This pattern is based on an artifact in the possession of From the Museum and Research Center of the American Mountain Men, dating to circa 1900. The general cut of the moccasin is Plains Indian, but because the sole has been replaced the actual tribal origin had to be inferred from other characteristics.

The cut of the tongue is like a number of Sioux moccasins, but not all Sioux have this cut and it is not Sioux exclusively. Also, they do not have the “buffalo hoof-print” pattern on the top that most Sioux fully beaded moccasins have. The yellow pigment rubbed into the background is distinctive to the Southern Plains Nations, but these moccasins do not have the fringed back seam or fringes down the instep to the toe as do the Kiowa and Commanche mocs.Ethnologists Bob Edgar and Clyde Hall along with some of their associates have identified the moccasins as Arapaho.

All the beads are Venetican glass, size 11 by current standards, and all beads are the colors that were common in the nineteenth century but for the most part have not been made since. The background is the well-known but very scarce and expensive greasy yellows. The red is a red white-heart (not the rose red white-heart, but the common brighter red). The trader blue is that milky, greasy, semi-translucent light blue that was so common during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries but is so scarce and costly now. The squares on the toe of the moccasins are of blue beads of a transparent thalo blue .

All stitching with the exception of the replacement soles has been done with sinue and is on brain tanned leather that is probably buffalo calf.

The beaded rows on the bands are done with eight beads per row, but in the toe area the rows contain ten up to fifteen beads on a single strand. This large number of beads lays down comparatively flat on this piece because it is done with sinew. These long strands look a bit loose and sloppy when we try to duplicate them today substituting Nymo for sinew.

The pattern is the intellectual property of the original Arapapho artist: it can be used to inform new designs for new moccasins but ought not to be directly copied.