Religion - Overview
One hallmark of the American experience captured in the Museum's collections is the nation's broad diversity of religious faiths. Artifacts range from Thomas Jefferson's Bible to a huge "Sunstone" sculpture carved for a Mormon temple in Illinois in 1844 to a household shrine from the home of a Pueblo Indian in the 1990s. Furniture, musical instruments, clothing, cooking ware, and thousands of prints and figures in the collections have all played roles in the religious lives of Americans. The most comprehensive collections include artifacts from Jewish and Christian European Americans, Catholic Latinos, Protestant Arab Americans, Buddhist and Christian Asian Pacific Americans, and Protestant African Americans. One notable group is the Vidal Collection of carved figures known as santos and other folk religious material from the practice of Santeria in Puerto Rico.
"Religion - Overview" showing 26 items.
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Chest
- Description
- Though this country was founded in part by European religious communities rebelling against an ornate and hierarchical Catholic faith to which they had been forced to adhere, this trunk reminds us of other Catholics adhering to a simpler monastic life. Isolated from their roots, many gave themselves over to the priesthood, meditation, and social work in a communitarian environment. This plain trunk is a pine chest painted blue, with iron fittings suggestive of New England Shaker furnishings. In fact it belonged to the Italian parents of a Dominican Sister who joined the Monastery of the Blessed Sacrament in Oullins, France. In America, she and another woman founded the first Dominican monastery in 1880 in the United States, the Monastery of Saint Dominic in Newark, New Jersey. This trunk is one of a several items received from the monastery, all demonstrating a simplicity of lifestyle, devoid of ornamentation.
- The Dominican nuns were founded by Saint Dominic in 1207, just prior to his foundation of the Order of Friars Preachers. It was his wish that the nuns should share in the preaching mission of the friars. They participate in the preaching of the Word by living their contemplative vocation and studying the Word of God. Today, Dominican nuns follow that same path in many countries throughout the world. The two American women who founded the Newark monastery in 1880 (and subsequently other Dominican monasteries across the United States), demonstrated an independence that also corresponded with the widening general push for increased autonomy and voice by American women in the same era.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1880
- user
- Monastery of St. Dominic
- ID Number
- CL*314563.01
- accession number
- 314563
- catalog number
- 314563.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of the "Dance of the Nahikai"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of the “Dance of the Nahikai” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Plate XII (p.438) in an article by Dr. Washington Matthews (1843-1905) entitled “The Mountain Chant: a Navajo ceremony” in the Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1883-84. The illustration was engraved by Henry Hobart Nichols (1838-1887).
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1887
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- graphic artist
- Nichols, H. H.
- author
- Matthews, Washington
- block maker
- A. P. J. & Co.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1539
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1539
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Mission Church, New Mexico
- Description
- Thomas Moran etched this view of a mission church in New Mexico in 1881 after a photograph by friend and traveling companion William Henry Jackson (1843–1942). Moran had met Jackson in 1871 on Ferdinand V. Hayden’s Yellowstone expedition, the first government-sponsored survey of that area. Jackson and Moran worked side by side recording views. While Moran’s paintings of the West made his reputation, fewer than one-fifth of his etchings depict Western or Mexican scenes. His signature “TYM” at lower left stands for Thomas “Yellowstone” Moran.
- The church shown in this print was replaced by a stone building in the early 20th century, and the San Juan Pueblo recently changed its name to Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo. It lies twenty-five miles north of Santa Fe.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1881
- Associated Date
- 1881
- graphic artist
- Moran, Thomas
- photographer
- Jackson, William Henry
- ID Number
- GA*14750
- catalog number
- 14750
- accession number
- 94830
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
1888 Prohibition Amendment Parlor Throw
- Description
- “Memorial to the Constitutional Prohibition Amendment 1888” is this quilt's painted inscription, found on a red satin triangle on a corner of the lining. In 1888 the Prohibition Party was beginning to achieve national strength in the presidential elections.
- Founded in 1869, for the purpose of prohibiting the sale and manufacture of liquor, the Prohibition Party finally achieved the goal in 1919 with the ratification of the 18th Amendment. The 18th Amendment was repealed in 1933 by the 21st Amendment. Although the party still exists, it does not have the following it had in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This parlor throw was made at the height of the Prohibition Party’s popularity.
- A 14-inch center block of red velvet with painted water lilies is framed by two rows of painted or embroidered 7-inch satin blocks. The use of three colors (amber, blue and black), set alternately, provides a balanced overall aesthetic. An 8 ¼-inch red velvet border completes the throw. The lining is red satin, machine-quilted in a triple diagonal grid. Five of the black satin squares have painted religious inscriptions: “Hope;” a Bible with “Tried and Proved;” “Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him;” Be of the same mind one toward another;” and, a cross with “Et Teneo et Teneor.” The last, meaning "I hold and am held," may have referred to the motto of a Baptist college founded by Charles Haddon Spurgeon in the 1860s. The floral and bird motifs, the spider web, and others are similar to those found on crazy patchwork of the late 19th century.
- Although the maker is not known, the sentiments expressed are indicative of the types of inscriptions on decorative items that might be found in many homes during that era.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1888
- maker
- unknown
- ID Number
- TE*T11462
- accession number
- 211904
- catalog number
- T11462
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of a "Zuni effigy"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of a “Zuni effigy” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the print was published in 1883 as Figure 463 (p.365) in an article by James Stevenson (1840-1888) entitled “Illustrated Catalogue of the Collections Obtained from the Indians of New Mexico and Arizona in 1879” in the Second Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1880-81.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1883
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Stevenson, James
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.0141
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.0141
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of an "Aleut dancing or mortuary mask"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of an “Aleut dancing or mortuary mask” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the print was published in 1884 as Plate XXVIII.71 (p.201) in an article by William Healey Dall (1845-1927) entitled “On Masks, Labrets, and Certain Aboriginal Customs with an Inquiry into the Bearing of Their Geographical Distribution” in the Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1881-82.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1884
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Dall, William H.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.0164
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.0164
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of an "Indian mask from the northwest coast of America"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of an “Indian mask from the northwest coast of America” was prepared by Henry Hobart Nichols (1838-1887) and the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the print was published in 1884 as Plate XIII.20 (p.171) in an article by William Healey Dall (1845-1927) entitled “On Masks, Labrets, and Certain Aboriginal Customs with an Inquiry into the Bearing of Their Geographical Distribution” in the Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1881-82.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1884
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Dall, William H.
- graphic artist
- Nichols, H. H.
- block maker
- N. J. Wemmer
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.0165
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.0165
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of an "Iroquois mask"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of an "Iroquois Mask" was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the print was published as Plate XXII.49 (p. 189) in an article by William Healey Dall (1845-1927) entitled “On Masks, Labrets, and Certain Aboriginal Customs with an Inquiry into the Bearing of Their Geographical Distribution” in the Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1881-82. According to the annual report, the mask was “used by the order of ‘Falsefaces’.” Lewis Henry Morgan (1818-1881) was the original artist.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1884
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Dall, William H.
- original artist
- Morgan, L. H.
- block maker
- A. P. J. & Co.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.0437
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.0437
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of a "Dancer holding up the great plumed arrow"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock for “Dancer holding up the great plumed arrow” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the print was published as Figure 54 (p.434) in an article by Dr. Washington Matthews (1843-1905) entitled “The Mountain Chant: a Navajo ceremony” in the Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1883-84.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1887
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- block maker
- A. P. J. & Co.
- author
- Matthews, Washington
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.0438
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.0438
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of an "Indian mask from the northwest coast of America"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of an “Indian mask from the northwest coast of America” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Plate XIV.23 (p.173) in an article by William Healey Dall (1845-1927) entitled “On Masks, Labrets, and Certain Aboriginal Customs with an Inquiry into the Bearing of Their Geographical Distribution” in the Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1881-82. According to the annual report, the image shows a “dancing mask used by the Indians of Cape Flattery, Washington Territory” and was originally drawn by J.G. Swan (1818-1900).
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1884
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Dall, William H.
- original artist
- Swan, J. G.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1011
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1011
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center