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Describe Native American Ioway Indian religion and beliefs.

The Iowa Tribe is the same as the Ioway Tribe—Native Americans of the Great Plains.  Their culture was comprised of elements of the Plains and Woodland tribes, which were nomadic and developed an equestrian culture.  This Indian tribe is the original people of Iowa and southwestern Minnesota.  The heritage of the Ioway mixes the blood of other tribes, like the Omaha, the Missouri, the Sauk, the Meskwaki, and the Otoe, as well as French traders and American farmers.  Few records survive as to Native American religions, and not many books were written about this tribe, but it was known that each clan had its own story of its creation.


Their rituals included the Sweat Lodge, the Vision Quest, and the Sun Dance Ceremony.


They gave names to the elements and powers of Nature, and they celebrated life through dancing. The naming of a person derived from a handful of sources: you were given a name as an honor from another tribe; you were named according to your birth and sex; once a child was old enough to stand unassisted, the elders of the clan could bestow a name on it; or an achievement or talent could earn a person a name, or perhaps an oddity about that person’s features.


The Iowa had seven clans, and the number seven was important to them.  The original seven (though Beaver and Snake were mentioned in the old writings) were: Black Bear, Buffalo, Elk, Thunder Eagle, Owl, Pigeon, and Wolf.


The Iowans recognized the seven cardinal directions, and each direction had a deity associated with it.  Their image of the Earth was that it was an island that rested on the back of a turtle, thus the name for Earth came to be Turtle Island.  The Earth was feminine and referred to as their Mother, with the Sky as Father.  Between these two poles, one could travel to worlds above and below.


They used medicinal plants like sage and sweetgrass, which were also used in ceremony.


Spirits, good and bad, lived throughout the land, but trees were considered generally beneficent and not cut down because they could trap evil spirits.

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