An Earthlodge (Awa-adi)

Earthlodge at Sunrise

NPS Photo / Ashley Bargmann

Quick Facts

Location:

Knife River Indian Villages NHS at 564 County Rd 37, Stanton, ND

Significance:

Home of the Hidatsa

Amenities

1 listed

Fire Extinguisher

When you leave the Visitor Center, try to imagine yourself back in time as a person living in one these villages. On the horizon you might see Bison, Deer or Elk and as you walk down the path you see your Mother in the garden with her sisters singing their prayers to the growing corn. Your Father would be sitting on top of the lodge keeping watch for herds to hunt or enemies attacking.  

Feeling safe, you walk into the lodge and smell the fire. You know something good is cooking. You are home. Passing the windbreak (Wid-daksuti), you see the corral for your family’s prized horses on the right. They are valued for their skill in hunting and warfare. The horses are kept inside overnight protected from weather and thieves. Under the watchful eye of your brother. The horses, now, are grazing a short distance away.  

Your favorite dog comes to greet you. You notice children quietly playing on the floor in the sunbeam coming from the smoke hole. As many as 20 relatives live with you including your grandparents.  

To the right you see the food storage platform where meals are prepared. Food and water are stored in clay pots. The mortar and pestle have been used. The mortar has grain in it and there are berries on the mashing hide. You go to grab a berry, but your sister pops her head out of the cache pit (root cellar) to tell you that you must wait for the others. 

You sit on a mat at the fireplace next to your Mother’s Father who is reclining on the Atuka. The Atuka is a place for honored members of the family and guest to sit or sleep because it is the closest place to the fire.  

Over his head you see the hanging buffalo robe. Though you’ve seen it a thousand times before, you like to look at your favorite story that was painted years ago on the robe.  

Your Grandmother reminds you of the upcoming Green Corn Dance. She asks you to get down the parfleche box hanging from the rafters to get your moccasins out, so she can check the fit. The moccasins are decorated with porcupine quills and beads from the traders. You do what she asked and ready your clothes for the event.  

Some of the beds have canopies folded like envelopes with door like openings.  

The beds have bison robes for a mattress and for blankets. The pillows are made of soft hide stuffed with antelope fur. It is very cozy.   

Your bed is the one next to the shrine. In order to get to your bed, you must walk around the big support-post because the area in front of the shrine is sacred. The shrine holds headdresses, medicine bags, ancient clan bundles, shields, spears and arrows all used in battle. They are all sacred and cherished items. 

 As you walk outside of the Earthlodge, you hear sounds of the village, men talking, children playing, dogs barking, and women singing. Then, slowly, they begin to fade as you return to the present day. 

Ranger Tour

More information on our website

Building An Earthlodge 

 

Duration:

4 minutes, 17 seconds

An earthlodge tour with Ranger Darian. Take a look inside and learn about the Hidatsa styled earthlodge of the Mandan Hidatsa Arikara Nation.