Photographs (left to right): Black Racer, Paynes Prairie, Florida; Mohave Desert, Nevada; Monhonk, New York

Wampum Belt Archive

 

Iroquois

10 sets diagonals

Galban

Original Size:	not given
Reproduction:	Beaded Length: 36.0 inches. Width: 4.0 inches. Length w/fringe: 60.0 inches.
Beads:	Rows: 9. Columns: 210. Beads: 1,890.
Materials:	Warp: Deer leather. Weft: Artificial sinew. Beads: Polymer.

Description:

This belt was referred to as the “Children of the Light”. Peabody Essex Museum described the belt a probable 18th century belt.

“Wampum are cylindrical shell beads, typically about one Quarter inch in length and one eighth inch in diameter. Wampum beads are white or purple, with the white made from the interior column of the Atlantic whelk shell and the purple made from that of the quahog…. The more important use of wampum was as a symbolic and documentary medium. Among the Iroquois, wampum strings functioned as mnemonics (sic) for reciting ritual speeches, while belts of wampum solemnized intertribal communiqués and commemorated councils and treaties.”

“Belts made mainly from white beads suggest cordial diplomacy, while those that made extensive use of purple (sometimes referred to as “black” beads) have more sober connotations. The meaning of the belt shown here, which is predominantly purple with ten white cross-filled hexagons, is now lost, but it bears faint traces of red paint on some of the beads and fringe. Belts marked with red were understood as a call to war.” (Grimes et al. 2002).

References
Grimes, John R., Feest, Christian F. and Mary Lou Curran. 2002. Uncommon Legacies: Native American Art from the Peabody Essex Museum in association with University of Washington Press, Seattle and London.

Peabody Essex Museum. 2008. http://teh.salemstate.edu/ImmigrationMigration/Wampanoag/pages/E39383WampumBelt_jpg.htm