1. Great Basin American Indian
Nez Perce
Great Basin American Indian

2. Where do the Nez Perce live?
The Great
Basin
The Nez Perce Indians are original people of Idaho, Oregon, and Washington state. Most Nez Perce people live in Idaho today.

3. What do the Nez Perce live in?
The Nez Perce lived in settled villages of earth houses. They made these homes by digging an underground room, then building a wooden frame over it and covering the frame with earth, cedar bark, and tule mats.

4. What do the Nez Perce live in?
There were two styles of Nez Perce earth houses: oval-shaped longhouses, which could be as long as 150 feet, and smaller round houses. Dozens of families lived together in a longhouse, while only one family lived in a round house.

5. What do the Nez Perce wear?
Nez Perce women wore long deerskin dresses. Nez Perce men wore breechcloths with leather leggings and buckskin shirts. Both men and women wore moccasins on their feet.

6. What do the Nez Perce wear?
A Nez Perce lady's dress or warrior's shirt was fringed and often decorated with beadwork, shells, and painted designs.

7. What do the Nez Perce wear?
Nez Perce Indian leaders did sometimes wear feather headdresses, but they weren't long and trailing like Sioux war bonnets. Nez Perce headdresses were made of a ring of feathers that stood up from a headband, as in this photo (right) of Chief Joseph and Red Cloud.

8. What do the Nez Perce eat?
The Nez Perce were fishing and hunting people. Nez Perce men caught salmon and other fish, and also hunted in the forests for deer, elk, and other game.

9. What do the Nez Perce eat?
Once they acquired horses, the Nez Perce tribe began to follow the buffalo herds like their Plains Indian neighbors.

10. What do the Nez Perce eat?
Nez Perce women also gathered roots, fruits, nuts and seeds to add to their diet.