Summary Of Pretty-Shield Medicine Woman Of The Crows

Frank B. Linderman’s seventh book, Pretty-shield Medicine Woman of the Crows, is a compilation of stories told to him by Pretty-shield about her life. As the title would indicate medicine is an important part of Crow Culture. Medicine I am referring to is usually an animal that helps a person by giving them advice or warnings about what to do. The medicine that a person receives can help them achieve great things in life. On the other hand the gift can be lost by going against the promise made to the animal helper. Below are three examples of when a person has a gift from a helper and uses it to affect their community and culture. Whether it was in a negative or positive influence big medicine is often followed by a significant event.

However if disobeyed medicine can be lost in a blink of an eye. In one such case a Lakota woman who had been captured by the Crow was not welcomed back into her community when given the chance. This woman, whose name was Feather-woman, had killed her husband. Because of this she was given her daughter and left to be a Crow slave. Feather-woman was treated well but was always an outcast. When the camp moved she would not walk right along with the group but to the side in the mountains. There she would roam looking for helpers while carrying her child on her back. Felani she found a helper. A mountain-lion told her that he would always help her if she was kind to everyone. She was kind to all for a long time and gained great medicine from the mountain-lion. However, she eventually “forgot her promise to the mountain-lion to be kind” (103) and lost all her gifts. Later on in she was killed her own people in 1866. This is a good example of how medicine can bring you greatness if used properly but be lost in a blink of an eye if

When it comes to battle many would rather avoid it all together and that is just what Little-face did. Little-face had no children and her husband out looking for bison so she was able to lay in her lodge go get some rest. As she was about to drift asleep she heard a small voice calling out to her. She looked around to find a small mouse that wished to speak with her. The mouse was a mother and had her children in Little-face’s pemican pouch and she feared for their lives. The mother mouse wished to warn Little-face about a Lakota war party that greatly outnumbered them and would be upon then in four days if they did not head the warning. Little-face was worried and went to tell the others. She spoke to a wolf that had recently had a the same uneasy feelings and the decision to move was made. That winter that Crow went back into the mountains for their winter camp and the mother mouse made the request the Little-face that she be left in the mountains to life out her life. Little-face did just that and released the mother mouse into a small mouse hole at the base of a big tree. The mother mouse then said to Little-face that she would “always hear you if you call me” (69) and mice became her medicine. From that day on she never stepped on a mouse hole in the ground for fear of disturbing the mice. This story is a good example of