When the average person think of an American Indian man, he usually pictures him as wearing a large eagle feather war bonnet. This stereotype has become so widespread that nowadays even the Indians themselves have taken it up, and members of tribes who never used the headgear in aboriginal times now wear it on occasions when white people expect them to "look like Indians". Much confusion exists, even among anthropologists, as to the symbolism, use and distribution of the various types of feathered bonnets worn by the Plains Indians.
Read more »