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A Painted Sioux Robe Upon his return to Fort Pierre, de Girardin came upon a large gathering of Sioux who had come to claim “the presents that the Washington government sends them every year.” While waiting for his departure to Fort Union in the Upper Missouri area, he spent time in their camp, observed daily life there, and was able to produce drawings and sketches. He describes one of the Sioux warriors who was to be his guide in a way that is remarkably reminiscent of the apparel and accoutrements of some of the horsemen depicted on our painted robe: While our little caravan’s military capabilities can hardly be considered awe inspiring, we have an ambulatory arsenal in the person of our Indian guide, who, armed with a rifle, two pistols, a cavalry saber, a bow and a quiver well-stocked with arrows, as well as a knife and a club, makes an almost comical impression as he majestically takes the lead in the march … wearing an infantry tunic with a general’s epaulette on one shoulder and a red wool epaulette on the other, but neither a shirt nor pants, and with his legs covered by buckskin gaiters with embroidered fringes that hang all the way down to the ground. Subsequently, de Girardin took part in other expeditions through the Plains and the Rocky Mountains until at least 1859, the date of his last known drawing, and he returned to France in 1860. Other than his 1864 account of the first part of his 1849 and 1850 travels in Le Tour du Monde, there are, to our knowledge, no further published descriptions of his travels. Records show that he was a property owner in his native Maine-et- Loire in 1878. He later returned to the Americas and died in Panama in 1888 at the age of fifty-nine. Significant Coincidences Just as they had attracted the attention of other artists like Catlin, Bodmer, and Kurz, painted robes immediately interested de Girardin. In Le Tour du Monde, he 143 writes, The Indians … having no written traditions, use hieroglyphic paintings to transmit their armed exploits for posterity. The most distinguished young warriors gather around a meticulously tanned white bison hide and each one takes a turn illustrating his prowess with crude paintings, which may be more or less truthful. It goes without saying that the artist always represents himself with the characteristics of a brilliant horseman, and gives himself the central role, while his enemies, the Pawnee and the Crow, flee ignominiously. FIGS. 2, 3, 4 and 5 (counterclockwise from upper left): Details of the painted robe in fig. 1: the warrior with the “horned” shield (fig. 2), warrior with shield and warrior with trailing eagle feather headdress (fig. 3), a probable representation of an encampment with American flags (fig. 4), and a warrior with long hair adorned with discs (fig. 5). interpretation of the narratives represented on this robe is necessarily hypothetical (horse thefts, pursuits, combat near a camp occupied by “whites”?). We can, however, surmise that the two “heroes” in the stories are undoubtedly the warrior with the “bird” shield and the one with the “horned” shield. The depiction of bridled but riderless horses most likely alludes to stolen horses. On the Trail of Eugène de Girardin Initially there was little information available about the origin and history of this hitherto unknown robe, which surfaced in 2010 and was purchased by the Musée du Quai Branly in 2012. Its owners had apparently acquired it in the late 1980s in a small village near Coligny in the department of Ain from an older person who had inherited it from his father. No other details were forthcoming. But one of the authors of this article, Michel Petit, recognized it as having been in the Musée de l’Homme in 1986. The owner at the time had loaned it to the museum for the purpose of obtaining an expertise, with the idea that this might lead to its being purchased. According to him, it had been fortuitously found in an attic in the Angers area of western France. How and when did this painted Plains robe arrive in France? Our research leads us to believe that it was collected from the Sioux in 1849 or 1850 in what is now South Dakota by Eugène de Girardin (1828–1888), who then brought it to France.3 Eugène de Girardin was born into a military family in Saint-Léger-des-Bois in the Angers region of France on December 2, 1828. He attended the Collège de Vendôme beginning in 1840 but quit the school in 1846 and left for America. In 1849 in Saint Louis he joined geologist John Evans’ 1849–1850 expedition through the Great Plains as an artist. He published an account of the first part of his travels in 1864 in Le Tour du Monde magazine in an article titled “Voyage dans les Mauvaises Terres du Nebraska” (Voyage through the Nebraska Badlands). The expedition traveled up the Missouri River and arrived at Fort Pierre, where de Girardin visited and spent time in a “Sioux camp” in the vicinity. He records in his article that he found it “nearly impossible to draw portraits of the warriors, or even depictions of their camp, because they believed that once he had mastered their image, he would have the power to destroy them easily.” The expedition then continued into the South Dakota Badlands. In addition to the French artist, it was comprised of “two geologists, five Canadians who tended to the animals and cooking chores, and an Indian guide.”


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