). The Quinault Indians, University of Washington, Seattle
Peters, R. (1978). Communication, cognition mapping, and strategy in wolves and hominids. In Hall, R. L., and Sharp, H. S. (eds.), Wolf and Man; Evolution in Parallel, Academic Press, New York, pp. 95–107.
Pimlott, D. H., Shannon, J. A., and Kolenosky, G. B. (1969). The Ecology of the Timber Wolf in Algonquin Provincial Park, Ontario Department of Lands & Forests, Toronto.
Potts, R. (1988). On an early homind scavenging niche. Current Anthropology 29(1): 153–155.
Pruitt, W. O., Jr. (1965). A flight releaser in wolf–caribou relations. Journal of Mammalogy 46: 350–351.
Reeves, B. O. K. (1978a). Bison killing in the southwestern Alberta rockies. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 63–78.
Reeves, B. O. K. (1978b). Head-Smashed-In: 5500 years of bison jumping in the Alberta plains. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 151–174.
Reeves, B. O. K. (1983, October). Six millenniums of buffalo kills. Scientific American 249: 120–135.
Reher, C. A., and Frison, G. C. (1980). The Vore site, 48CK302, a stratified buffalo jump in the Wyoming Black Hills. Plains Anthropologist 25(88, Pt. 2, Memoir 16).
Rosier, P. C. (2001). Rebirth of the Blackfeet Nation, 1912–1954, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln.
Samek, H. (1987). The Blackfoot Confederacy 1880–1920; a Comparative Study of Canadian and U.S. Indian Policy, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.
Schaefer, C. E. (1978). The bison drive of the Blackfeet Indians. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 243–248.
Schultz, J. W. (1907). My Life as an Indian, Houghton Mifflin, Boston.
Schultz, J. W. (1916). Apauk Caller of Buffalo, Houghton Mifflin, Boston.
Schultz, J. W. (1962). Blackfeet and Buffalo, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman.
Sharp, H. S. (1978). Comparative ethnology of the wolf and the chippewyan. In Hall, R. L., and Sharp, H. S. (eds.), Wolf and Man; Evolution in Parallel, Academic Press, New York, pp. 55–79.
Shaw, J. H. (1997). Bison Ecology—What We Do and Do Not Know. In Irby, L. R., and Knight, J. E. (eds.), International Symposium on Bison Ecology and Management in North America, Montana State University, Bozeman, pp. 113–120.
Shea, J. J. (1998). Neanderthal and early modern human behavioral variability: A regional-scale approach to lithic evidence for hunting in the Levantine Mousterian. Current Anthropology 39(Suppl. 2): S45-S78.
Singer, J. F., Swift, D. M., Coughenour, M. B., and Varley, J. D. (1998). Thunder on the Yellowstone revisited: An assessment of management of native ungulates by natural regulation. Wildlife Society Bulletin 26(3): 375–390.
Smith, D. W., Mech, L. D., Meagher, M., Clark, W. E., Phillips, M. K., Mack, J. A., Mech, L. D., Meagher, M., and Jaffe, R. (2000). Wolf–bison interactions in Yellowstone National Park. Journal of Mammalogy 81(4): 1128–1135.
Smith, D. W., Murphy, K. M., and Monger, S. (2001). Killing of a bison, Bison bison, calf by a wolf, Canis lupus, and four coyotes, Canis latrans, in Yellowstone National Park. Canadian Field Naturalist 115(3): 343–345.
Stanford, D. J. (1978). The Jones-Miller site: An example of hell gap bison procurement strategy. Plains Anthropologist 23(82, Pt. 2, Memoir 14): 90–97.
Stopp, M. P. (1997). Modelling mythologies of early human adaptation in the Northern Hemisphere. In Jackson, L. J., and Thacker, P. T. (eds.), Caribou and Reindeer Hunters of the Northern Hemisphere, Avebury, Aldershot, UK, pp. 32–51.
Sugiyama, M. S. (2001). Food, foragers, and folklore: The role of narrative in human subsistence. Evolution and Human Behavior 22(2): 221–240.
Thomas, D. H. (ed.)(1986). A Blackfoot Source Book; Papers by Clark Wissler, Garland, New York.
Tieszen, L. L., Stretch, L., and Vander Kooi, J. (1998). Stable isotopic determination of seasonal dietary patterns in bison at four preserves across the Great Plains. In Irby, L. R., and Knight, J. E. (eds.), International Symposium on Bison Ecology and Management in North America, Montana State University, Bozeman, pp. 130–140.
Verbicky-Todd, E. (1984). Communal Buffalo Hunting Among the Plains Indians: An Ethnographic and Historic Review, Occasional Paper No. 24, Archaeological Survey of Alberta, Edmonton.
Vila, C., Savolainen, P., Maldonado, J. E., Amorim, I. R., Rice, J. E., Honeycutt, R. L., Crandall, K. A., Lundeberg, J., and Wayne, R. K. (1997, June). Multiple and ancient origins of the domestic dog. Science 276: 1687–1689.
Vinton, M. A., Hartnett, D. C., Finck, E. J., and Briggs, J. M. (1993). Interactive effects of fire, bison (Bison bison) grazing and plant community structure in Tallgrass Prairie. American Midland Naturalist 129: 10–18.
Vos, J. (2000). Food habits and ecology of two Iberian wolf packs (Canis lupus signatus) in the north of Portugal. Journal of Zoology (London) 251(4): 457–462.
Wedel, W. R. (1986). Central Plains Prehistory; Holocene Environments and Culture Change in the Republican River Basin, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln.
Williams, M. W. (1957, May). The Wichitas: Land of the living prairie. National Geographic Magazine 63: 661–697.
Wilson, G. O. (1924). The horse and the dog in Hidatsa culture. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History 15: 125–311.
Wissler, C. (1912). Ceremonial bundles of the Blackfoot Indians, Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, No. 7(2): 65–289, Trustees of the American Museum of Natural History, New York.
Wissler, C. (1913). Societies and dance associations of the Blackfoot Indians, Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, No. 11(4), Trustees of the American Museum of Natural History, New York.
Wissler, C., and Duvall, D. C. (1908). Mythology of the Blackfoot Indians. Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of National History, No. 2(1), Trustees of the American Museum of Natural History, New York.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Barsh, R.L., Marlor, C. Driving Bison and Blackfoot Science. Human Ecology 31, 571–593 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:HUEC.0000005514.93842.91
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/B:HUEC.0000005514.93842.91