Assignment 4

Fool’s Crow is the main character of the book. In the beginning of the book he is known as White Man’s Dog. It isn’t until after his Crow raid that he becomes the self-assured man who later is known as Fool’s Crow. Initially he is seen as a self-conscious unlucky youth. He is the oldest son of Rides at the Door and Double Strike Woman, all members of the Lone Eaters band of Pikunis Indians. Rides at the Door is a steady wise man. He is respected among his people and is the war leader for the Lone Eaters. Fast Horse starts out as one of White-Man’s-Dog’s good friends, however, their journey as friends comes to a halt because of Fast Horse’s prideful behavior. He is boastful, proud, ambitious, and in many ways arrogant. His father, Boss Ribs is greatly respected among all of the Pikunis people because he is considered a healer and keeper of the beaver medicine bundle. The bundle itself is greatly revered by the people because it contains healing properties and has been passed down over many generations. Fast Horse was supposed to inherit the beaver medicine bundle, but that never comes to pass. Yellow Kidney is a strong warrior among the Lone Eaters and even though he is 38, he is valued and greatly respected by his people. After the Crow raid, Yellow Kidney is never the same. His fingers were chopped off and he endured the white scabs disease and never fully recovered physically or emotionally even though he eventually returned to his home. His marriage to Heavy Shield Woman was compromised due to the events of the Crow raid. She is prompted by a dream to become a sacred vow woman for the Sun Dance festival. She is a virtuous woman and fulfills her duties well at the Sundance. Their children Red Paint, Good Young Man, and One Spot are all interconnected with Fool’s Crow by the end of the novel. Red Paint becomes Fool’s Crow’s wife and bears their son. She is a talented and intelligent young woman. Good Young Man and One Spot are both afflicted by the white scabs disease, but only One Spot survives. One Spot survived the white scabs disease and rabies during the course of the novel. Fool’s Crow also had a brother, Running Fisher, who is a good young man in the beginning, however, turns prideful and boastful towards the middle because he is envious of Fool’s Crow’s accomplishments. He is eventually banished from the Lone Eaters by his father because he has dishonored his whole family by bedding his father’s youngest wife Kills Close to the Lake. She is a sad, young woman who was taken as a wife by Rides at the Door as a favor to her father since he had no dowry to give a man. Fool’s Crow had often fantasized about Kills Close to the Lake before he had taken Red Paint as his wife. Fool’s Crow grows throughout the novel to be a brilliant young warrior, horse thief, leader, and husband. Because of his accomplishments with the Crow raid and his later kill of Bull Shield (Crow leader), he becomes a respected member of the Lone Eaters. He is calm, collected, intelligent, and believes strongly in the traditions of his people. He later learns the ways of the medicine man Mik-Api, who is greatly respected and revered. Owl Child becomes an important figure throughout the course because he believes in fighting the white people and making them suffer. He is the antagonist for both the Pikunis and the Napikwans. His forceful behavior brings great sorrow for the Pikunis. Each member of the Lone Eaters with the exception of Fast Horse, Owl Child, and his gang are deeply rooted in traditions that have been passed down from generation to generation.
The novel Fool’s Crow is set in the year 1870 following the Lone Eaters band of the Pikunis Indians. Their settlement was nestled between the Two Medicine and Bear rivers in northwestern Montana. The main character of the book is known as White Man’s Dog in the beginning and later became Fool’s Crow. White Man’s Dog is seen as an unlucky young man, however he is asked by a friend (Fast Horse) to accompany him and a few other warriors in a count coup and raid against one of the enemy tribes known as the Crows. Along the way, WMD meets Yellow Kidney and Eagle Ribs. Yellow Kidney notices a calmness in WMD that he likes. He also recognizes a foolish arrogance in Fast Horse and starts to wonder if he should have asked the young man to come with them even though he greatly respects Boss Ribs, Fast Horse’s father. Yellow Kidney is the leader of the party and when they get closer to the Crow’s camp he decides to make WMD leader of the young warriors and to have Eagle Ribs, Fast Horse, and himself the buffalo runner thieves. WMD and the young warriors do everything according to plan and he steals an entire herd of horses almost unnoticed. He is forced to kill a youth so he would not run and alert the whole camp about the raid. It is WMD’s first person he’s ever killed. Fast Horse, Eagle Ribs, and Yellow Kidney take the second task of stealing the buffalo runners. Meanwhile, WMD and the other youths return to their designated meeting place along Woman Don’t Walk Butte, but only Eagle Ribs returns. A few days later, Fast Horse finally turns up, but he is haggard and puny from a winter storm he was caught in. He blames the storm on a dream he had and hadn’t fulfilled to Cold Maker. Yellow Kidney doesn’t show up, and the others fear the worst has happened so they return to the Lone Eaters’ camp. Eagle Ribs distributes the horses to each man with Yellow Kidney’s wife getting the most because he was believed to be dead, then Eagles Ribs with second most, and Fast Horse and WMD getting twenty five horses each, and so on.
Once their return, Eagle Ribs breaks the news to Heavy Shield Woman, Yellow Kidney’s only wife. She is heartbroken, but after a dream decides her husband is still alive. Her dream reveals to her that she must become a sacred vow woman in order for her husband to ever return to her. Fast Horse, turns from all his prior ambitions and becomes a self-critical unlucky man yet still prideful. However, White Man’s Dog learned a lot from his trip about himself and his capabilities. His life is given a purpose and realizes his place within his tribe. He becomes an apprentice under the medicine man Mik-Api and learns his healing ways. Fast Horse changes more and withdraws from the community, and White Man’s Dog suspects it has something to do with Yellow Kidney.
In the Spring Yellow Kidney returns to the Lone Eaters. He tells how the Crow raid went bad because of Fast Crow. It was Fast Crow who shouted out with boastful pride during the raid and caused Yellow Kidney to be captured and tortured. He also tells of his own mistake of essentially raping a young girl with the white scabs disease and how he too became infected. After all of this, he is welcomed back into camp, but he is never viewed the same way. He is looked down upon because he has lost all of his ability to provide for his family and is looked upon in a pitiful way. WMD is chosen by the chief to make an important journey to all the other tribes and get the approval for Heavy Shield Woman to be sacred vow woman in the Sundance festival. He returns and brings good news and the Sundance goes well and the Pikunis should be smiled upon by Sunchief. It is about this time that WMD has noticed Red Paint, Yellow Kidney and Heavy Shield Woman’s daughter and asks her to marry him.
After the Sundance, the war parties decide to make the Crow’s pay for Yellow Kidney’s humiliation. Red Paint realizes she is pregnant and tries to convince WMD not to go, but as he is young, he must. Fast Horse, however, has disappeared from camp and decides he will go and join Owl Child’s gang and make the Napikwans cry. WMD leads a war party to the Crows camp and they steal more horses and kill Bull Shield, the Crow’s leader. It is here that WMD achieves his great victory by accident and earns his name of Fool’s Crow. He is shot by Bull Shield and falls to the ground, and Bull Shield thinking WMD is dead comes closer and WMD realizes he is not dead and leans up and shoots and kills Bull Shield. Once WMD returns to camp, the story gets a little misconstrued and everyone believes WMD fooled Bull Shield into thinking he was dead and then killed him.
The novel takes a different turn after this and the main focus is on the struggle between the Pikunis and the Napikwans. White settlers were moving into the area and bringing disease and heart ache. Many of the tribes were struck by the white scabs disease and many were forced to abandon their lands. Owl Child’s gang creates more havoc amongst the Pikunis since they are killing many white settlers and stealing their horses. It is this turn of events that forces the Lone Eaters to abandon their lands and move across the Medicine Line. Rides at the Door becomes the new chief of the Lone Eaters because Three Bears, the original chief, dies of the white scabs disease.
There are many beliefs and customs throughout the novel that are strange to an outsider like me. For instance, Striped Face Woman recounted several attempted rapes and at least one successful one and she didn’t seem upset about it. Rape seemed to be a prevalent action by many of the warriors. Another important theme throughout the novel was the idea of a spiritual leader in the form of an animal. Fool’s Crow’s spirit brother was the wolverine and he had many dreams about this animal and lived his life according to what this spirit told him. As for customs, one of the strangest was after the Lone Eaters defeated the Crows and had killed Bull Shield. They removed their dead from the enemy camp and buried them along the road home. For each of their dead warriors, they shot a Crow horse in the head so each man had a horse to ride in the other world.