Detail of the dress, top half

Diagram of a side-fold dress, reverse view, detail

Microscopic image of hair from an animal in the family Cervidae, detail

Menominee woman working deer hide

Cheyenne elkhorn hide scraper with tallies, detail

A Mandan/Hidatsa woman cleaning hair from a bison hide with an elk-horn scraper

Assiniboine tipi encampment, late 19th century

Detail of the dress showing porcupine and bird quillwork

Mrs. Little Crow quilling, Fort Berthold reservation, North Dakota, detail

Illustration of quillwork techniques, detail

Bison sinew, magnified

Quillworking kit with quill storage case made from a bison bladder

Deer bone awl

Metal awl with beaded case

Glass blowing demonstration at the Murano Glass Factory in Venice, Italy in October 2001

Detail, sample bead card of Venetian beads

Detail of a baby carrier, showing blue and white glass beads

Detail of a baby carrier, showing blue and white glass beads with a red cloth insert

Baby carrier

English brass button, reverse

Detail of English painting by Daniel Gardner, circa 1790

Women in a Birmingham button factory, from the Penny Magazine, November 30, 1844

Man at stamping press in a Birmingham button factory, from the Penny Magazine, November 30, 1844

Cowry shells on the back shoulder of the dress

The Maldives, where the cowry shells are from

Detail of the dress showing porcupine quillwork and tufts of red wool

Military jacket

Workers dying cloth soaked in madder over a furnace in medieval England,
from Jean de Ries’s The Book of the Properties of Things, published in 1482

Detail of the dress showing metal tinklers on skirt

Jingle dancers, Little Sell pow-wow

Chewing tobacco can

Detail of the dress showing tufts of red trade cloth and dyed porcupine quills

An illustration of the madder plant, based on Gerard’s Herbal of 1597

An illustration of the bloodroot plant (Sanguinaria canadensis)

An illustration of the root of the bloodroot plant (Sanguinaria canadensis)

Portrait of Sand Bar (Tchon-su-mons-ka) by George Catlin

Sakakawea dollar coin, U.S. mint, 2000

Engraving of Fort Union by Karl Bodmer

English brass buttons were highly prized

Catlin drawing of Metaharta Village, before 1834

Site of Metaharta village today

Portrait of Black Moccasin by George Catlin

Trading was the primary point of contact between Indian people and Europeans.

Detail of a map of North America, showing the Mandan and Hidatsa villages

Earrings made from Pacific Coast Abalone and Dentalium shell

When fur-bearing mammals became depleted, traders created a market for buffalo hides

Woman’s metal knife with beaded case

Meriwether Lewis thought that blue beads were the most prized.

Nokota Mare, Nokota Horse Conservancy