MANDAN. A noted and interesting tribe of Siouan stock (q.v.), now settled on Fort Ber thold Reservation, at the junction of the Little Missouri with the Missouri River, North Dakota, in alliance with the Arikara (Ree) and Minita ree (Hidatsa or Gros Ventre, q.v.). They former ly lived much farther down the Missouri and were then a numerous and influential people. but their decline has been almost without parallel for its rapidity. About 17T3 they occupied nine villages on both sides of the Missouri about the entrance of Heart River. Pressed by the Sioux and wasted by smallpox, they soon afterwards moved up the river, combining now into six vil lages. By 1804 they had again removed up the river, reduced now to two villages, and settled a few miles below the entrance of Knife River, in close neighborhood to their friends, the Ari kara and Minitaree. Here they were found by the explorers Lewis and Clark, who wintered among them and have much to say of their friendly character. Here it was also that they were nearly exterminated in 1837 by the small pox, which, brought first to their villages by a trading steamer, rapidly swept the whole plains, destroying thousands of victims and spreading death and terror among all the tribes from Canada to the Gulf. It is estimated to have killed from 6000 to S000 of the great tribe of Blackfeet, and'at least 2000 of the Pawnee, while the Mandan themselves were reduced in a few weeks from a tribe of about 1600 to a mere hand ful, reported, on what seems good authority. at 145 souls. Whatever may have been the true number, it was so small that they were lost sight of. The Arikara, who had lost about half their own munber, moved into the un tenanted Mandan villages, and for some years the Mandan tribe was thought by the traders to have become extinct. A few were still left, how ever. among the Arikara and Minitaree. and with rare determination they set about building up again their shattered tribal structure. They re
fused to adopt the language or customs of those with whom they lived, and made and strictly en forced a law forbidding all intermarriages with other tribes except upon condition that the for eign partner should become a member of a Man dan household and agree to rear his children in the Mandan language and rites. The result was that within ten years they were again a tribe, small hut respected. In 1S45 the l'ilinitaree moved up the river to the present location at Fort Berthold. where the Mandan soon after wards joined them, to be followed still later by the Arikara. The three allied tribes now number together 1100 souls, of whom the Mandan are 250.
In spite of their migrations. the Mandan were not properly a nomadic people. hut lived in stockaded villages of large and substantial circu lar log houses with earth-covered roofs, similar to those of the Pawnee and other sedentary tribes along the :Nlissouri River. They were agricul tural, raising corn, tobacco, and sunflowers. be sides going out upon the plains to hunt buffalo, at regular seasons. They tattooed upon the face and breast, and were usually designated as 'tat tooed people' in the sign language. They used a peculiar circular boat, known as a bull-boat and much resembling a tub in shape. made of buffalo skins stretched over a willow frame. Among all the tribes they were noted for their elaborate ceremonials and particularly for the terrible self-imposed tortures of the great Okeepa rite, described by Catlin. The light complexion and hair frequently seen among them, the prin cipal ground on which Catlin and others have tried to establish a theory of Welsh origin. is due partly to a species of albinism by no means rare in some tribes, but more to admixture of white blood.