[126] A nakwákwoci is an individual prayer-string, and consists of one or more prescribed feathers tied to a cotton string. These prayer emblems are made in great numbers in every Tusayan ceremony.
[127] The evidence afforded by this bowl would seem to show that the cult of the Corn-maid was a part of the mythology and ritual of Sikyatki. The elaborate figures of the rain-cloud, which are so prominent in representations of the Corn-maid on modern plaques, bowls, and dolls, are not found in the Sikyatki picture.
[128] The reason for my belief that this is a breath feather will be shown under the discussion of feather and bird pictures.
[129] For the outline of this legend see Journal of American Ethnology and Archæology, vol. iv. The maid is there called the Tcüa-mana or Snake-maid, a sacerdotal society name for the Germ goddess. The same personage is alluded to under many different names, depending on the society, but they are all believed to refer to the same mythic concept.
[130] The attitude of the male and female here depicted was not regarded as obscene; on the contrary, to the ancient Sikyatki mind the picture had a deep religious meaning. In Hopi ideas the male is a symbol of active generative power, the female of passive reproduction, and representations of these two form essential elements of the ancient pictorial and graven art of that people.
[131] The doll of Kokopeli has along, bird-like beak, generally a rosette on the side of the head, a hump on the back, and an enormous penis. It is a phallic deity, and appears in certain ceremonials which need not here be described. During the excavations at Sikyatki one of the Indians called my attention to a large Dipteran insect which he called "Kokopeli."
[132] The practice still exists at Zuñi, I am told, and there is no sign of its becoming extinct. It is said that old Naiutci, the chief of the Priesthood of the Bow, was permanently injured during one of these performances. (Since the above lines were written I have excavated from one of the ruins on the Little Colorado a specimen of one of these objects used by ancient stick-swallowers. It is made of bone, and its use was explained to me by a reliable informant familiar with the practices of Oraibi and other villagers. It is my intention to figure and describe this ancient object in the account of the explorations of 1896.)
[133] "Tusayan Katcinas," Fifteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1893-94, Washington, 1897. Hewüqti is also called Soyokmana, a Keresan-Hopi name meaning the Natacka-maid. The Keresan (Sia) Skoyo are cannibal giants, according to Mrs Stevenson, an admirable definition of the Hopi Natackas.
[134] The celebration occurs in the modern Tusayan pueblos in the Powamû where the representative of Calako flogs the children. Calako's picture is found on the Powamû altars of several of the villages of the Hopi.
[135] Figures of the human hand have been found on the walls of cliff houses. These were apparently made in somewhat the same way as that on the above bowl, the hand being placed on the surface and pigment spattered about it. See "The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly," by Cosmos Mindeleff; Sixteenth Annual Report, 1894-95.