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Parfleche
| The parfleche was used by the Plains Indians as a type of suitcase for storage and transportation. The word is French in origin (pare une fleche) meaning "deflects arrows" referring to the hard semi-tanned hide used to make the containers as well as shields. They were used to carry dried meat and pemmican and also clothing, tools, valuables and other materials. There were box shaped parfleche to store clothing and moccasins and tube shaped containers used to store feather headresses or hair roaches. They were constructed of rawhide, typically from buffalo, which was soaked in a crude wood-ash lye to remove the hair, cut and folded and then painted in bold geometric or abstract designs that were distinctive by tribe and many times passed down through the family for generations. The paint colors were from aniline dyes or trade paints and were typically blue, red, yellow, green and black.
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