The Osage and the Invisible World: From the Works of Francis La Flesche (Civilization of the American Indian Series)

About this book

Francis La Flesche (1857-1932) Omaha Indian and anthropologist with the Bureau of American Ethnology published an enormous body of work on the religion of the Osage Indians all gathered from the most knowledgeable Osage religious leaders of their day. Yet his writings have been largely overlooked because they were published piecemeal over the course of twenty-five years and never adequately collected or analyzed. In this book Garrick A. Bailey brings together in a clear understandable way La Flesches data for two important Osage religious ceremonies--the "Songs of Wa-xo-be " an initiation into a clan priesthood and the Rite of the Chiefs an initiation into a tribal priesthood. To put La Flesches work into perspective Bailey offers a short biography of this prolific Native American scholar and an overview of traditional Osage religious beliefs and practices.