Encouraging Bear, aka Horn Chips (Lakota

Lakota language

Lakota is a Siouan language spoken by the Lakota people of the Sioux tribes. While generally taught and considered by speakers as a separate language, Lakota is mutually understandable with the other two languages , and is considered by most linguists one of the three major varieties of the Sioux...

: Ptehé Wóptuȟ’a (in Standard Lakota Orthography)), was a noted Oglala Lakota

Oglala Lakota

The Oglala Lakota or Oglala Sioux are one of the seven subtribes of the Lakota people; along with the Nakota and Dakota, they make up the Great Sioux Nation. A majority of the Oglala live on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, the eighth-largest Native American reservation in the...

 medicine man

Medicine man

"Medicine man" or "Medicine woman" are English terms used to describe traditional healers and spiritual leaders among Native American and other indigenous or aboriginal peoples...

, and the spiritual advisor to Crazy Horse

Crazy Horse

Crazy Horse was a Native American war leader of the Oglala Lakota. He took up arms against the U.S...

. Horn Chips was orphaned as a young child and raised by his grandmother. Later he was adopted by the uncle of Crazy Horse.

Chips and Crazy Horse were raised together. He is said to have had the gift of prophecy, being able to change the weather, and find lost objects and missing people. He is also acknowledged as the man who saved traditional Lakota religion from extinction and trained a number of successors.

Chips was present when Crazy Horse was killed. When the soldier jerked the bayonet from Crazy Horse's body, he hit Chips in the shoulder with the butt and dislocated his shoulder. Chips buried Crazy Horse, and he was the only person who knew the body's location.