Chapter XLIV: Section 1: Time

Dr. William H. Corbusier, surgeon, U. S. Army, gives the following information:

The Dakotas make use of the circle as the symbol of a cycle of
time; a small one for a year and a large one for a longer period
of time, as a life time, one old man. Also a round of lodges or a
cycle of seventy years, as in Battiste Good’s Winter Count. The
continuance of time is sometimes indicated by a line extending in a
direction from right to left across the page when on paper, and the
annual circles are suspended from the line at regular intervals by
short lines, as in Fig. 182, upper character, and the ideograph for
the year is placed beneath each one. At other times the line is not
continuous, but is interrupted at regular intervals by the yearly
circle, as in the lower character of Fig. 182.

Under other headings in this paper are presented graphic expressions for divisions of time--month, day, night, morning, noon, and evening. See, for some of them, Chap. XX, Sec. 2.