This selection of Native American quotes provides a window into the thoughts, ideas, and emotions of some of history’s greatest indigenous voices.
Listen to what these words say about the Native way of life (and death), their connection to nature and spirituality, and their place on this earth.
Famous Native American quotes
1.) One does not sell the land people walk on.
– Crazy Horse, Oglala Lakota
2.) When you know who you are when your mission is clear, and you burn with the inner fire of unbreakable will; no cold can touch your heart; no deluge can dampen your purpose. You know that you are alive.
– Chief Seattle, Duwamish
3.) When you were born, you cried, and the world rejoiced. Live your life so that when you die, the world cries, and you rejoice.
– Cherokee saying
4.) When we show our respect for other living things, they respond with respect for us.
– Arapaho saying
5.) What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. And, it is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.
– Blackfoot saying
Native American quotes about nature
6.) Everything on the earth has a purpose, every disease, and herb to cure it, and every person a mission. This is the Indian theory of existence.
– Mourning Dove, Salish
7.) I was warmed by the sun, rocked by the winds, and sheltered by the trees as other Indian babes. I can go everywhere with a good feeling.
– Geronimo, Chiricahua Apache
8.) I love the land of winding waters more than all the rest of the world. A man who would not love his father’s grave is worse than a wild animal.
– Chief Joseph, Nez Perce
9.) The land is sacred. These words are at the core of your being. The land is our mother, the rivers our blood. Take our land away, and we die. That is, the Indian in us dies.
– Mary Brave Bird, Lakota
10.) The Great Spirit is in all things. He is in the air we breathe. The Great Spirit is our Father, but the Earth is our Mother. She nourishes us…..That which we put into the ground she returns to us.
– Big Thunder Wabanaki, Algonquin
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Geronimo Quote Meme
About Land
11.) The Holy Land is everywhere.
– Black Elk, Oglala Lakota
12.) Our land is everything to us… I will tell you one of the things we remember on our land. We remember that our grandfathers paid for it – with their lives.
– John Wooden Leg, Cheyenne
13.) The ground on which we stand is sacred ground. It is the blood of our ancestors.
– Chief Plenty Coups, Crow
14.) If you talk to the animals, they will talk with you, and you will know each other. If you do not talk to them, you will not know them, and what you do not know, you will fear. What one fears, one destroys.
– Chief Dan George, Tsleil-Waututh
15.) The American Indian is of the soil, whether it be the region of forests, plains, pueblos, or mesas. He fits into the landscape, for the hand that fashioned the continent also fashioned the man for his surroundings. He once grew as naturally as the wild sunflowers; he belongs just as the buffalo belonged…
– Luther Standing Bear, Oglala Sioux
16.) When the Earth is sick, the animals will begin to disappear; when that happens, The Warriors of the Rainbow will come to save them.
– Chief Seattle, Suquamish
Native American Quotes Image
About love
17.) I am poor and naked, but I am the chief of the nation. We do not want riches, but we do want to train our children right. Riches would do us no good. We could not take them with us to the other world. And we do not want riches. We want peace and love.
– Red Cloud, Oglala Lakota
18.) Honor the sacred. Honor the Earth, our Mother. And honor the Elders. Honor all with whom we share the Earth: Four-leggeds, two-leggeds, winged ones, swimmers, crawlers, plant and rock people. Walk-in balance and beauty.
– Native American elder
On war
19.) It is better to have less thunder in the mouth and more lightning in hand.
– Apache saying
20.) I am a great chief among my people. If you kill me, it will be like a spark on the prairie. It will make a big fire – a terrible fire!
– Chief Satanta, Kiowa
21.) This war did not spring up on our land; this war was brought upon us by the children of the Great Father who came to take our land without a price and who, in our land, do a great many evil things… This war has come from robbery – from the stealing of our land.
– Spotted Tail, Sicangu (Brulé) Lakota
22.) When a white army battles Indians and wins, it is called a great victory, but if they lose, it is called a massacre.
– Chiksika, Shawnee
23.) Will we let ourselves be destroyed in our turn without a struggle, give up our homes, our country bequeathed to us by the Great Spirit, the graves of our dead, and everything that is dear and sacred to us? I know you will cry with me, ‘Never! Never!’”
– Chief Tecumseh, Shawnee
On gratitude
24.) Hold on to what is good, Even if it’s a handful of earth. Hold on to what you believe, Even if it’s a tree that stands by itself. And, hold on to what you must do, Even if it’s a long way from here. Hold on to your life, Even if it’s easier to let go. Hold on to my hand, Even if someday I’ll be gone away from you.
– Crowfoot, Blackfoot
25.) May the stars carry your sadness away, May the flowers fill your heart with beauty, May hope forever wipe away your tears, And, above all, may silence make you strong.
– Chief Dan George, Tsleil-Waututh
About the white man
26.) How smooth must be the language of the whites when they can make right look like wrong and wrong like right?
– Black Hawk, Sauk
27.) I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man, he would have made me so in the first place. He put in your heart certain wishes and plans; in my heart, he put other and different desires. Each man is good in his sight. It is not necessary for Eagles to be Crows. We are poor… but we are free. No white man controls our footsteps. If we must die… we die defending our rights.
– Sitting Bull, Hunkpapa Lakota
28.) Whenever the white man treats the Indian as they treat each other, then we will have no more wars. We shall all be alike–brothers of one father and one another, with one sky above us and one country around us and one government for all.
– Chief Joseph, Nez Perce
29.) If the white man wants to live in peace with the Indian, he can live in peace… Treat all men alike. Give them all the same law. Give them all an even chance to live and grow. All men were made by the same Great Spirit Chief. They are all brothers. The Earth is the mother of all people, and all people should have equal rights upon it… Let me be a free man, free to travel, free to stop, free to work, free to trade… free to choose my own teachers, free to follow the religion of my fathers, free to think and talk and act for myself, and I will obey every law, or submit to the penalty.
– Chief Joseph, Nez Perce
Native American quotes about death
30.) Sing your death song and die like a hero going home.
– Chief Tecumseh, Shawnee
31.) There is no death—only a change of worlds.
– Chief Seattle, Suquamish
32.) Life is not separate from death. It only looks that way.
– Blackfoot saying
About children
33.) Children learn from what they see. We need to set an example of truth and action.
– Howard Rainer, Taos Pueblo-Creek
34.) Grown men can learn from very little children, for the hearts of the little children are pure. Therefore, the Great Spirit may show to them many things which older people miss.
– Black Elk, Oglala Lakota
Wisdom philosophy
35.) It does not require many words to speak the truth.
– Chief Joseph, Nez Perce
36.) A very great vision is needed, and the man who has it must follow it as the eagle seeks the deepest blue of the sky.
– Crazy Horse, Oglala Lakota
37.) You have to look deeper, way below the anger, the hurt, the hate, the jealousy, the self-pity, way down deeper where the dreams lie, son. Find your dream. It’s the pursuit of the dream that heals you.
– Billy Mills, Oglala Lakota
38.) I have seen that in any great undertaking, it is not enough for a man to depend simply upon himself.
– Lone Man, Teton Sioux
39.) All things share the same breath — the beast, the tree, the man, the air shares its spirit with all the life it supports.
– Chief Seattle, Suquamish
40.) So long as mists envelop you, be still; be still until the sunlight pours through and dispels the mists — as it surely will. Then act with courage.
– Chief White Eagle, Ponca
Native American Proverbs
41.) You can’t wake a person who is pretending to be asleep.
– Navajo proverb
42.) Don’t be afraid to cry. It will free your mind of sorrowful thoughts.
– Hopi proverb
43.) All dreams spin-out from the same web.
– Hopi proverb
44.) All who have died are equal.
– Comanche proverb
45.) Day and night cannot dwell together.
– Duwamish proverb
46.) Be still, and the earth will speak to you.
Navajo proverb
47.) A frog does not drink up the pond in which it lives.
– American Indian proverb
48.) Regard Heaven as your Father, Earth as your Mother, and all that live as your brother and sister.
Navajo proverb
Sayings from Native Americans
49.) Before eating, always take time to thank the food.
– Arapaho saying
50.) Walk lightly in the spring; Mother Earth is pregnant.
– Kiowa saying
51.) Our first teacher is our own heart.
– Cheyenne saying
52.) The weakness of the enemy makes our strength.
– Cherokee saying
53.) It is better to have less thunder in the mouth and more lightning in hand.
– Apache saying
54.) We will be known forever by the tracks we leave.
– Dakota saying
55.) Our first teacher is our own heart.
Native American saying
56.) Don’t be afraid to cry. It will free your mind of sorrowful thoughts.
– Hopi saying
57.) When you were born, you cried, and the world rejoiced. Live your life so that when you die, the world cries, and you rejoice.
– Cherokee saying
Inspirational Quotes
58.) We must protect the forests for our children, grandchildren and children yet to be born. We must protect the forests for those who can’t speak for themselves such as the birds, animals, fish and trees.
– Qwatsinas
59.) I see a time of Seven Generations when all the colors of mankind will gather under the Sacred Tree of Life and the whole Earth will become one circle again. In that day, there will be those among the Lakota who will carry knowledge and understanding of unity among all living things and the young white ones will come to those of my people and ask for this wisdom. I salute the light within your eyes where the whole Universe dwells. For when you are at that center within you and I am that place within me, we shall be one.
– Crazy Horse
60.) Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.
– Chief Seattle
61.) Do not judge your neighbor until you walk two moons in his moccasins.
– Cheyenne
62.) Grown men can learn from very little children for the hearts of the little children are pure. Therefore, the Great Spirit may show to them many things which older people miss.
– Black Elk, Oglala Lakota Sioux
63.) Upon suffering beyond suffering, the Red Nation shall rise again, and it shall be a blessing for a sick world. A world filled with broken promises, selfishness and separations. A world longing for light again.
– Crazy Horse
64.) Remember that your children are not your own but are lent to you by the Creator.
– Mohawk
65.) I do not think the measure of a civilization is how tall its buildings of concrete are, but rather how well its people have learned to relate to their environment and fellow man.
– Sun Bear, Chippewa
66.) Man’s law changes with his understanding of man. Only the laws of the spirit remain always the same.
– Crow
67.) Live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart.
– Chief Tecumseh
68.) If a man is as wise as a serpent, he can afford to be as harmless as a dove.”
– Cheyenne
69.) If we wonder often, the gift of knowledge will come.
– Arapaho
How to use these quotes
These quotes provide unique insights into often-overlooked Native American wisdom and philosophy.
Use these sayings as inspiration in your everyday life. If a particular quote stands out to you, you may wish to discover more about that particular Native speaker and his thoughts.
There is a rich history of Native Americans beyond the typical classroom teachings. Much can be learned from indigenous words and sayings. Hopefully, these quotes will inspire you to look deeper into that history.
— Andy Atticus
Andy is a writer based in the Twin Cities.
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