The community had to recognize the deeds.

The title therefore linked personal action to collective judgment.

That relationship also helps explain why the horse theft mattered so deeply.

The act was not valuable because horses were expensive.

It mattered because generations of Crow people understood the danger and skill represented by entering enemy territory, taking animals central to mobility, and returning alive.

Medicine Crow’s World War II experience placed an old standard inside a new battlefield.

He did not imitate the surface appearance of nineteenth-century warfare.

He completed equivalent acts under the conditions actually available to him.

The result raises a broader question about tradition.

What makes a tradition authentic?