Historic Tribes

Wickiups provided temporary shelter for some Native Americans while they were in Yellowstone. No authentic, standing wickiups are known to remain in the park.

NPS / Harlan Kredit

 

Greater Yellowstone’s location at the convergence of the Great Plains, Great Basin, and Plateau Indian cultures means that many tribes have a traditional connection to the land and its resources. For thousands of years before Yellowstone became a national park, it was a place where people hunted, fished, gathered plants, quarried obsidian, and used the thermal waters for religious and medicinal purposes.

Tribal oral histories indicate more extensive use during the Little Ice Age. Kiowa stories place their ancestors here from around C.E. 1400 to 1700. Ancestors to contemporary Blackfeet, Cayuse, Coeur d'Alene Nez, Shoshone, and Perce, among others, continued to travel the park on the already established trails. They visited geysers, conducted ceremonies, hunted, gathered plants and minerals, and engaged in trade. The Shoshone report family groups came to Yellowstone to gather obsidian, which they used to field dress bison. Some tribes used the Fishing Bridge area as a rendezvous site.

The Crow occupied the area generally east of the park, and the Umatilla occupied the area to the north. The Shoshone, Bannock, and other tribes of the plateaus to the west traversed the park annually to hunt on the plains to the east. Other Blackfeet groups hunted in open areas west and south of Yellowstone.

In the early 1700s, some tribes in this region began to acquire the horse. Some historians believe the horse fundamentally changed lifestyles because tribes could now travel faster and farther to hunt bison and other animals of the plains.

 

 

Tribes used hydrothermal sites ceremonially and medicinally. The Mud Volcano area is significant for the Kiowa. Their tradition says that a hot spring called Dragon’s Mouth (above) is where their creator gave them the Yellowstone area for their home. The Crow also have stories about this feature.

NPS

The Tukudika (Sheep Eaters)

Some groups of Shoshone who adapted to a mountain existence chose not to acquire the horse. These included the Tukudika, or Sheep Eaters, who used their dogs to transport food, hides, and other provisions. The Tukudika acquired the name "Sheep Eaters" from the bighorn sheep whose migrations they followed. Bighorn sheep were a significant part of their diet, and they crafted the carcasses into a wide array of tools. For example, they soaked sheep horns in hot springs to make them pliable for bows. They traded these bows, plus clothing and hides, to other tribes.