TABOOS.
§ 82. Mr. Hamilton was told by the Iowa that no member of any gens could eat the flesh of the eponymic animal.
The author gained the following taboos from a Missouri, Ckaʇɔe-yiñe or Ckaʇɔinye, who visited the Omaha in 1879: The members of the Tunaⁿp’iⁿ, a Black Bear gens in the Oto and Nyut’atci (or Missouri) tribes can not touch a clam shell. The Momi people, now a subgens of the Missouri Bird gens, abstain from small birds which have been killed by large birds, and they can not touch the feathers of such small birds.
PUBLIC OR TRIBAL FETICHES.[81]
§ 83. Among these are the sacred pipes, the sacred bags, or waruxawe, and the sacred stone or iron. The sacred pipes are used only on solemn occasions, and they are kept enveloped in the skin wrappers. The sacred bags, or waruxawe, are made from the skins of animals. They are esteemed as mysterious, and they are reverenced as much as Wakanta. Among the Winnebago (and presumably among the ┴ɔiwere tribes) no woman is allowed to touch the waruxawe. There used to be seven waruxawe among the Iowa, “related to one another as brothers and sisters,” and used by war parties. On the return from war the seven bags were opened and used in the scalp dance. They contained the skins of animals and birds with medicine in them, also wild tobacco and other war medicine, also the war club. There used to be seven war clubs, one for each waruxawe, but during the last expedition of the Iowa, prior to the date of Mr. Hamilton’s letters, the war club and pipes or whistles were lost from the principal bag. The next kind of sacred bags, the Waci waruxawe, numbered seven. They were the bad-medicine bags, by means of which they professed to deprive their enemies of power, when they had discouraged them by blowing the whistles. Owing to this enchantment, they said, their enemies could neither shoot nor run, and were soon killed. The next kind were the Tce waruxawe, or buffalo medicine bags. They were not used in war, but in healing the wounded. These bags contain medicine and the sticks with the deer hoofs attached which they shake while treating the sick; also a piece of buffalo tail, and perhaps a piece from the skin covering the throat of an elk.
The Ta waruxawe, or deer medicine bags, contain the sacred otter skins used in the Otter dance. (See § 86.)
In some of the sacred bags are round stones, which the warriors rub over themselves before going to war, to prevent their being killed or wounded.
The waruxawe is always carried with the same end foremost, the heads of the animals or birds being placed in the same direction, and care is taken to keep them so. (See § 28.) On one occasion a leader broke up a war party by turning the bag around.
The Iowa claim to have a mysterious object by which they try men, or make them swear to speak the truth. This mysterious iron or stone had not been gazed upon within the recollection of any of the Iowa living in 1848. It was wrapped in seven skins. No woman was allowed to see even the outer covering, and Mr. Hamilton was told that he would die if he looked at it.
Ckaʇɔinye, the Missouri, told the author that there were four Tu-naⁿp’iⁿ men who kept sacred pipes (raqnowe waqonyitaⁿ), their names being Weqa-nayiⁿ, Cŭⁿ-ʞiqowe, Naⁿ[ç]ra[ç]raʇɔe, and Naⁿʇɔe-yiñe. It is probable that two of these men belong to the Tunaⁿp’iⁿ gens of the Oto tribe and two to the Tunaⁿp’iⁿ gens of the Nyut’atci tribe, as these two tribes have been consolidated for years. In the Aruqwa or Buffalo gens of the Oto, ┴ɔe-ʇo-nayiⁿ and ┴ɔe-wañeʞihi are the keepers of the sacred pipes of that gens.
SYMBOLIC EARTH FORMATIONS OF THE WINNEBAGO.[82]
§ 84. The Winnebago tent used for sacred dances is long and narrow; not more than 20 feet wide and varying from 50 to 100 feet long.
In the Buffalo dance, which is given four times in the month of May and early June, the dancers are four men and a large number of women. As the dancers enter each woman brings in a handful of fine earth and in this way two mounds are raised in the center at the east—that is, between the eastern entrance and the fire, which is about 15 feet from the eastern entrance. The mounds thus formed are truncated cones. An old man said to me, “That is the way all mounds were built; that is why we build so for the buffalo.”
The mounds were about 4 inches high and not far from 18 inches in diameter. On top of the mounds were placed the head-gear worn by the men, the claws, tails, and other articles used by the four leaders or male dancers.
The men imitate the buffalo in his wild tramping and roaring, and dance with great vigor. They are followed by a long line of gaily decked women in single file. Each woman as she dances keeps her feet nearly straight and heels close together, and the body is propelled forward by a series of jerks which jars the whole frame, but the general effect on the long, closely packed line is that of the undulating appearance of a vast herd moving. The women dance with their eyes turned toward the ground and with their hands hanging closely in front, palms next to the person. The track left by their feet is very pretty, being like a close-leaved vine. It is astonishing to notice how each woman can leap into her predecessor’s track. Water is partaken of and the entire dance is clearly indicative of the prayer for increase and plenty of buffalo. The two mounds remind one of larger structures and suggest many speculations, particularly when taken in connection with the manner of their building.
In the great mystery lodge, whence so many of the sacred societies among other tribes professedly take their rise and inspiration, the fire is at the east, and is made by placing four sticks meeting in the center and the other ends pointing to the four points of the compass.[83] Just at that part of the initiation of the candidate when he is to fall dead to the old life, be covered as with a pall, and then be raised to the new life, the remains of the four sticks are taken away and the ashes raised in a sharp conical mound, again suggesting hints of a peculiar past.
Upon the bluffs of the Missouri, on a promontory * * * is a little depression cut in the ground, circular in form, with an elongated end at the east. The depression is 1 foot in diameter and about 6 inches deep. Placing my compass in the center, the long end or entrance was found to be exactly to the east. To the south of this sacred spot, for it is cleared and cleaned * * * every year, stood a large cedar tree, now partly blown down. This was the sacred tree on which miraculous impersonation of visions lit; and here the spirits tarried as they passed from one resting place to another going over the country. About every 50 miles there is one of these strange, supernatural resting places.