NEW YORK – Christopher Columbus was a disaster for indigenous people, but he did do one thing they derived considerable benefit from. In 1493, he reintroduced the horse to the North American continent. Now, a wide-ranging exhibit showing the many ways horses have affected Native people, and the strong bond they still share, is on display at the National Museum of the American Indian.

“A Song for the Horse Nations” is an appreciative and affectionate salute to the ways horses changed American Indian life. Increased military prowess and hunting capability were only the obvious changes. The horse’s impact on Native art, folkways, clothing, wealth, spirituality and even the role of women was also substantial.

There are many gorgeous and striking items on display at the NMAI exhibit. The first to catch your eye may be a Cuban cave painting from the 1500s, showing how far back the horse goes in the Native imagination.

Another early key event was the New Mexico pueblos’ revolt against Spanish rule in 1680. It captured many horses that became ancestors of many tribal herds, according to NMAI. The horse spread from the pueblos to their neighboring Navajo, Ute and Apache tribes, and then to the Comanche, who traded horses with their kin, the Shoshone. “By the late 1700s virtually every tribe in the West was mounted,” according to the exhibit.

Through trading, horses became a part of tribal economies. The exhibit relates how one ordinary riding horse could command eight buffalo robes, and one fine racing horse would bring 10 guns. A cheaper way of obtaining horses, through raiding, soon also became popular, and could affect the balance of tribal standing both positively and negatively.

A winter count by Long Soldier (Hunkpapa Lakota) on display has an image of a horse bleeding from several wounds, telling visually the story of how in 1860 tribal members killed each other’s horses out of jealousy.

Horses also became connected to Native spirituality, appearing in creation myths such as that of the Diné, who were said to have gotten their first horses through the adventures of a character called Turquoise Boy.

Native craftsmen soon were busy making saddles, bridles, cinchers, whips, quirts, blankets and other horse-related objects, some of them imitating Spanish forms but many developing their own tribal traditions. Many examples of these items are on display, including a spectacular Karok horseshoe, circa 1920, made of iron and plant fiber.

Horses affected not just the craft items made to be used with them. They also decorated a wide array of Native art items. Some of the most evocative are horse sticks, which commemorated a particular beloved animal and which could be decorated with that horse’s hair.

The role of women changed when tribes acquired horses, according to NMAI. The wealth acquired by increased access to food sources gave women more time to devote themselves to the arts, especially through bead and quill work. Beaded and quilled horse masks, leggings, saddle blankets and other items are among the highlights of the exhibit.

These continue to this day. An extraordinary horse mask made of porcupine quills, seed beads, brass buttons, feathers and hide by Juanita Growing Thunder Fogarty, Assiniboine/Sioux, is breathtaking.

Horses figured in many Native ceremonies, and horse visions were experienced by Indians. Horses decorated pipes and tampers used to smoke tobacco in ceremonies. According to the exhibit, having a name that included Horse in it – like Crazy Horse or American Horse – was a sign of character.

Indian affection for horses continues, despite the destruction of herds by the United States in the 1800s. They are featured in yearly pow wows like the Crow Fair in Montana and the Julyamsh pow wow in Idaho. The Nez Perce continue to breed spotted horses, the Appaloosa, and the American Quarter Horse is descended from crosses of Chickasaw ponies. Each year, to foster youth leadership, a Future Generations Ride retraces the 300 mile journey that led to the Wounded Knee massacre in South Dakota in 1890.

Horses figure prominently in Native literature. It relates Black Elk’s vision of a sky full of horses, and reproduces several horse-related songs. One, by the Lakota Two Shields, goes “See them prancing they come/neighing they come/a horse nation. See them prancing they come/neighing they come.”

The two centuries between 1685 and 1875 were the high point of the horse/Native connection, according to the exhibit. Horses “became an integral part of tribal cultures, honored in objects, stories, songs and ceremonies. Horses changed methods of hunting and warfare, modes of travel, lifestyles, and standards of wealth and prestige.”

Horses were “an ally, inspiring and useful in times of peace, and intrepid in times of war.”

The exhibit continues until July 7, 2011 at the George Gustave Heye Center in New York City, and then will travel to the NMAI main museum in Washington, D.C.