Yes.

Although old Hollywood movies would make you think otherwise, the practice of scalping goes back at least 2,500 years to the Scythians of southern Russia. According to the book Heritage in Canada, scalping in North America probably began with a governor of the New Netherlands colony who wanted Native people killed. He paid for the scalps, considering them proof of the Natives' death.

By the eighteenth century, apparently, the British were paying for French scalps, and vice-versa, and both paid for Natives' scalps. Natives took up the practice and in some tribes the taking of scalps became a symbol of warrior status.

Scalps were usually taken from the dead, but occasionally people were scalped and still lived. Some people were then allowed to return home as a warning of what could happen.