Bound by Honor Bound by Love (23 page)

The resources I used in
research include (but are not limited to) the following:

The North American
Indian
(volume 5) written and published by
Edward S. Curtis (1909).  (book)

Mandan Social and
Ceremonial Organization  
(book)
Alfred W. Bowers
foreword by Gerard Baker
2004
University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, Nebraska
original 1950 by
The University of Chicago

I also took a trip to
Bismarck, North Dakota in 2011 to see Mandan artifacts and read on
their traditions and myths at the Heritage Center and a visit to
the On-A-Slant Indian Village (south of Mandan, North Dakota) where
the earthen lodges, drying platforms, and historical items kept in
one of their lodges is available for touring.

I will admit that every
time I think of how history has played out (the last full-blooded
Mandan died in 1971), I tear up.  The bulk of the series has
been the struggle for the Mandans to preserve their way of life.
 But inevitably the tides of change was too powerful for them
to fight, and that’s the ultimate conclusion that is reached at the
end of the series.  So I consider the ending of Bound by
Honor, Bound by Love to be a bittersweet one.  For Citlali and
Onawa, it’s a happy ending, but for the tribe, it means accepting
that they would never recapture their past glory.