Rush Mat
date: label: Accession Date
content: 1991
name: label: Donor Name
content: No Information
notes: label: Notes
content: Large rush mat, clearly marked with number 154062, but this is a wrong number. "Sioux" is also marked on it, but this was probably due to its (incorrect) association with catalog number 154062 in the Hazen collection, and therefore is questionable, though it does resemble mat # E154066 in the Hazen collection, which was formerly identified as Sioux, though currently has been reidentified as Arikara, Hidatsa, or Mandan. Mat is also marked near one end in small writing in fading ink "Chicago 32" and has an old partial tag which reads "Mat for behind ..." Chicago 32 most probably indicates it was used in a Smithsonian Life Group exhibit # 32 at the Chicago World's Fair/World's Columbian Exposition of 1893. See Manuscript 7217, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution, "List of figures and costumes for exhibition at World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago" by C. Bergmann, entry # 32, "Chippewa Medicine Man drawing on birch bark" life group, which lists "Mat & Poles - Chicago # 32" as being included in the exhibit. This exhibit included a number of artifacts collected by Walter James Hoffman for the Bureau of American Ethnology, but also included some artifacts from other collections. The fact that no catalogue number was listed for this artifact on the Bergmann list - it was just called Chicago # 32 - may indicate it was an uncatalogued exhibit prop, or it possibly could also be an artifact that had lost its museum number previously? The same exhibit, in several forms, was subsequently used at the Smithsonian U.S. National Museum (variously titled "Chippewa medicine man" or "Chippewa scribe"). See Smithsonian Institution Annual Report for 1920, Plate 13, after p. 620 (photo negative # 8392), which shows a photo of this exhibit, with a rush mat set up on poles behind the mannequin, which appears to be rush mat ET24570. The file print photo neg. # 8392 notes this exhibit was subsequently dismantled, but does not give a date for that. Possible cultural attributions for this mat are based on the cultures of the artifacts used in the "Chippewa medicine man" exhibit, and the cultures of the artifacts Walter James Hoffman collected around the time of the Chicago World's Fair. The possible Arikara/Hidatsa/Mandan ID has also been preserved, in case it would be from the Hazen collection.
label: Record Last Modified
content: 31 May 2023
label: Specimen Count
content: 1
place: label: Place
content: United States (not certain), North America
topic: label: Topic
content: Ethnology
culture: label: Culture
content: Chippewa (Ojibwe, Anishinaabe) (?)
label: Culture
content: Winnebago (Ho-Chunk) (?)
label: Culture
content: Menominee (Mamaceqtaw) (?)
label: Culture
content: Arikara (Sahnish) (?)
label: Culture
content: Hidatsa (?)
label: Culture
content: Mandan (?)
setName: label: See more items in
content: Anthropology
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: NMNH - Anthropology Dept.
identifier: label: Accession Number
content: 999999
label: USNM Number
content: ET24570-0
objectType: label: Object Type
content: Mat