Dig It - 4/27/26
Hey, you there! Yeah, you, Seeker, today we have a special treat; this is a beaded pouch from the Delaware, or Lenni Lenape, people. They were recognized as the original inhabitants of the Mid-Atlantic States such as New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and southern New York by other tribes of the East Coast. Their Algonquian name means the “Original, original people.”
Now, my ancestors met the Lenape sometime in the late 16th to early 18th century and purchased 10,000 acres of land from them in central New Jersey. Around that time the Dutch had led a number of “punitive” expeditions against the Delaware and pushed most of them west to Pennsylvania and Ohio. White Europeans kept pushing the Delaware further and further west. Indianapolis was a Delaware town, as was Kansas City or Westport, as it was known in the early 19th century. Eventually the Delaware ended up in Oklahoma, where some still reside today.
This pouch is very unusual. The front consists of two buffalo hide beaded strips. The beadworker has used a number of different and rare beading techniques. Her designs and color choices are crazy cool, and the results are very abstract and painterly. I’ve never really seen anything like it. It has power and movement. The sides, back, and flap are made from a thin, beautifully native-tanned hide, which is possibly antelope. Wow! What a beautiful and unusual example of Native American beadwork. It came out of the collection of a teacher and dean of the IAIA back in the 1960s and 1970s. Well Fellow Seeker, I’m going to offer it for sale. Don’t miss this Once In A Lifetime Opportunity! Call or email me! -Lonesome