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قراءة كتاب Notes on the Kiowa Sun Dance
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ANTHROPOLOGICAL PAPERS
OF
THE AMERICAN MUSEUM
OF NATURAL HISTORY
Vol. XVI, Part VI
NOTES ON THE KIOWA SUN DANCE
BY
LESLIE SPIER
NEW YORK
PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE TRUSTEES
1921
NOTES ON THE KIOWA SUN DANCE.
By Leslie Spier.
ILLUSTRATIONS.
Text Figures.
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| 1. Groundplan of Dance Lodge | 441 |
NOTES ON THE KIOWA SUN DANCE.
The following notes were obtained from Andres Martinez (Andele, a Mexican captive of the Kiowa whose history[1] is well known) in August, 1919. Attention was directed in the first instance to the organization of the dance, but a brief description of the whole ceremony was also obtained, chiefly by way of comments on Scott's account.[2] The last Kiowa sun dance was held in 1887.[3]
The Kiowa sun dance is the prerogative of the individual who owns the sacred image, the tai'me. He deputes the ancillary offices where he sees fit, although there is a well-defined tendency for them to be hereditary. The predominant idea of this image is that of a war medicine. Thus the dance is fundamentally like that of the Crow, but it differs from it in two important respects. First, the Kiowa rites cluster about only one particular medicine, whereas among the Crow, any one of a number of medicine dolls may be used in the ceremony. The question arises whether the dozen minor Kiowa images, which are sometimes brought into the dance, were more recently acquired or constructed in order to reproduce the functions of the tai'me, or whether one medicine doll has completely overshadowed all the others, as seemed about to happen among the Crow. The evidence favors the first view, since no rites, other than those attendant on any personal medicine, are described, or even intimated, for the minor images. The second difference is, that while the Crow shaman invokes his medicine for any one who appeals to him for aid, acting only in a directive capacity, the Kiowa tai'me owner is himself the principal suppliant. Were it not for the hereditary bias in the distribution of ceremonial functions, the Kiowa sun dance would be the prerogative of one man as completely as that of the Crow is, when the latter is once under way. The hereditary principle does not appear in the military societies except in the ownership of the medicine lance or arrow (zë'bo).[4]
The Kiowa sun dance (k’oθdun specifically the name for the lodge) was an annual tribal affair, in which the associated Kiowa Apache freely joined.[5] It was danced in an effort to obtain material benefits from, or through, the medicine doll in the possession of the medicineman, who is at the same time director and principal performer.
This is a small image, less than 2 feet in length, representing a human figure dressed in a robe of white feathers, with a headdress consisting of a single upright feather and pendants of ermine skin, with numerous strands of blue beads around its neck, and painted upon the face, breast, and back with designs symbolic of the sun and moon. [Martinez says the face is entirely obscured by hanging beads.] The image itself is of dark-green stone, in form rudely resembling a human head and bust, probably shaped by art like the stone fetishes of the Pueblo tribes. It is preserved in a rawhide box in charge of the hereditary keeper, and is never under any circumstances exposed to view except at the annual sun dance, when it is fastened to a short upright stick planted within the medicine lodge, near the western side.... The ancient tai'me image was of buckskin, with a stalk of Indian tobacco for a headdress. This buckskin image was left in the medicine lodge, with all the other adornments and sacrificial offerings, at the close of each ceremony. The present tai'me is one of three, two of which came originally from the Crows, through an Arapaho who married into the Kiowa tribe, while the third came by capture from the Blackfeet.[6]
The bundle containing the image is usually hung outside of its keeper's tipi. It is not customary to expose the image except at the sun dance, but tobacco is placed with it from time to time. Its function outside of the dance is identical with its use there: those who need its aid make vows to it, which they fulfil by sacrificing horses, etc., and making sweatlodges. The image is the property of one man, or more properly of his family, since it may be inherited by his blood relatives. If the transfer is made before the father's death, payment and a sweatlodge must be given by the son.[7] After Long Foot died about 1870, as he had no son, it passed into the possession of three of his nephews in succession, and reverted in 1894 to his daughter who still has it.[8] While she may handle the image, she would not be permitted to enter the dance with it.[9] There the functions which would normally devolve on her would be performed in their entirety by a captive. This captive has been trained to the position in