Massika, Sauk Man

Description

Massika ("Turtle") was one of several Sauk and Fox who came to St. Louis in March of 1833 to plead for the release of Black Hawk, a chief who had been imprisoned after an 1832 uprising. These were the first Indians encountered by Maximilian, and he studied them with great interest, noting that the men shaved their heads, leaving only a short tuft and a long, thin braid. To this they often attached a crestlike ornament called a roach made of stiff deer hair; see Plates 133 and 352 for examples. Today both the hair style and the ornament are commonly called a roach.Massika is pictured in Tableau 3 of the aquatints. Maximilian evidently intended him to be depicted exactly as shown here. Instead, in the published aquatint he appears with an ornamental roach obscuring his hair, but wearing the same strings of shell beads on his ear, the same blanket, and the same bold face paint as in this watercolor. The inscription at the lower left gives Massika's name, its meaning, his tribe, and the date and place of his portrait.