They were deciding that the specific form of documentation the study could provide was worth the specific use of the biological material it required.

That decision was theirs to make, as it had never been the decision of the people who removed the hair from Sitting Bull’s body in December 1890.

The study produced findings that were scientifically meaningful and carefully framed.

The peer-reviewed publication added to the scientific literature on degraded DNA analysis.

The coverage brought the story of the repatriation and the family’s long-maintained identity to audiences who had not been aware of it.

And Tatanka Iyotake remains who he was: a Hunkpapa Lakota man of extraordinary significance to his community, to the Lakota Nation, and to the broader history of the relationship between Native peoples and the United States.