HIDATSA

The Hidatsa, also known as the Minitaree, occupied ancestral territory along the upper Missouri River in what now is North Dakota. In early colonial history, they were called the Gros Ventre of the River by French traders, but the name Gros Ventre is more commonly applied to another tribe (see GROS VENTRE). Hidatsa, pronounced hee-DOT-suh, possibly means “rows of lodges”; the alternative name Minitaree, also spelled Minitari, pronounced min-uh-TAR-ee, means “willows.”

The Siouan-speaking Hidatsa are close relatives of another Siouan-speaking people who lived to their west in what is now Montana, the CROW. According to tribal tradition, the Hidatsa once lived near Devil’s Lake, also in what is now North Dakota, but were pushed south-westward by the SIOUX (DAKOTA, LAKOTA, NAKOTA). The Hidatsa settled along the Missouri River and came to be associated with the tribes whose villages flanked their own—the MANDAN and ARIKARA.

All three peoples—the Hidatsa, Mandan, and Arikara—were primarily village farmers. They lived in earth lodges on bluffs overlooking the Missouri River. They made pottery, unlike other more nomadic tribes of the region, who used less fragile hide bags for cooking and storing food. The Hidatsa acquired some of their meat through trade with other tribes, exchanging corn for buffalo and deer meat and hides.

The Hidatsa shared many rituals with the Mandan. One custom the two tribes had in common was the Corn Dance Feast of the Women. They believed that

Hidatsa hoop-and-pole game, the object being to toss the pole through the moving hoop

The Old Woman Who Never Dies sent waterfowl to them in the spring as a symbol of the seeds the Indians planted. The geese represented corn; the ducks, beans; and the swans, gourds. To repay the Old Woman, the elderly women of the tribe would hang dried meat on poles as a sacrifice, then perform a dance. During the ceremony, young women of the tribe would feed the dancing women meat and receive grains of corn to eat in return. Some of the consecrated grain from the ceremony would be mixed with the tribe’s planting seeds. The sacrificed meat would be left on the poles until harvest time.

The Hidatsa hunted as well as farmed. They organized an annual buffalo hunt. Like the Mandan, the Hidatsa had a White Buffalo Society for women only. Women would dance in ceremonies to lure the buffalo to the hunters. After the Hidatsa had acquired horses from other tribes through trade, they tracked buffalo herds farther from their villages, onto territory that is now South Dakota and Montana. The Hidatsa also shared customs, such as the Sun Dance, with their more nomadic Siouan relatives. They are usually classified as PLAINS INDIANS but are also referred to as PRAIRIE INDIANS.

Early French and English traders plying the muddy waters of the Missouri River in their flatboats and pirogues (boats resembling canoes) made regular stops at Hidatsa villages to barter their trade goods—guns, liquor, tools, cloth, glass beads—for furs. Early explorers traveling the Missouri, such as Meriwether Lewis and William Clark during their expedition of 1804—06, also lived among the Hidatsa.

After the smallpox epidemic of 1837, which decimated the tribes of the upper Missouri, Hidatsa survivors regrouped into a single village. In 1845, the tribe moved this village to the vicinity of Fort Berthold, North Dakota. In 1870, by executive order of the federal government, a reservation was established for the Hidatsa, to be shared with the Arikara and Mandan.

A copy of a map, drawn by the Hidatsa Indian Lean Wolf, about 1880. It shows the route he took along the Missouri River in a successful raid for horses on a Sioux encampment. The circles represent Hidatsa lodges, with dots showing the number of poles supporting each roof. The crosses represent Sioux tipis. Combined circles and crosses represent dwellings belonging to intermarried Hidatsa and Sioux. Squares represent dwellings of whites. The square with a cross represents the house of a white man and Sioux woman. Lean Wolf's original path is shown in footprints and his return with the stolen horses in hoofprints.

In the 1950s, the Garrison Dam was built, flooding about one-quarter of reservation lands—156,000 acres—including the tribal capital and hospital, many homes, and the best croplands. The Three Affiliated Tribes received compensation for their relocation from the federal government, but only in 2003 did they receive $20 million to build a new hospital.

The Three Affiliated Tribes run a tourism complex. Each tribe sponsors an annual powwow. Traditional war-bonnet dances are featured parts of the festivities. The Four Bears Casino and Lodge, in operation since 1993, has increased tribal revenues.

See WINNEBAGO