Everyone has seen pictures and paintings of colorful and vibrant American Indian headdresses but not many people know the true meaning behind these Native head dresses. Usually it was very important members of the tribe that would wear the American Indian headdresses such as the tribal chiefs and spiritual leaders. One of the first known tribes to wear this head wear were the Sioux Indians, and their head dresses were made out of colorful feathers that the Indian had to collect over the years through random acts of bravery and devotion to the tribe and the customs.

This was how it was thought that the American Indian headdresses were started by the Sioux tribe but many other Native American tribes also used the Native American head dresses. The headdresses varied greatly from tribe to tribe across the whole land, and some of the Indian tribes had larger and more colorful head dresses while other tribes had smaller sizes and sometimes more dull colors. The region of the United States that the American Indian tribe primarily lived in played a big part in the colors of the feathers, since it varied depending on the kind of birds the feathers came from, and sometimes these feathers were also dyed.

There were other times when these American Indian headdresses would be worn and these were usually on special occasions such as weddings and ceremonies, and among many tribes the medicine man would wear a special headdress during spiritual rituals. Many of the pictures that are commonly seen are usually of great chiefs or medicine men in their extremely bright and colorful headdresses.  There were some tribes that also wore other styles of the American Indian headdresses which were often times worn during war battles, and these were meant to protect the head and also intimidate the enemies; this was the same reason that the American Indians wore paint on their bodies and faces. There were also many other decorations that would be seen hanging from the Native headdresses such as strands of beads that had some sort of symbolic meaning to the specific tribe, and usually all of the colors in the headdresses also had some symbolism to the Native American Indian people.

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