Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma
Cultural Services

Item's Choctaw Name:  Tanamp Shibata

Item's English Name:  Fishing Bow

Age:  early 1900s

Material: Osage Orange Wood

Dimensions:

            Length = 165 cm

            Grip:

                        Width = 3.3cm

                        Thickness = 1.81cm

            Mid Limb:

                        Width = 2.0cm

                        Thickness = 1.4 cm

            Tip:

                        Width = 1.7cm

                        Thickness = 1.3cm

Current Owner: Choctaw Nation Museum

Location: Tuskahoma, OK

Contact: (918) 569-4465

Notes:  This bow is unusual in having a nock cut out near the handle to receive the arrow.  This has been positioned at the largest knot in the bow.  The tips of the bow are recurved; it is elliptical in cross section.  On the upper end is a pin nock, with grooves made in the belly side for the string. In flat view, the limbs are somewhat "snaky", following the grain of the wood, but several growth rings are violated on the bow's back.  The implement has a number of rasp marks on it, but its overall morphology suggests that most of the shaping was done through scraping and planing.  Unfortunately, at some point over the last century, one of the limbs was partially broken as a result of someone bending the bow backwards.