Lakota Cosmo-vision
The Habitation of land and the orientation of the universe endures to demonstrate the significance that bares on Native life and religion. The Lakota tribe in particular originally inhabited and roamed a vast territory of the mid-west. Which present-day are now parts of North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming, and Montana. Their worldview has been based off their orientation to surrounding environment with respect to the alignment of exclusive stars and/or constellations at specific intervals of time. Also certain individuals (medicine men) among the tribe have been be bestowed with scared ability of vision. Which allowed them to connect the Great Spirit. This has provided them greater reasoning to their worldview. Many
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They consider the stars to be “the holy breath of the Great Spirit” (Goodman,1). Evidence of this mirroring effect is shown on artifacts of two separate but identical maps, printed on tanned hides. One map distinctly shows the scared race track (the red clay valley that encircles the Black Hills) and the sacred sites that are inside of it. Likewise, the Lakota constellation map reproduces the Sacred Hoop and corresponds a sacred site on earth with a constellation in the Sky. As the Sun moves from north to south annually creating the change of seasons; Lakota people would perform various ceremonies. These ceremonies are practiced at the sacred sites that correspond to the constellation the sun has enter during that particularly season. One well known example is the lighting of the Celestial Pipe. The big dipper is a macrocosm representing the wooden spoon that medicine men would use to carry live coals to light the pipe, the Sun also represents the coals. As the Sun is carried into the dry willow constellation, this would signal the end of winter and the beginning of spring in conjunction it announces that the people are ready to follow the teachings of the Sacred Pipe (Goodman, 6). Thus allowing the people to perform the peace pipe ceremony which is offered to the four quarters, spirit above, and Mother Earth this would allow the individual to ordinate themselves to the Cosmos above and