While roaming around Ottawa in the cold taking pictures of Christmas lights the other night, I came across this monument which I hadn't noticed before — perhaps because I hadn't been in that spot before. Perhaps.
It's the National Aboriginal Veterans Monument although I'm almost sure that the wording on the monument said First Nations rather than Aboriginal. I snapped a picture and rather like the way that it turned out.
Here is a little more information from the Saskatchewan Sage News and Headlines for June, 1998 (scroll down the page if you go there).
The monument depicts four representative Aboriginal people - a woman, a First Nations person, a Métis person and an Inuit person.
As well, animals are incorporated into the design to show the traits valued in Aboriginal societies which may show up as spirit guides: a bear for strength, a wolf for family values, a cougar for stealth and an elk for sharp senses.
Above all else on the monument flies an eagle, known as the thunderbird, which is symbolic of the Creator.
That's some impressive monument! Nice that the government recognized the Natives' efforts and sacrifice.
ReplyDeleteMagnificent & Lively!
ReplyDeleteBear, Elk, Wolf, Cougar, Eagle, Human = Strong Alliance
I want to know more about the Metis...
ReplyDeleteI like the animal alliance, and enjoy these traditional motiffs in Native American Art. So much reading to do, so little time.
Well, AC, you had me curious, so I did a search on Metis, and got this:
ReplyDeleteMETIS [MEE-tis] is the innermost known satellite of Jupiter ... Metis and Adrastea lie within Jupiter's main ring and ...
METIS is a family of programs for partitioning unstructured graphs and hypergraphs and computing fill ... very large problems. The METIS family consists of three different packages ...
Then, I found what I was looking for, not a hypergraph or one of Jupiter's rings! Just some fascinating info about the Native-European mix. I found this interesting:
"Metis people adapted their form of dance from that of the Plains Indians and European jigs and reels, to their own. It is believed that many forms of Metis dances grew into the very popular square dancing of today."
Interesting how statues inspire exploration... The article you linked had another link to a nice article on beadworking by Pamela Green
Nice post, you can read more about this on my friend Shelley's blog.
ReplyDeletehttp://the-unspoken-truth.blogspot.com
I've always been fascinated with the Native Code talkers.
Anvilcloud, I invite you please to turn your mind to A Worthy Project on my site. Thanks, George
ReplyDeleteWhat a striking monument.
ReplyDelete