Native American Tobacco Pipes

1. Native American Tobacco Pipes By: Shayan Mondegari Derrick Vu

2. Peace Pipe • A peace pipe, also called a calumet or medicine pipe, is a ceremonial smoking pipe used by many Native American tribes, traditionally as a token of peace. It was used as a major means of communication with the spiritual world. The pipe was actually used in both of war and peace. • A leader of a war expedition carried a pipe as a symbol of his leadership and his responsibilities for members of his party. During ceremonies, the pipe was smoked to ask for protection and success and to seek guidance on the expedition. Pipe ceremonies also took place to establish alliances between different tribal peoples and in councils before important deliberations were to take place.

3. Origin • Founded by Lakota from a mysterious lady who says that they must smoke tobacco out of the pipe before all ceremonies to bring peaceful thoughts into their minds. • They must use it when they pray to the Strong One above and to Mother Earth to ensure that they receive their blessings. • Black Elk, a medicine man or "shaman," of the Oglala Sioux Indians (Lakota), predicted that his people would bring forth beneficial change to the next generation. He predicted that the pipe, and the respectful pipe holder, would be required to establish a spiritual basis for this nation.

4. How the Pipe is Made • Several materials have been employed in making the pipe: pipestone, bone, wood, and clay. The bowl of the pipe is cut from one piece. In a procedure that takes about eight hours, the pipe is gradually carved and ground from one piece of pipestone, and then the bowl and stem hole are carefully hollowed out, using a simple drill. • The pipestone is oiled with grease, which gives it its distinctive bright red appearance. Sometimes clay is gathered, molded into a pipe, dried, and then fired in a fire pit. Bones, wood, and shell have been used, depending on their availability. The stem of the pipe is wood or reed decorated with feathers or porcupine quills, and tufts of horsehair and animal fur. These were believed to correspond to the essential parts of the Universe.

5. Different Types of Pipes • Clay - The clay pipe represents the clay body of the human, within which is contained the burning ember of life. • Red Pipestone - Catlinite is an iron-rich, reddish, soft quartzite slate typically excavated from below groundwater level. Red pipestone was used by the Eastern Tribes, Western and Great Basin Tribes, and the Plains Tribes. • Blue Pipestone - Also a form of catlinite, blue pipestone was used almost predominantly by the Plains Tribes for ceremonial pipes. Deposits of the stone are also found in South Dakota.

6. Contd. • Bluestone - a hard, greenish-blue quartzite stone from the southern Appalachian Mountains. This stone was used by several Eastern Woodlands tribes for pipemaking. • Salmon Alabaster - Salmon alabaster was generally mined in central Colorado. • Green Pipestone - A white on green marbled cupric pipestone found in Wyoming and South Dakota and used by the Shoshone, Ute, and Plains Tribes for personal and ceremonial pipes.

7. Contd. • Black Pipestone (South Dakota) - a soft, brittle, white on black marbled pipestone used by the Plains Tribes for ceremonial pipes. • Black Pipestone (Uinta) - an extremely hard black quartzite slate found in the southeastern drainage of the Uinta Mountains in Utah and Colorado. This stone was used by the Great Basin Tribes for war clubs and pipes that are jet black with a high gloss when polished.

8. From top left: red pipestone, red pipestone, green pipestone, salmon alabaster, blue pipestone

9. Symbols embedded in the smoking pipes • The stem of the pipe represents the Male Principle as well as straightness of speech, mind and body. Animals or other creatures carved on the stem stand for, and thus pull into a ceremony, all of the four-legged creatures of the earth. Eagle feathers tied to the stem stand for the winged creatures above. Colored ribbons stand for the four cardinal directions. • The bowl of the pipe represents the Female Principle as well as the Plant Kingdom. The bowl of the pipe is of red stone; it is the Earth. • The whole of the pipe represents Creation, and as soon as bowl and stem are connected the ceremonial pipe becomes sacred as a result.

10. Symbolism of Pipe Smoke to Lakota • The use of the pipe was considered a sacred ritual. The smoking mixture consisted of various herbs, often tobacco mixed with willow bark, sumac leaves, certain manzanita leaves, cedar shavings, or white sage. Although some tribes at times smoked for relaxation and/or a narcotic effect, most did not normally inhale the smoke. Rather, they used the pipe as a major means of communication with the spiritual world. • The pipe smoke is also related to incense smoke in Catholicism. One reason for the pipe smoke is to perfume the air with a special fragrance. The second reason is because "incense produces smoke lighter than air, and thus the smoke rises. These symbolize prayers rising to heaven. This is to make invisible things (prayers) visible (the smoke).

11. Why did the Lakota use them? • As a means of prayer, pipes have been used to give thanks, to establish new relations and seal agreements, to mark important passages of ceremonial life, and to begin important expeditions. • Among the Sioux there are three different uses for pipes. The least important kind is one that is used for social purposes. It is filled with regular tobacco and smoked with friends. Anyone can smoke it.A higher kind is the personal pipe that we use to make and continue friendships, and it is the one that is filled and sent as an offering to a medicine man when his services are needed.The third and most important kind of pipe is one that is used by its owner for ceremonial purposes, such as the sweatlodge rites, vision quests, and the Sun Dance. It is also the one used by the holy men and medicine men for their private rituals, for healing patients, and as they lead the various tribal ceremonies. • One often-used method for opening meetings was to first light the calumet, then offer the calumet (or blow smoke) to the Thunderbird (or Eagle) in the east, and then make the same offering in a clockwise direction to the south, west, and north, and then to Father Sky and Mother Earth.

12. Ceremonial Use of the Peace Pipe • The pipe ceremony begins with loading tobacco, a natural substance, into a pipe • The pipe is held firmly by the bowl in the palm of the hand with the stem pointed outward. The last step of the pipe offering is the holding up of the pipe with its stem pointed straight upward, out into the center of the universe. • In the complete ritual of the pipe, there are three phases: the purification with the smoke of a sacred herb; the "expansion" of the pipe so that it includes the entire universe; and finally, what could be called the "identity", which is the sacrifice of the whole universe in the fire.

13. Lakota Use of the Calumet Today • The pipe is still used today, as Indian peoples are "rediscovering" their cultural roots. • Much of the sacred ceremonial meanings have been lost because, for the past three generations, tribal elders and medicine men have been unable to find enough tribal youth who were willing (or able) to receive the ancient teachings.

14. Native American Indian Peace Pipe Dance • Native American Indian Peace Pipe Dance • Native American Indian Peace Pipe Dance

15. Works cited "American Indian Pipes (Calumet)." Native American Indian Pipes. May 1997. 1 June 2008 <http://www.native-languages.org/pipes.htm>. Brown, Joseph E. The Sacred Pipe: Black Elk's Account of the Seven Rites of the Oglala Sioux (Civilization of the American Indian Series). Oklahoma City: University of Oklahoma P, 1989. 1-152. "First Americans." Origin of the Peace Pipe. June 2008. 31 May 2008 <http://www.ic.arizona.edu/ic/kmartin/School/ghost.htm>. Paper, Jordan. Offering Smoke: the Sacred Pipe and Native American Religion. Oklahoma: University of Idaho P, 1988. 1-181. "Peace Pipe." Wikipedia. 8 May 2008. EncyclopæDia Britannica Eleventh Edition. 2 June 2008 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_pipe>. Tree, James M. The Way of the Sacred Pipe. New York: Blue Sky, 2006. 1-108.