lac courte oreilles bow

[Bloodhound]

I hunt alot in NW WI and would like to make a traditional bow from the region. Any specs on that type of bow and what wood was traditionally used would be appreciated.

[half eye]

There are quite a few Native American tribes in that area. To name a few Fox, Sac, Ho-chunk, Santee Sioux, Northern Chippewa, Both Sub-arctic Cree and Plains Cree not to mention Odawa, Illinois, Miami, and a whole slew of others. Some of the tribes were horse culture and some were not. Other than the Miami I believe you will find the bows were the regular square section hardwood self bows because that geographic area is still in the abundantly wooded area. I believe you will find that a lot of the bows were either Ash, Ironwood, Hickory, or osage....some of the northern tribes would have also used birch. I have only seen one example of a sinew lined bow from the area and that was northern Cree ( plain wood, sinewed lined and decorated with deer foot prints in black. Carved edge bows were quite common amoungst the Fox, Sac, Ho-Chunk and of course thw Chippewa and Odawa. For the most part the bows will be a square sectioned, hardwood, between 36" and (about)54, no grip wrap and either single curved or slightly double curved.

If have a particular tribe in mind I can see if I have photos of any of the appropriate bows squirrled away.
rich

[Aaron H]

Half Eye, what do you mean by single or double curved?

[half eye]

That is term as described by early museum curators. The bows I usually make (1/2 circle) would be single curved. Even if the tips (they used the word horns) were flipped....the main bow has one big curve.  A double curve was described as two demi-circles, one on either side of the grip. Some of those were straight tipped and some had flipped tips but the were still referred to as double curves.

Now-a-days we call a flipped tip double curve a "gull-wing" or a "five curve". Sorry for the confusion, but I'm in the habit of calling them by the old description because I would be really confused regarding shape while researching various bows because most of the desdcriptions were written and catalogued a long time ago.

rich

[GB]

I am interested in this as well.  I live in Neenah, WI, which is on the west shore of Lake Winnebago (another tribe) and has the Fox River running through it.  I've seen drawings of those scalloped edge bows in Jim Hamm's book and TBB's.  I've always wondered if they are prone to splitting or lifting a splinter along that edge.  Or maybe with a wood like hickory it isn't a concern?

[half eye]

GB, I've made quite a few scalloped bows, splitting is not an issue as long as the scallop separators are not deeper than the scallop, and your cross section has a very slight "low crown" back and belly.  I have made them from ash, elm, hard maple, ironwood, osage, and both white and yellow birch and hickory. They do have a "cool" factor.

PS: sorry about the confusion the other Algonquian language groups in the great lakes referred to the Winnebago as "Ho-Chunk" they are in fact the same.
rich

[GB]

Thanks for the information, Rich!  I didn't realize that the Ho-Chunks and Winnebagos were the same tribe.  Those scalloped bows are very cool indeed and I've seen some really nice ones on here.  I greatly admire the bows of the Native Americans of my area and hope to make a replica of one someday.

Apologies to Bloodhound; I didn't mean to hijack your thread.