Akimel O’odham (Pima) shield; ca. 1870-1880<BR> Hide, wood, sinew, pigments; d. 44-46 cm.<BR> RMV 362-46; collected by Herman ten Kate on the Gila River Indian Reservation, Arizona, June 1883<BR> <BR> The Piman peoples of southwestern Arizona had to fight off encroaching and raiding Apaches from the east almost continually, and they allied with the Maricopas to fight the neighboring Lower Colorado River Yumans and Yavapais in the west and north. The Pimans almost continually guarded their camps with sentries. Their warriors were outfitted with shields, clubs, bows and arrows and fought on foot. Boys trained and warriors kept in shape by staging sham battles.<BR> <BR> When the Akimel O’odham (Pimas) prepared for war, they evoked the spirits to grant them magical powers that would render the enemy's magical powers impotent. It was believed that magical powers obtained by either party were the decisive factor in the outcome of a battle. Warriors were divided in two classes of specialists: archers armed with bow and arrows, and battlemen with a war club in the right hand and their protective shield on the left. The latter often fought crouching to the ground, so that the shield protected their whole body. Jumping from left to right in this squatting position was a strategy to confuse and elude the enemy. Moreover, the battlemen had painted their shields with magical symbols in strong colors, and by their jumping and partially rotating the shield from the wrist or forearm in a rapid manner they tried to optically confuse the enemy with their dazzling act until a decisive blow could be struck to the opponent. Warriors fighting with bows and arrows became more prevalent after they acquired more horses. The Akimel O’odham had a reputation of being peaceful and friendly to whites who had not infrequently found refuge with them during raids by the Apaches, their arch enemies. In 1872 General O.O. Howard established peace between the tribes.<BR> <BR> The rawhide shield called káwats, with painted designs in different colors, served for defense. After a long search, followed by protracted negotiations, Ten Kate managed to buy one from an old warrior. Vivid and cherished memories were attached to the shield, and the anthropologist had to pay four dollars to obtain it, a substantial price (Hovens 2010:91-92). Traditional weapons included bows and arrows, and clubs. The latter were called sónjik or sóntjik, made from hard mesquite or iron wood, and the Ten Kate collection contains two such specimens of the so-called “potato-masher” type (RMV 362-45 and 674-61).<BR> <BR> The shields were made from thick rawhide, cut in a circular shape, and with handles of carved wood, fastened to the back of the shield by means of deer sinew or leather thongs, the attachments strengthened on the inside by a square piece of hide. The painted designs on the front in black, red, yellow, and white include triangles and swastikas or whirlwinds, radiating suns representing the God of War. Their shapes and vibrant colors certainly must have confused enemies when they were waved and whirled before their eyes in hand-to-hand combat (Russell 1908:120-122,149,200-202; Shaw 1974:35-46,58-63). While Ten Kate worked for the Hemenway Expedition in 1887-1888 he surveyed Pima territory and noted: "Certain signs or symbols which I found among ancient petrographs at different places on the Pima reservation are equally found in Pima body paint and tattooing, on old fashioned war shields (káwats) and among the decorations on Pima pottery. I refer here more particularly to different forms of crosses, fylfot like figures and various forms of coils" (Hovens 1995:666). The shield that Ten Kate collected and the one obtained in 1883 by Johan Adrian Jacobsen for the Museum of Anthropology in Berlin are probably the oldest Pima shields extant (Russell 1908:96; Di Peso 1956:488-490; Bolz and Sanner 1999:115).<BR> <BR> <BR> Pieter Hovens<BR> National Museum of Ethnology, Leiden; 2015<BR> <BR> <BR> Peter Bolz and Hans-Ulrich Sanner, Native American Art: the Collections of the Ethnological Museum Berlin. G+H Verlag; Berlin, 1999. C.C. Di Peso, The Upper Pima of San Cayetano del Tumacacori; Publications of the Amerind Foundation 7; Dragoon, 1956. Pieter Hovens, Ten Kate's Hemenway Diary, 1887-1888; in: Journal of the Southwest 37/4:635-700; 1995. Pieter Hovens, ed., American Indian Material Culture: the Ten Kate Collection, 1882-1888; National Museum of Ethnology and ZKF Publishers; Leiden and Altenstad, 2010. Frank Russell, The Pima Indians; Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 26; Washington, D.C., 1908. Anna Moore Shaw, A Pima Past; University of Arizona Press; Tucson, 1974.<BR> <BR> <BR> 362-46<BR> Pima war shield; káwats (TK), kawad (Saxton et.al. 1983); buckskin, wood, pigment; d. 44-46 cm.; ca. 1870-1880.<BR> When the Pimas prepared for war, they evoked the spirits to grant them magical powers that would render the enemy's magical powers impotent, and make the Pimas victorious. It was believed that magical powers that could be obtained by either party were the decisive factor in the outcome of a battle. Pima warriors were divided in two classes of specialists: archers armed with bow and arrows, and battlemen with a war club in the right hand and their protective shield on the left. The latter often fought crouching to the ground, so that the shield protected their whole body. Jumping from left to right in this squatting position was a strategy to confuse and elude the enemy. Moreover, the battlemen had painted their shields with magical symbols in strong colors, and by their jumping and partially rotating it from the wrist or forearm in a rapid manner they tried to confuse the enemy with their dazzling act until a decisive blow could be struck to the opponent.<BR> The shield were made from thick rawhide, cut in a circular shape, and with handles of carved wood, fastened to the back of the shield by means of deer sinew or leather thongs, the attachments strengthened on the inside by a square piece of hide. The painted designs on the front in black, red, yellow, and white include triangles and swastikas or whirlwinds, radiating suns representing the God of War. Their shapes and vibrant colors certainly must have confused enemies when they were waved and whirled before their eyes in hand-to-hand combat (Russell 1908:120-122,149,200-202; Shaw 1974:35-46,58-63). While Ten Kate worked for the Hemenway Expedition in 1887-1888 he surveyed Pima territory and noted: "Certain signs or symbols which I found among ancient petrographs at different places on the Pima reservation are equally found in Pima body paint and tattooing, on old fashioned war shields (káwats) and among the decorations on Pima pottery. I refer here more particularly to different forms of crosses, fylfotlike figures and various forms of coils" (Hovens 1995:666). The shield that Ten Kate collected and the one obtained in 1883 by Johan Adrian Jacobsen for the Museum of Anthropology in Berlin (Bolz and Sanner 1999:115, fig. 94) are probably the oldest Pima shields extant.<BR> The Pimas had a reputation of being fierce warriors, keeping fit by staging sham battles, defeating the Yumas to the west repeatedly, and standing up to the Apaches in the east. The Sobaipuris who intermarried with the Pimas were regarded as having the fiercest warriors, a matter of necessity because they were the moist immediate neighbors of the Apaches (Russell 1908;23,165,186-187,200-202,353-356; Shaw 1974:10-13,37-42,58-62). See also: 362-47.<BR> (Hovens 2009)<BR> <BR> Rond leren schild met ornamenten op de voorzijde in geel, rood en wit op een zwarte grond. Achterzijde met houten handgreep door middel van leren riemen tegen een stuk vel of bont bevestigd.