Lenape Feather Mantles or Capes

Much has been written about the clothing of the American Indians, but not much was written about the capes or mantles of feathers worn by many tribes in the eastern and southeastern United States. Perhaps this is because most tribes stopped making them by the early 1800s, and also because the material from which they were made was very perishable and subject to insect damage. Early written evidence for use of capes made of turkey feathers, as well as other types of feathers, has been documented for the Lenape or Delaware Indians. They continued to be made into the late 1700s or perhaps early 1800s as recorded by the Moravian missionaries and memories of them were passed down through oral tradition.