Apache war cap; ca. 1880<BR> Hide, feathers, cloth, pigment, brass; h. 15 cm.<BR> RMV 361-17; purchased by Herman Ten Kate collection on the San Carlos or Camp Apache Indian Reservation, Arizona, summer 1883<BR> <BR> During the 1800s the attire of Western Apache men was basic and functional. In camp they wore only a breechcloth with a belt, moccasins, and a cloth headband. While hunting, raiding, or on the warpath, a pouch, an awl or knife case, and a small sack of food were suspended from a cartridge belt fastened around the hips (Ten Kate 2004:207). High-top moccasins were pulled up to protect feet and legs from thorns and brush. When Ten Kate visited San Carlos and Fort Apache in June and July of 1883, he noted that "Leather war hats or caps (sjach, tsjach) decorated with eagle or wild turkey feathers, whose shape vaguely recalls Roman helmets, are still worn now and then" (2004:197).<BR> <BR> Ten Kate identified this cap as Coyotero Apache, which, at that time, referred to White Mountain Apaches living south of the Black River (Goodwin 1942:2) and was almost certainly purchased in June or July 1883 at San Carlos or Camp Apache. This is an elaborately constructed and decorated example typical of this type of cap. It has a full crown of split Great Horned Owl (Bubo virginianus) flight feathers atop a cap made of mountain lion skin (Felis concolor). In the front, silhouetted against a strip of red flannel, is a row of upright buckskin triangles decorated with turquoise blue paint and brass buttons or tacks. Two large trapezoidal tabs hang down in the back, and are decorated with "sunburst" motifs painted in a turquoise blue paint and more brass buttons.<BR> <BR> Ten Kate's statement that this was a "war cap" is both valuable and problematic. In the 1930s, Western Apaches described six types of caps, two primarily for secular use, and the other four having subtly overlapping functions related to curing, warfare, and protection (Ferg 1987:132-138). By this time, Apache statements about who wore this type of cap (covered with owl feathers), and why, were quite variable, some suggesting that they were worn only by San Carlos men, or only by old men, but historic photographs show young men wearing them as well, including Scouts in the U.S. Army. The common thread among the descriptions seems to be that any man could wear an owl-feather cap, and that it served to protect the wearer from harm in general, and perhaps owls and ghosts in particular. However, it seems possible that these 1930s descriptions may be somewhat jumbled because these caps were no longer functioning in the way they had in the 1800s. Albert Reagan observed around 1900 that some objects (including caps) "formerly used only in war" had come to be considered "medicine accouterments" (1930:302). With the confinement of Apaches to reservations, raiding and warfare were things of the past, and a type of cap made originally to specifically protect a warrior in battle now took on a more general protective role. In support of the idea that this type of cap may originally have been a war cap, we can note that Navajos (related culturally and linguistically to Apaches) also made what are identified as war caps out of mountain lion skin (Kluckhohn et al. 1971:272-280). Apaches and Navajos also made mountain lion skin quivers, which Stuart Baldwin (1997:9-10) believed they introduced to the Pueblo Indians in the Southwest some time after A.D. 1400. Whichever way the diffusion of lion skin quivers went, Apaches, Navajos and Pueblo Indians in Arizona and New Mexico shared a strong association of mountain lions with bravery, strength, and warfare, some of which undoubtedly derived from similar beliefs of earlier Mesoamerican cultures to the south. Pueblo imagery includes mountain lions or their paws and claws in rock art, kiva murals, and fetishes. Hopi warriors kept mountain lion paws as a source of power, and one wonders if an Apache pouch made from a whole lion's paw served a similar purpose.<BR> <BR> In sum, what might appear like a casual, and perhaps overly generalized remark by Ten Kate that this was a "war cap" appears, when combined with information about the cap's incorporation of mountain lion skin, to more probably be a concise, accurate observation about the specific function of this type of cap in the nineteenth century.<BR> <BR> <BR> Alan Ferg<BR> Arizona State Museum, Tucson, AZ; 2015<BR> <BR> S.J. Baldwin, Apacheans Bearing Gifts: Prehispanic Influence on the Pueblo Indians; The Arizona Archaeologist 29; Arizona Archaeological Society; Phoenix, 1997. Alan Ferg, ed., Western Apache Material Culture: The Goodwin and Guenther Collections; University of Arizona Press; Tucson, 1987. Grenville Goodwin, The Social Organization of the Western Apache; University of Chicago Press; Chicago, 1942. Clyde Kluckhohn, W.W. Hill, and Lucy Wales Kluckhohn, Navaho Material Culture; Belknap Press of Harvard University Press; Cambridge, 1971. Herman Ten Kate, Travels and Researches in Native North America, 1882-1883; University of New Mexico Press; Albuquerque, 2004.<BR> <BR> Alan Ferg (2010):<BR> 361-17<BR> Coyotero (Western) Apache owl-feather cap; sjach, tsjàch (TK); mountain lion skin, feathers, brass tacks, paint; h. 15 cm.; ca. 1880.<BR> This is a typically elaborate, beautiful example of this type of cap with a full crown of split Great Horned Owl flight feathers atop a cap made of mountain lion skin. Whether the use of mountain lion skin indicates this was indeed a cap intended to be worn primarily on raids is uncertain; other men's items such as quivers and a type of pouch were made of mountain lion skin. Certainly there are war/mountain lion associations among Pueblo groups. In the 1800s, Navajos made a host of similarly elaborate caps using mountain lion, and with equally mixed discussions of their functions (Kluckhohn et al. 1971:272-278). Silhouetted against a strip of red flannel in the front is a row of upright buckskin triangles and brass buttons or tacks. Two trapezoidal tabs in the back are decorated with "sunburst" motifs painted in a turquoise blue paint and more brass buttons. This specimen was collected in June/July 1883 at either San Carlos or Camp Apache, Arizona.<BR> <BR> 361-17, 18 Apache caps<BR> "Leather war hats or caps (sjach, tsjach) decorated with eagle or wild turkey feathers, whose shape vaguely recalls Roman helmets, are still worn now and then" Ten Kate observed. His generalization that these were "war" caps is too broad. In the 1930s, Western Apaches described six different traditional types of caps, two primarily for secular use, and the other four having subtly overlapping functions related to curing, warfare and protection (Ferg 1987:132). Both caps collected by Ten Kate are of a type covered with split owl flight feathers, and the presence of two painted triangular or trapezoidal tabs in the back is common. Statements about who wore owl caps, and why, are quite variable, suggesting that they were only worn by San Carlos men, or only by old men, but historic photographs show young men wearing them as well, including scouts in the U.S. Army. The common thread among the descriptions seems to be that any man could wear an owl-feather cap, and that it served to protect the wearer from harm in general, and perhaps owls and ghosts in particular.<BR> <BR>