Ball-Headed War Club (late 1700s–early 1800s): Art, History and Details

Ball-Headed War Club (late 1700s–early 1800s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The ball at the striking end of this club is clenched in an abstract, jawlike form that likely refers to a protector animal who endowed the owner with power. Incised on the shaft is a rich record of doodemag (singular, doodem, “totem”)—animals representing other-than-human progenitors from which Anishinaabe peoples trace their descent. (The Anishinaabeg, a group of related Great Lakes nations, include the Odawa, Ojibwe, Potawatomi, and others.) Included is an antlered creature, perhaps a caribou, along with mammals, birds, and powerful spirit beings: the thunderbird, its wings outstretched, and perhaps the long-tailed underwater panther. When this example was made, clubs had become symbols of status and earlier ways of life, having been replaced as favored weapons by metal tomahawks and European firearms. Today, clubs are part of powwow regalia.

Object facts

• Title: Ball-Headed War Club
• Date: late 1700s–early 1800s
• Culture: Native North America, Northeastern Woodlands, Great Lakes, Anishinaabe
• Type: Tools and Equipment
• Technique: wood (maple?)
• Dimensions: Overall: 58.6 x 7.8 x 13.1 cm (23 1/16 x 3 1/16 x 5 3/16 in.)
• Collection: AA - Native North America
• Department: Art of the Americas
• Accession number: 1991.21

Collection credit

Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Cleveland Museum of Art. The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.