A Rosebud Reservation Winter Count, circa 1751-1752 to 1886-1887

This is a discussion of a newly found winter count of a Lakota tiyospaye (extended kinship group) that eventually ended up on the Rosebud Reservation created for the Sicangu (Brule). The count is on muslin, measuring 89 centimeters by 176 centimeters. It consists of 136 pictographs, most drawn in black ink with colored ink washes, that cover a span approximately from 1751–2 to 1886–7. The count was obtained by either John A. Anderson or Myrtle Miller Anderson and passed on to their family. It resurfaced in 1998, in an old trunk, and was donated to the Smithsonian Institution in the fall of 2000. The count is closely related to the one on a tipi cover that was photographed by John Anderson in 1895 and is possibly the basis for the cover.