He gave her a Lakota name — accounts vary on the specific name and its translation, but versions including “Little Sure Shot” have appeared in multiple sources.

Whether the relationship reflected genuine personal warmth or was shaped by the performance context of the show is difficult to assess.

What the Wild West show years make clear is that Sitting Bull was a person who attracted intense projection from people who did not know him, who was capable of navigating situations that were entirely outside his previous experience, and who maintained his own perspective and priorities even in contexts designed to cast him in a specific predetermined role.

Those same qualities characterized the rest of his life and shaped the complexity of the legacy that his descendants have had to navigate.