The Alósaka cult of the Hopi Indians

by Jesse Walter Fewkes

The fact that the last is called Kwátaka, and that the Bird-man in Soyáluña was given the same name, supports the theory that the latter is a solar god. In his performance he does not, to be sure, wear a mask with solar symbols, but he imitates a bird in action and voice. He is a patron of warriors, like the sun; he is the first god to return, and the Soyáluña is a celebration to cause the sun to return. The eagle or a raptorial bird is the sun bird; the sun fertilizes the earth, and the ceremonial acts of the Bird-man at the Winter Solstice dramatize fertilization. In short, the conclusion to which studies of the ceremonial acts of the Bird-man, reinforced by those of comparative symbolism, have led me, is that the Bird-man personates the sun or a solar deity.

Ceremony with the Alósaka Screen

After the bird personator had retired, a short interval elapsed, all the spectators of the previous rites remaining seated. A screen was then handed through the kiva hatchway and propped upright near the fireplace with blocks of clay and stones. This screen ([plate XXVI]) was estimated to be between four and five feet long, by about three feet wide, and was decorated on the side turned toward the fireplace and the raised floor of the kiva. The entire middle of the screen was occupied by a picture of Alósaka, identical with that on the sun-shield used in the Walpi Soyáluña.[13] The head of this figure bore two curved horns, with two fan-shaped lateral attachments; the chin was painted black; in the right hand an ear of corn was represented, and in the left a moñkohu or whitened slab of wood with attached feathers.

A triple rain-cloud symbol was depicted on the screen above the head of the Alósaka figure, and to the left were four parallel bars with a vertical row of four dots. In the lower left-hand corner there was a symbolic picture of the sun, and on the right side of Alósaka appeared an elongated figure which possibly may have represented a sprouting seed. To each side of the screen were attached four artificial flowers, and to the upper edge a number of hoops covered with raw cotton, possibly representing snow. A conventional symbol of corn was drawn on the lower part of the screen, and the surface was covered with various seeds, as corn, beans, etc., fastened with clay.

PL. XXVI

Drawn by Mary M. Leighter

SCREEN OF THE ALÓSAKA

The rites performed before this screen were of a very simple nature, and one of the most important was the scraping of the seeds from the lower part into a tray after certain prayers and other observances. To the seeds in the basket was added a small quantity of raw cotton taken from the top of the screen, which was then carried out of the kiva.

The ceremony before the screen is interpreted as a prayer to Alósaka for rain, snow, fertilization of seed, and abundant harvests, symbolized by the figures on it and the rites performed before it. These ceremonies are very appropriately introduced in connection with those of the Rain-cloud people, since both came from the south and were brought by related clans.[14]