The Windom pipe: a chaine operatoire analysis

Abstract

This paper defines the Windom pipe, an L-shaped smoking pipe with a tall bowl set at a slightly acute angle to a short stem. This form of pipe is found in sites of the Great Bend aspect and related phases that are the products of ancestral Wichita populations of the fifteenth through late seventeenth centuries. The method of manufacture is traced here in detail, and two new tool types used in pipe manufacture are described for the first time. At some point after the pipes had been made and used, some were dissected and portions of the bowl used to make pendants that probably marked the status of the former pipe owner The Windom pipe was apparently used in rituals of alliance within and between Great Bend communities but not for purposes of creating alliances with outsiders. Eventually, this form of pipe and its associated ritual was superceded by the calumet pipe and ritual derived from the Skiri Pawnee.