 | O-kee-pa, a religious ceremony, and other customs of the Mandans |  |
O-KEE-PA:
A RELIGIOUS CEREMONY OF THE MANDANS.
In a narrative of fourteen years' travels and residence amongst the
native tribes of North and South America, entitled `Life amongst
the Indians,' and published in London and in Paris, several years
since, I gave an account of the tribe of Mandans,—their personal
appearance, character, and habits; and briefly alluded to the singular
and unique custom which is now to be described, and was then
omitted, as was alleged, for want of sufficient space for its insertion,—
the "O-kee-pa," an annual religious ceremony, to the strict observance
of which those ignorant and superstitious people attributed not
only their enjoyment in life, but their very existence; for traditions,
their only history, instructed them in the belief that the singular
forms of this ceremony produced the buffalos for their supply of food,
and that the omission of this annual ceremony, with its sacrifices
made to the waters, would bring upon them a repetition of the
calamity which their traditions say once befell them, destroying the
whole human race, excepting one man, who landed from his canoe
on a high mountain in the West.
This tradition, however, was not peculiar to the Mandan tribe, for
amongst one hundred and twenty different tribes that I have visited in
related to me distinct or vague traditions of such a calamity, in which
one, or three, or eight persons were saved above the waters, on the top
of a high mountain. Some of these, at the base of the Rocky Mountains
and in the plains of Venezuela, and the Pampa del Sacramento
in South America, make annual pilgrimages to the fancied summits
where the antediluvian species were saved in canoes or otherwise,
and, under the mysterious regulations of their medicine (mystery)
men, tender their prayers and sacrifices to the Great Spirit, to ensure
their exemption from a similar catastrophe.
Indian traditions are generally conflicting, and soon run into
fable; but how strong a proof is the unanimous tradition of the
aboriginal races of a whole continent, of such an event!—how strong
a corroboration of the Mosaic account,—and what an unanswerable
proof that anthropos Americanus is an antediluvian race! And how
just a claim does it lay, with the various modes and forms which
these poor people practise in celebrating that event, to the inquiries
and sympathies of the philanthropic and Christian (as well as to
the scientific) world!
Some of those writers who have endeavoured to trace the aborigines
of America to an Asiatic or Egyptian origin, have advanced these traditions
as evidence in support of their theories, which are, as yet,
but unconfirmed hypotheses; and as there is not yet known to exist
(as I shall show, but not in this place), either in the American languages,
or in the Mexican or Aztec, or other monuments of these
people, one single proof of such an immigration (though it could have
been made), these traditions as yet are mine, and not theirs,—are
American,—indigenous, and not exotic. If it were shown that inspired
history of the Deluge and of the Creation restricted those events to
one continent alone, then it might be that the American races came
from the Eastern continent, bringing these traditions with them;
but until that is proved, the American traditions of the Deluge are
aborigines of America brought their traditions of the Deluge from
the East, why did they not bring inspired history of the Creation?
Though there is not a tribe in America but what have some
theory of man's creation, there is not one amongst them all that
bears the slightest resemblance to the Mosaic account. How strange
is this if these people came from the country where inspiration
was prior to all history! The Mandans believed they were created
under the ground, and that a portion of their people reside there
yet. The Choctaws assert that "they were created craw-fish, living
alternately under the ground and above it, as they chose; and
coming out at their little holes in the earth to get the warmth of
the sun one sunny day, a portion of the tribe was driven away
and could not return; they built the Choctaw village, and the remainder
of the tribe are still living under the ground."
The Sioux relate with great minuteness their traditions of the
creation. They say that "the Indians were all made from the red
pipe-stone, which is exactly of their colour; that the Great Spirit,
at a subsequent period, called all the tribes together at the red pipe-stone
quarry, and told them this, that the red stone was their flesh,
and that they must use it for their pipes only."
Other tribes were created under the water; and at least one half
of the tribes in America represent that man was first created under
the ground, or in the rocky caverns of the mountains. Why this
diversity of theories of the Creation, if these people brought their tradition
of the Deluge from the land of inspiration?
This interesting subject, too intricate for full discussion in this
work, will be further incidentally alluded to in the course of the
following relations.
For the scientific, who look amongst these native people chiefly
for shapes of their skulls and for analogies to foreign races, I believe
there will be found enough in the following description of their
philanthropic and religious world, whose motives are love and sympathy,
there will be sufficient to excite their profoundest astonishment,
and to touch their hearts with pity.
In a relation so singular, and apparently incredible, as I am now
to make, I hope the reader will be able to follow me, under the
conviction that I am representing nothing in my descriptions or in
my illustrations but what I saw, and that I had by my side, during
the four days of these scenes, three civilized and educated men,
who gave me their certificates that they witnessed with me all these
scenes as I have represented them, and which certificates, with other
evidences, will be produced in their proper places, as I proceed.
During the summer of 1832 I made two visits to the tribe of
Mandan Indians, all living in one village of earth-covered wigwams,
on the west bank of the Missouri river, eighteen hundred miles above
the town of St. Louis.
Their numbers at that time were between two and three thousand,
and they were living entirely according to their native modes,
having had no other civilized people residing amongst them or in
their vicinity, that we know of, than the few individuals conducting
the Missouri Fur Company's business with them, and living in a
trading-house by the side of them.
Two exploring parties had long before visited the Mandans, but
without in any way affecting their manners. The first of these, in
1738, under the lead of the Brothers Verendrye, Frenchmen, who
afterwards ascended the Missouri and Saskachewan, to the Rocky
Mountains; and the other, under Lewis and Clark, about sixty years
afterwards.
The Mandans, in their personal appearance, as well as in their
modes, had many peculiarities different from the other tribes
around them. In stature they were about the ordinary size; they
were comfortably, and in many instances very beautifully clad with
made of skins, and neatly embroidered with dyed porcupine quills.
Every man had his "tunique and manteau" of skins, which he wore
or not as the temperature prompted; and every woman wore a dress
of deer or antelope skins, covering the arms to the elbows, and the
person from the throat nearly to the feet.
In complexion, colour of hair, and eyes, they generally bore a
family resemblance to the rest of the American tribes, but there
were exceptions, constituting perhaps one-fifth or one sixth-part of
the tribe, whose complexions were nearly white, with hair of a
silvery-grey from childhood to old age, their eyes light blue, their
faces oval, devoid of the salient angles so strongly characterizing all
the other American tribes, and owing, unquestionably, to the infusion
of some foreign stock.
Amongst the men, practised by a considerable portion of them,
was a mode peculiar to the tribe, and exceedingly curious,—that of
cultivating the hair to fall, spreading over their backs, to their
haunches, and oftentimes as low as the calves of their legs; divided into
flattened masses of an inch or more in breadth, and filled at intervals
of two or three inches with hardened glue and red or yellow ochre.
I here present (Plate I.) three of my Mandan portraits in their
ordinary costume,—a chief, a warrior, and a young woman,—lest
the reader should form a wrong opinion of their usual appearance,
from the bizarre effects of the figures disguised with clay and other
pigments in the ceremony to be described in this work.
The Mandans (Nu-mah-ká-kee, pheasants, as they called themselves)
have been known from the time of the first visits made to
them to the day of their destruction, as one of the most friendly and
hospitable tribes on the United States frontier; and it had become a
proverb in those regions, and much to their credit, as they claimed,
"that no Mandan ever killed a white man."
I was received with great kindness by their chiefs and by the
other designs and notes on their customs; and from Mr. J. Kipp,
the conductor of the Fur Company's affairs at that post, and his
interpreter, I was enabled to obtain the most complete interpretation
of chiefly all that I witnessed.
I had heard, long before I reached their village, of their "annual
religious ceremony," which the Mandans call "O-kee-pa," and from
Mr. Kipp, who had resided several years with the people, a partial
account of it; and from him the most pressing advice to remain
until the ceremony commenced, as he believed it would be a subject
of great interest to me.
I resolved to await its approach, and in the meantime, while inquiring
of one of the chiefs whose portrait I was painting, when this
ceremony was to begin, he replied that "it would commence as soon
as the willow-leaves were full grown under the bank of the river."
I asked him why the willow had anything to do with it, when he
again replied, "The twig which the bird brought into the Big Canoe
was a willow bough, and had full-grown leaves on it."
It will here be for the reader to appreciate the surprise with
which I met such a remark from the lips of a wild man in the heart
of an Indian country, and eighteen hundred miles from the nearest
civilization; and the eagerness with which I followed up my inquiries
on a subject so unexpected and so full of interest.
I inquired of him what bird he alluded to, which he found difficulty
in making me understand, and, taking me by the arm, he conducted
me through the winding avenues of the village until he discovered
a couple of mourning doves pecking in the side of one of the
earth-covered wigwams, and pointing to them said, "There is the
bird; it is great medicine." It then occurred to me that on my
arrival in their village Mr. Kipp had cautioned me against harming
these birds, which were numerous in the village, and guarded and protected
with a superstitious veneration as great medicine (or mystery).
The reader may here very properly inquire, If the American
traditions of the Deluge have not been brought from the Eastern
Continent, how is it that the Mandans have the Mosaic account of
the olive-branch and the dove? This is easily explained; for these
terms, and "Big Canoe," used by the Mandans, form no part of the
general traditions, being entirely unused by, and unknown to, the
other tribes of the American Continent; but have been introduced
amongst the Mandans, like other customs that will be described, by
some errant colony of Welsh, or other civilized people who have
merged into the Mandan tribe, and, having witnessed the Mandan
ceremonies, and heard their traditions of the Deluge, have described
to those people the Mosaic account, and from which the Mandans
have appropriated and introduced into their system the terms "willow
bough" for olive-branch, and "Big Canoe" for the Ark, whilst
all the other tribes which speak of a canoe use the word "canoe"
only. And there are yet many tribes in the vicinity of the Rocky
Mountains, and in the north of Mexico, which, without impairing in
the least the great fact of the tradition, make no mention of a canoe
whatever, but represent that the ancestor or ancestors of the present
human race, by various miraculous modes, which they describe,
gained the summit of a mountain above the reach of the waters in
which the rest of mankind perished.
In Plate II. I have given a bird's-eye view of a section of the
Mandan village, which is necessary to enable the reader fully to
understand the ceremonies to be described.
As I have before said, these people all lived in one village, and
their wigwams were covered with earth,—they were all of one form;
the frames or shells constructed of timbers, and covered with a
thatching of willow-boughs, and over and on that, with a foot or two
in thickness, of a concrete of tough clay and gravel, which became
so hard as to admit the whole group of inmates, with their dogs, to
recline upon their tops. These wigwams varied in size from thirty
from twenty to thirty persons within.
The village was well protected in front by a high and precipitous
rocky bank of the river; and, in the rear, by a stockade of
timbers firmly set in the ground, with a ditch inside, not for water,
but for the protection of the warriors who occupied it when firing
their arrows between the pickets.
In this view the "Medicine Lodge," as it is termed, and the "Big
Canoe" (or symbol of the "Ark") are conspicuous, and their positions
should be borne in mind during the descriptions of the ceremonies
that are to be given.
The "Medicine Lodge," the largest in the village and seventy-five
feet in diameter, with four images (sacrifices of different-coloured
and costly cloths) suspended on poles above it, was considered by
these people as a sort of temple, held as strictly sacred, being built
and used solely for these four days' ceremonies, and closed during
the rest of the year.
In an open area in the centre of the village stands the Ark (or
"Big Canoe"), around which a great proportion of their ceremonies
were performed. This rude symbol, of eight or ten feet in height,
was constructed of planks and hoops, having somewhat the appearance
of a large hogshead standing on its end, and containing some
mysterious things which none but the medicine men were allowed to
examine. An evidence of the sacredness of this object was the fact
that though it had stood, no doubt for many years, in the midst and
very centre of the village population, there was not the slightest
discoverable bruise or scratch upon it!
In the distance in this view, and outside of the picket, is seen
a portion of their cemetery. Their dead, partially embalmed, are
tightly wrapped in buffalo hides, softened with glue and water, and
placed on slight scaffolds, above the reach of animals or human
hands, each body having its separate scaffold.
The O-kee-pa, though in many respects apparently so unlike it,
was strictly a religious ceremony, it having been conducted in most of
its parts with the solemnity of religious worship, with abstinence,
with sacrifices, and with prayer, whilst there were three other distinct
and ostensible objects for which it was held.
1st. As an annual celebration of the event of the "subsiding of
the waters" of the Deluge, of which they had a distinct tradition,
and which in their language they called "Mee-ne-ró-ka-há-sha" (the
settling down of the waters).
2nd. For the purpose of dancing what they called "Bel-lohk-na-pick
(the bull-dance), to the strict performance of which they attributed
the coming of buffalos to supply them with food during the
ensuing year.
3rd. For the purpose of conducting the young men who had
arrived at the age of manhood during the past year, through an
ordeal of privation and bodily torture, which, while it was supposed
to harden their muscles and prepare them for extreme endurance,
enabled their chiefs, who were spectators of the scene, to decide upon
their comparative bodily strength, and ability to endure the privations
and sufferings that often fall to the lot of Indian warriors,
and that they might decide who amongst the young men was the
best able to lead a war-party in an extreme exigency.
The season having arrived for the holding of these ceremonies,
the leading medicine (mystery) man of the tribe presented himself
on the top of a wigwam one morning before sunrise, and haranguing
the people told them that "he discovered something very strange in
the western horizon, and he believed that at the rising of the sun
a great white man would enter the village from the west and open
the Medicine Lodge."
In a few moments the tops of the wigwams, and all other elevations,
were covered with men, women, and children on the look-out;
and at the moment the rays of the sun shed their first light over the
and in a few minutes all voices were united in yells and mournful
cries, and with them the barking and howling of dogs; all were in
motion and apparent alarm, preparing their weapons and securing
their horses, as if an enemy were rushing on them to take them by
storm.
All eyes were at this time directed to the prairie, where, at the
distance of a mile or so from the village, a solitary human figure was
seen descending the prairie hills and approaching the village in a
straight line, until he reached the picket, where a formidable array
of shields and spears was ready to receive him. A large body of
warriors was drawn up in battle-array, when their leader advanced
and called out to the stranger to make his errand known, and to tell
from whence he came. He replied that he had come from the high
mountains in the west, where he resided,—that he had come for the
purpose of opening the Medicine Lodge of the Mandans, and that he
must have uninterrupted access to it, or certain destruction would
be the fate of the whole tribe.
The head chief and the council of chiefs, who were at that moment
assembled in the council-house, with their faces painted black,
were sent for, and soon made their appearance in a body at the
picket, and recognized the visitor as an old acquaintance, whom they
addressed as "Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah" (the first or only man). All
shook hands with him, and invited him within the picket. He then
harangued them for a few minutes, reminding them that every
human being on the surface of the earth had been destroyed by the
water excepting himself, who had landed on a high mountain in the
West, in his canoe, where he still resided, and from whence he had
come to open the Medicine Lodge, that the Mandans might celebrate
the subsiding of the waters and make the proper sacrifices to the
water, lest the same calamity should again happen to them.
The next moment he was seen entering the village under the
ceased, and orders were given by the chiefs that the women
and children should all be silent and retire within their wigwams,
and their dogs all to be muzzled during the whole of that day, which
belonged to the Great Spirit.
In the midst of this startling and thrilling scene, which was so well
acted out by men, women, and children, and (apparently) by their
dogs, I should scarcely have had the nerve to have been a close observer
but for the announcement by the fur-trader, Mr. Kipp, with
whom I was lodging, that this was the beginning of the "great
ceremony," and that I ought not to lose a moment in witnessing its
commencement, and of making sketches of all that transpired.
With this advice Mr. Kipp had accompanied me to the picket,
where I had a fair view of the reception of this strange visitor from
the West; in appearance a very aged man, whose body was naked,
with the exception of a robe made of four white wolves' skins. His
body and face and hair were entirely covered with white clay, and he
closely resembled, at a little distance, a centenarian white man. In
his left hand he extended, as he walked, a large pipe, which seemed
to be borne as a very sacred thing. The procession moved to the
Medicine Lodge, which this personage seemed to have the only means
of opening. He opened it, and entered it alone, it having been (as
I was assured) superstitiously closed during the past year, and never
used since the last annual ceremony.
The chiefs then retired to the Council-house, leaving this strange
visitor sole tenant of this sacred edifice; soon after which he placed
himself at its door, and called out to the chiefs to furnish him "four
men,—one from the North, one from the South, one from the East,
and one from the West, whose hands and feet were clean and would
not profane the sacred temple while labouring within it during that
day."
These four men were soon produced, and they were employed
and strewing the floor, which was a concrete of gravel and clay,
and ornamenting the sides of it, with willow boughs and aromatic
herbs which they gathered in the prairies, and otherwise preparing
it for the "Ceremonies," to commence on the next morning.
During the remainder of that day, while all the Mandans were
shut up in their wigwams, and not allowed to go out, Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah
(the first or only man) visited alone each wigwam, and,
while crying in front of it, the owner appeared and asked, "Who's
there?" and "What was wanting?" To this Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah
replied by relating the destruction of all the human family
by the Flood, excepting himself, who had been saved in his "Big
Canoe," and now dwelt in the West; that he had come to open
the Medicine Lodge, that the Mandans might make the necessary sacrifices
to the water, and for this purpose it was requisite that he
should receive at the door of every Mandan's wigwam some edged
tool to be given to the water as a sacrifice, as it was with such tools
that the "Big Canoe" was built.
He then demanded and received at the door of every Mandan
wigwam, some edged or pointed tool or instrument made of iron or
steel, which seemed to have been procured and held in readiness for
the occasion; with these he returned to the Medicine Lodge at evening,
where he deposited them, and where they remained during the
four days of the ceremony, and were, as will be seen, on the last day
at sundown, in the presence of the chiefs and all the tribe, to be
thrown into deep water from the top of the rocks, and thus made a
sacrifice to the water.
Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah rested alone in the Medicine Lodge during
that night, and at sunrise the next morning, in front of the lodge,
called out for all the young men who were candidates for the
O-kee-pa graduation as warriors, to come forward,—the rest of the
villagers still enclosed in their wigwams.
In a few minutes about fifty young men, whom I learned were
all of those of the tribe who had arrived at maturity during the last
year, appeared in a beautiful group, their graceful limbs entirely
denuded, but without exception covered with clay of different colours
from head to foot,—some white, some red, some yellow, and others
blue and green, each one carrying his shield of bull's hide on his left
arm, and his bow in his left hand, and his medicine bag in the right.
In this plight they followed Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah into the Medicine
Lodge in "Indian file," and taking their positions around the
sides of the lodge, each one hung his bow and quiver, shield and
medicine-bag over him as he reclined upon the floor of the wigwam.
Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah then called into the Medicine Lodge the
principal medicine man of the tribe, whom he appointed O-kee-pa-ka-see-ka
(Keeper or Conductor of the Ceremonies), by passing into
his hand the large pipe which he had so carefully brought with
him, "which had been saved in the big canoe with him," and on
which it will appear the whole of these mysteries hung.
Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah then took leave of him by shaking hands
with him, and left the Medicine Lodge, saying that he would return to
the West, where he lived, and be back again in just a year to reopen
the Medicine Lodge. He then passed through the village, shaking
hands with the chiefs, and in a few moments was seen disappearing
over the hills from whence he came the day previous.
No more was seen of this extraordinary personage during the
ceremonies, but more will be learned of him before this description
is finished.[1]
Here is the proper place to relate the manner in which I gained
admission into this sacred temple, and to give the credit that was due,
to the man who kindly gave me permission to witness what was probably
never seen before by a white man, the secret and sacred transactions
of the interior of the Mandan Medicine Lodge, so sacred that
a double door, with an intervening passage and an armed sentinel at
each end, positively denying all access except by permission of the
Conductor of the Ceremonies, and strictly guarding it against the
approach or gaze of women, who, I was told, had never been allowed
to catch the slightest glance of its interior.
This interior had also been too sacred a place for the admission of
Mr. Kipp, the fur-trader, who had lived in the village eight or ten
years; but luckily for me, I had completed a portrait the day before,
of the renowned doctor or "mystery man," to whom the superintendence
of the ceremonies had just been committed, and whose
vanity had been so much excited by the painting that he had
mounted on to a wigwam with it, holding it up by the corners and
haranguing the villagers, claiming that "he must be the greatest
man among the Mandans, because I had painted his portrait before I
had painted the great chief; and that I was the greatest `medicine'
of the whites, and a great chief, because I could make so perfect a
duplicate of him that it set all the women and children laughing!"
This man, then, in charge of the Medicine Lodge, seeing me with
one of my men and Mr. Kipp, the fur trader, standing in front of
the door, came out, and passing his arm through mine, politely led
me into the lodge, and allowing my hired man and Mr. Kipp, with
one of the clerks of his establishment, to follow. We took our seats,
and were allowed to resume them on the three following days, occupying
them most of the time from sunrise to sundown; and therefore
the following description of those scenes, and the paintings
which I then made of them, and to all of which Mr. Kipp and the
other two men attached their certificates, which are here given.
"We hereby certify that we witnessed, with Mr. Catlin, in the Mandan
village, the ceremonies represented in the four paintings to which this certificate
refers, and that he has therein represented those scenes as we saw
them enacted, without addition or exaggeration.
The Conductor or Master of the Ceremonies then took his position,
reclining on the ground near the fire, in the centre of the
lodge, with the medicine-pipe in his hand, and commenced crying,
and continued to cry to the Great Spirit, while he guarded the young
candidates who were reclining around the sides of the lodge, and for
four days and four nights were not allowed to eat, drink, or to sleep.
(This interior, which they called "Mee-ne-ro-ka-Há-sha,"—the waters
settle down,—see in Plate III.)
By such denial great lassitude, and even emaciation, was produced,
preparing the young men for the tortures which they afterwards
went through.
The Medicine Lodge, in which they were thus resting during the
four days, and which I have said was seventy-five feet in diameter,
presented the most strange and picturesque appearance. Its sides
were curiously decorated with willow-boughs and aromatic herbs,
and its floor (covered also with willow-boughs) with a curious
arrangement of buffalo and human skulls.
There were also four articles of veneration and importance lying
on the ground, which were sacks, containing each some three or
four gallons of water. These seemed to be objects of great superstitious
regard, and had been made with much labour and ingenuity,
being constructed of the skins of the buffalo's neck, and sewed
together in the forms of large tortoises lying on their backs, each
having a sort of tail made of raven's quills, and a stick like a drumstick
the ceremony, the musicians beat upon the sacks as instruments of
music for their strange dances.
By the sides of these sacks, which they called Eeh-tee-ka (drums),
there were two other articles of equal importance, which they called
Eeh-na-de (rattles), made of dried undressed skins, shaped into the
form of gourd-shells, which they also used, as will be seen, as another
part of the music for their dances.
The sacks of water had the appearance of great antiquity, and
the Mandans pretended that the water had been contained in them
ever since the Deluge. At what time it had been originally put
in, or when replenished, I consequently could not learn. I made
several efforts to purchase one of these tortoise drums, so elaborately
and curiously were they embroidered and ornamented, offering them
goods at the Fur Company's trading-house to the value of one hundred
dollars, but they said they were medicine (mystery) things, and
therefore could not be sold at any price.
Such was the appearance of the interior of the Medicine Lodge
during the three first (and part of the fourth) days. During the
three first days, while things remained thus inside of the Medicine
Lodge, there were many curious and grotesque amusements and
ceremonies transpiring outside and around the "Big Canoe."
The principal of these, which they called Bel-lohk-na-pick (the
bull dance), to the strict observance of which they attributed the
coming of buffaloes to supply them with food, was one of an exceedingly
grotesque and amusing character, and was danced four times
on the first day, eight times on the second day, twelve times on the
third day, and sixteen times on the fourth day, and always around
the "Big Canoe," of which I have already spoken. (See the "Bull
Dance," Plate IV.)
The chief actors in these strange scenes were eight men, with the
entire skins of buffaloes thrown over them, enabling them closely
of the dancers were kept in a horizontal position, the horns and
tails of the animals remaining on the skins, and the skins of the
animals' heads served as masks, through the eyes of which the
dancers were looking.
The eight men were all naked and painted exactly alike, and in
the most extraordinary manner; their bodies, limbs, and faces being
everywhere covered with black, red, or white paint. Each joint was
marked with two white rings, one within the other, even to the
joints in the under jaw, the fingers and the toes; and the abdomens
were painted to represent the face of an infant, the navel representing
its mouth. (See "A Buffalo Bull," Plate V.[2]
)
Each one of these characters also had a lock of buffalo's hair tied
around the ankles, in his right hand a rattle (she-shée-quoin), and
a slender staff six feet in length in the other; and carried on his
back, above the buffalo skin, a bundle of willow-boughs, of the ordinary
size of a bundle of wheat. (See "A Buffalo Bull" dancing,
Plate VI.)
These eight men representing eight buffalo bulls, being divided
into four pairs, took their positions on the four sides of the Ark,
or "Big Canoe" (as seen in the general view, Plate IV.), representing
thereby the four cardinal points; and between each couple
of these, with his back turned to the "Big Canoe," was another
figure engaged in the same dance, keeping step with the eight
buffalo bulls, with a staff in one hand and a rattle in the other: and
being four in number, answered again to the four cardinal points.
The bodies of these four men were also entirely naked, with the
exception of beautiful kilts of eagles' quills and ermine, and headdresses
made of the same materials.
Two of these figures were painted jet black with charcoal and
grease, whom they called the night, and the numerous white spots
dotted over their bodies and limbs they called stars. (See one of
these, Plate VII.)
The other two, who were painted from head to foot as red as
vermilion could make them, with white stripes up and down over
their bodies and limbs, were called the morning rays (symbols of day).
(See one of them, Plate VII.)
These twelve were the only figures actually engaged in the Bull
dance, which was each time repeated in the same manner without
any apparent variation. There were, however, a great number of
characters, many of them representing various animals of the country,
engaged in giving the whole effect to this strange scene, and all
of which are worthy of a few remarks.
The bull dance was conducted by the old master of ceremonies
(O-kee-pa Ka-see-ka) carrying his medicine pipe; his body entirely
naked, and covered, as well as his hair, with yellow clay.
For each time that the bull dance was repeated, this man came
out of the Medicine Lodge with the medicine pipe in his hands, bringing
with him four old men carrying the tortoise drums, their bodies
painted red, and head-dresses of eagles' quills, and with them another
old man with the two she-shée-quoins (rattles). These took their
seats by the side of the "Big Canoe," and commenced drumming
and rattling and singing, whilst the conductor of the ceremonies,
with his medicine pipe in his hands, was leaning against the "Big
Canoe," and crying in his full voice to the Great Spirit, as seen in
the general view, Plate IV. Squatted on the ground, on the opposite
side of the "Big Canoe," were two men with skins of grizzly bears
thrown over them, using the skins as masks covering their faces.
Their bodies were naked, and painted with yellow clay.
These characters, whom they called grizzly bears, were continually
growling and threatening to devour everything before them, and
keep them quiet, the women were continually bringing and placing
before them dishes of meat, which were as often snatched away and
carried to the prairies by two men called bald eagles, whose bodies
and limbs were painted black, whilst their heads and feet and hands
were whitened with clay. These were again chased upon the
prairies by a numerous group of small boys, whose bodies and limbs
were painted yellow, and their heads white, wearing tails of white
deer's hair, and whom they called antelopes.
Besides these there were two men representing swans, their
bodies naked and painted white, and their noses and feet were
painted black.
There were two men called rattlesnakes, their bodies naked and
curiously painted, resembling that reptile; each holding a rattle in
one hand and a bunch of wild sage in the other. (See "A Rattlesnake,"
Plate VIII.) There were two beavers, represented by two
men entirely covered with dresses made of buffalo skins, except
their heads, and wearing beavers' tails attached to their belts. (See
"A Beaver," Plate VIII.)
There were two men representing vultures, their bodies naked and
painted brown, their heads and shoulders painted blue, and their
noses red.
Two men represented wolves, their bodies naked, wearing wolf-skins.
These pursued the antelopes, and whenever they overtook
one of them on the prairie one or both of the grizzly bears came up
and pretended to devour it, in revenge for the antelopes having
devoured the meat given to the grizzly bears by the women.
All these characters closely imitated the habits of the animals
they represented, and they all had some peculiar and appropriate
songs, which they constantly chanted and sang during the dances,
without even themselves (probably) knowing the meaning of them,
they being strictly medicine songs, which are kept profound secrets
initiated into their medicines (mysteries) at an early age, and at an
exorbitant price; and I therefore failed to get a translation of them.
At the close of each of these bull dances, these representatives of
animals and birds all set up the howl and growl peculiar to their
species, in a deafening chorus; some dancing, some jumping, and
others (apparently) flying; the beavers clapping with their tails,
the rattlesnakes shaking their rattles, the bears striking with their
paws, the wolves howling, and the buffaloes rolling in the sand or
rearing upon their hind feet; and dancing off together to an adjoining
lodge, where they remained in a curious and picturesque group
until the master of ceremonies came again out of the Medicine Lodge,
and leaning as before against the "Big Canoe," cried out for all the
dancers, musicians, and the group of animals and birds to gather
again around him.
This lodge, which was also strictly a Medicine Lodge during the
occasion, and used for painting and arranging all the characters, and
not allowed to be entered during the four days, except by the persons
taking part in the ceremonies, was shown to me by the conductor of
the ceremonies, who sent a medicine man with me to its interior
whilst the scene of painting and ornamenting their bodies for the
bull dance was taking place; and none but the most vivid imagination
could ever conceive anything so peculiar, so wild, and so curious in
effect as this strange spectacle then presented to my view.
No man painted himself, but, standing or lying naked, submitted
like a statue to the operations of other hands, who were appointed
for the purpose. Each painter seemed to have his special department
or peculiar figure, and each appeared to be working with great care
and with ambition for the applause of the public when he turned out
his figure.
It may be thought easy to imagine such a group of naked figures,
and the effect that the rude painting on their bodies would have; but
appreciate the singular beauty of these graceful figures thus decorated
with various colours, reclining in groups, or set in rapid motion; it
was one of those few scenes that must be witnessed to be fully
appreciated.
The first ordeal they all went through in this sanctuary was that
of Tah-ke-way ka-ra-ka (the hiding man), the name given to an
aged man, who was supplied with small thongs of deer's sinew, for
the purpose of obscuring the glans secret, which was uniformly done
by this operator, with all the above-named figures, by drawing the
prepuce over in front of the glans, and trying it secure with the sinew,
and then covering the private parts with clay, which he took from a
wooden bowl, and, with his hand, plastered unsparingly over.
Of men performing their respective parts in the bull dance,
representing the various animals, birds, and reptiles of the country,
there were about forty, and forty boys representing antelopes,—
making a group in all of eighty figures, entirely naked, and painted
from head to foot in the most fantastic shapes, and of all colours, as
has been described; and the fifty young men resting in the Medicine
Lodge, and waiting for the infliction of their tortures, were also
naked and entirely covered with clay of various colours (as has been
described), some red, some yellow, and others blue and green; so
that of (probably) one hundred and thirty persons engaged in these
picturesque scenes, not one single inch of the natural colour of their
bodies, their limbs, or their hair could be seen!
During each and every one of these bull dances, the four old men
who were beating on the sacks of water, were chanting forth their
supplications to the Great Spirit for the continuation of his favours,
in sending them buffaloes to supply them with food for the ensuing
year. They were also exciting the courage and fortitude of the
young men inside of the Medicine Lodge, who were listening to their
prayers, by telling them that "the Great Spirit had opened his ears
peace and happiness for them when they got through; that the
women and children could hold the mouths and paws of the grizzly
bears; that they had invoked from day to day the Evil Spirit; that
they were still challenging him to come, and yet he had not dared to
make his appearance."
But, in the midst of the last dance on the fourth day, a sudden
alarm throughout the group announced the arrival of a strange
character from the West. Women were crying, dogs were howling;
and all eyes were turned to the prairie, where, a mile or so in distance,
was seen an individual man making his approach towards the
village; his colour was black, and he was darting about in different
directions, and in a zigzag course approached and entered the village,
amidst the greatest (apparent) imaginable fear and consternation of
the women and children.
This strange and frightful character, whom they called O-ke-hée-de
(the owl or Evil Spirit), darted through the crowd where the
buffalo dance was proceeding (as seen in Plate IV.), alarming all
he came in contact with. His body was painted jet black with
pulverized charcoal and grease, with rings of white clay over his
limbs and body. Indentations of white, like huge teeth, surrounded
his mouth, and white rings surrounded his eyes. In his two hands
he carried a sort of wand—a slender rod of eight feet in length, with
a red ball at the end of it, which he slid about upon the ground as
he ran. (See "O-ke-hée-de," Plate IX.)
On entering the crowd where the buffalo dance was going on, he
directed his steps towards the groups of women, who retreated in the
greatest alarm, tumbling over each other and screaming for help as
he advanced upon them. At this moment of increased alarm the
screams of the women had brought by his side O-kee-pa-ká-see-ka
(the conductor of the ceremonies) with his medicine pipe, for their
protection. This man had left the "Big Canoe," against which he
pipe before this hideous monster, and, looking him full in the eyes,
held him motionless under its charm, until the women and children
had withdrawn from his reach.
The awkwardness of the position of this blackened demon, and
the laughable appearance of the two, frowning each other in the face,
while the women and children and the whole crowd were laughing
at them, were amusing beyond the power of description.
After a round of hisses and groans from the crowd, and the
women had retired to a safe distance, the medicine pipe was gradually
withdrawn, and this vulgar monster, whose wand was slowly lowering
to the ground, gained power of locomotion again.
The conductor of the ceremonies returned to the "Big Canoe,"
and resumed his former position and crying, as the buffalo dance
was still proceeding, without interruption.
The Evil Spirit in the meantime had wandered to another part of
the village, where the screams of the women were again heard, and
the conductor of the ceremonies again ran with the medicine pipe in
his hands to their rescue, and arriving just in time, and holding this
monster in check as before, enabled them again to escape.
In several attempts of this kind the Evil Spirit was thus defeated,
after which he came wandering back amongst the dancers, apparently
much fatigued and disappointed; and the women gradually advancing
and gathering around him, evidently less apprehensive of danger
than a few moments before.
In this distressing dilemma he was approached by an old matron,
who came up slily behind him with both hands full of yellow dirt,
which (by reaching around him) she suddenly dashed in his face,
covering him from head to foot and changing his colour, as the dirt
adhered to the undried bears'-grease on his skin. As he turned
around he received another handful, and another, from different
quarters; and at length another snatched his wand from his hands,
snapping them into small bits, threw them into his face. His power
was thus gone, and his colour changed: he began then to cry, and,
bolting through the crowd, he made his way to the prairies, where
he fell into the hands of a fresh swarm of women and girls (no doubt
assembled there for the purpose) outside of the picket, who hailed
him with screams and hisses and terms of reproach, whilst they
were escorting him for a considerable distance over the prairie, and
beating him with sticks and dirt.
He was at length seen escaping from this group of women, who
were returning to the village, whilst he was disappearing over the
plains from whence he had made his first appearance.
The crowd of women entered the village, and the area where the
ceremony was transpiring, in triumph, and the fortunate one who
had deprived him of his power was escorted by two matrons on each
side. She was then lifted by her four female attendants on to the
front of the Medicine Lodge, directly over its door, where she stood
and harangued the multitude for some time; claiming that "she
held the power of creation, and also the power of life and death over
them; that she was the father of all the buffaloes, and that she could
make them come or stay away, as she pleased."
She then ordered the bull dance to be stopped—the four musicians
to carry the four tortoise-drums into the Medicine Lodge. The assistant
dancers and all the other characters taking p
into the dressing and pan-lodge. The and
on the floor of the Medicine Lodge (as seen in Plate III.) she ordered
to be hung on the four posts (as seen in Plate X.). She
the chiefs to enter the Medicine Lodge, and (being seated) to witness
the voluntary tortures of the young men, now to commence. She
ordered the conductor of the ceremonies to sit by the fire and smoke
the medicine pipe, and the operators to go in with their knife and
splints, and to commence the tortures.
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She then called out for and demanded the handsomest woman's
dress in the Mandan village, which was due to her who had disarmed
O-ke-hee-de and had the power of making all the buffaloes which the
Mandans would require during the coming year. Her demand for
this beautiful dress was peremptory, and she must have it to lead the
dance in the Feast of the Buffaloes, to be given that night.
The beautiful dress was then presented to her by the conductor
of the ceremonies, who said to her, "Young woman, you have gained
great fame this day; and the honour of leading the dance in the
Feast of the Buffaloes, to be given this night, belongs to you."
Thus ended the bull dance (bel-lohk-ná-pick) and other amusements
at midday on the fourth day of the O-kée-pa, preparatory to
the scenes of torture to take place in the Medicine Lodge; and the
pleasing moral from these strange (and in some respects disgusting)
modes, at once suggests itself, that in the midst of their religious
ceremony the Evil Spirit had made his entrée for the purpose of
doing mischief, and, having been defeated in all his designs by the
magic power of the medicine pipe, on which all those ceremonies
hung, he had been disarmed and driven out of the village in disgrace
by the very part of the community he came to impose upon.
The bull dance and other grotesque scenes being finished outside
of the Medicine Lodge, the torturing scene (or pohk-hong as they called
it) commenced within, in the following manner. (See Plate X.)
The young men reclining around the sides of the Medicine Lodge
(before shown in Plate III.), who had now reached the middle
of the fourth day without eating, drinking, or sleeping, and consequently
weakened and emaciated, commenced to submit to the
operation of the knife and other instruments of torture.
Two men, who were to inflict the tortures, had taken their positions
near the middle of the lodge; one, with a large knife with a
sharp point and two edges, which were hacked with another knife
in order to produce as much pain as possible, was ready to make the
splints of the size of a man's finger, and sharpened at both ends, to
be passed through the wounds as soon as the knife was withdrawn.
The bodies of these two men, who were probably medicine men,
were painted red, with their hands and feet black; and the one who
made the incisions with the knife wore a mask, that the young men
should never know who gave them their wounds; and on their
bodies and limbs they had conspicuously marked with paint the scars
which they bore, as evidence that they had passed through the same
ordeal.
To these two men one of the emaciated candidates at a time
crawled up, and submitted to the knife (as seen in Plate X.),
which was passed under and through the integuments and flesh taken
up between the thumb and forefinger of the operator, on each arm,
above and below the elbow, over the brachialis externus and the
extensor radialis, and on each leg above and below the knee, over
the vastus externus and the peroneus; and also on each breast and each
shoulder.
During this painful operation, most of these young men, as they
took their position to be operated upon, observing me taking notes,
beckoned me to look them in the face, and sat, without the apparent
change of a muscle, smiling at me whilst the knife was passing
through their flesh, the ripping sound of which, and the trickling of
blood over their clay-covered bodies and limbs, filled my eyes with
irresistible tears.
When these incisions were all made, and the splints passed
through, a cord of raw hide was lowered down through the top of
the wigwam, and fastened to the splints on the breasts or shoulders,
by which the young man was to be raised up and suspended, by men
placed on the top of the lodge for the purpose.
These cords having been attached to the splints on the breast or
the shoulders, each one had his shield hung to some one of the splints:
was attached to the splint on each lower leg and each lower arm, that
its weight might prevent him from struggling; when, at a signal,
by striking the cord, the men on top of the lodge commenced to draw
him up. He was thus raised some three or four feet above the ground,
until the buffalo heads and other articles attached to the wounds
swung clear, when another man, his body red and his hands and feet
black, stepped up, and, with a small pole, began to turn him around.
The turning was slow at first, and gradually increased until
fainting ensued, when it ceased. In each case these young men
submitted to the knife, to the insertion of the splints, and even to
being hung and lifted up, without a perceptible murmur or a groan;
but when the turning commenced, they began crying in the most
heartrending tones to the Great Spirit, imploring him to enable them
to bear and survive the painful ordeal they were entering on. This
piteous prayer, the sounds of which no imagination can ever reach,
and of which I could get no translation, seemed to be an established
form, ejaculated alike by all, and continued until fainting commenced,
when it gradually ceased.
In each instance they were turned until they fainted and their
cries were ended. Their heads hanging forwards and down, and
their tongues distended, and becoming entirely motionless and silent,
they had, in each instance, the appearance of a corpse. (See Plate
XI.) In this view, which was sketched whilst the two young men
were hanging before me, one is suspended by the muscles of the
breast, and the other by the muscles of the shoulders, and two of the
young candidates are seen reclining on the ground, and waiting for
their turn.
When brought to this condition, without signs of animation, the
lookers-on pronounced the word dead! dead! when the men who
had turned them struck the cords with their poles, which was the
signal for the men on top of the lodge to lower them to the ground,
minutes.
The excessive pain produced by the turning, which was evinced
by the increased cries as the rapidity of the turning increased, was
no doubt caused by the additional weight of the buffalo skulls upon
the splints, in consequence of their centrifugal direction, caused by
the rapidity with which the bodies were turned, added to the sickening
distress of the rotary motion; and what that double agony
actually was, every adult Mandan knew, and probably no human
being but a Mandan ever felt.
After this ordeal (in which two or three bodies were generally
hanging at the same time), and the bodies were lowered to the
ground as has been described, a man advanced (as is seen in Plate
X.) and withdrew the two splints by which they had been hung
up, they having necessarily been passed under a portion of the
trapezius or pectoral muscle, in order to support the weight of their
bodies; but leaving all the others remaining in the flesh, to be got
rid of in the manner yet to be described.
Each body lowered to the ground appeared like a loathsome and
lifeless corpse. No one was allowed to offer them aid whilst they
lay in this condition. They were here enjoying their inestimable
privilege of voluntarily entrusting their lives to the keeping of the
Great Spirit, and chose to remain there until the Great Spirit gave
them strength to get up and walk away.
In each instance, as soon as they got strength enough partly to
rise, and move their bodies to another part of the lodge, where there
sat a man with a hatchet in his hand and a dried buffalo skull before
him, his body red, his hands and feet black, and wearing a mask,
they held up the little finger of the left hand (as seen in Plate X.)
towards the Great Spirit (offering it as a sacrifice, as they thanked
him audibly, for having listened to their prayers and protected their
lives in what they had just gone through), and laid it on the buffalo
the hatchet, close to the hand.
In several instances I saw them offer immediately after, and give,
the forefinger of the same hand,—leaving only the two middle fingers
and the thumb to hold the bow, the only weapon used in that hand.
Instances had been known, and several such were subsequently shown
to me amongst the chiefs and warriors, where they had given also
the little finger of the right hand, a much greater sacrifice; and
several famous men of the tribe were also shown to me, who proved,
by the corresponding scars on their breasts and limbs, which they
exhibited to me, that they had been several times, at their own
option, through these horrid ordeals.
The young men seemed to take no care or notice of the wounds
thus made, and neither bleeding nor inflammation to any extent
ensued, though arteries were severed,—owing probably to the checked
circulation caused by the reduced state to which their four days and
nights of fasting and other abstinence had brought them.
During the whole time of this cruel part of the ceremonies, the
chiefs and other dignitaries of the tribe were looking on, to decide
who amongst the young men were the hardiest and stoutest-hearted,
who could hang the longest by his torn flesh without fainting, and
who was soonest up after he had fainted,—that they might decide
whom to appoint to lead a war party, or to place at the most important
posts, in time of war.
As soon as six or eight had passed through the ordeal as above
described, they were led out of the Medicine Lodge, with the weights
still hanging to their flesh and dragging on the ground, to undergo
another and (perhaps) still more painful mode of suffering.
This part of the ceremony, which they called Eeh-ke-náh-ka
Na-pick (the last race) (see Plate XII.), took place in presence of
the whole tribe, who were lookers-on. For this a circle was formed
by the buffalo dancers (their masks thrown off) and others who had
quills, and all connected by circular wreaths of willow-boughs held
in their hands, who ran, with all possible speed and piercing yells,
around the "Big Canoe;" and outside of that circle the bleeding
young men thus led out, with all their buffalo skulls and other
weights hanging to the splints, and dragging on the ground, were
placed at equal distances, with two athletic young men assigned to
each, one on each side, their bodies painted one half red and the other
blue, and carrying a bunch of willow-boughs in one hand, (see one
of them, Plate XIII.,) who took them, by leather straps fastened
to the wrists, and ran with them as fast as they could, around the
"Big Canoe;" the buffalo skulls and other weights still dragging on
the ground as they ran, amidst the deafening shouts of the bystanders
and the runners in the inner circle, who raised their voices to the
highest key, to drown the cries of the poor fellows thus suffering by
the violence of their tortures.
The ambition of the young aspirants in this part of the ceremony
was to decide who could run the longest under these circumstances
without fainting, and who could be soonest on his feet again after
having been brought to that extremity. So much were they exhausted,
however, that the greater portion of them fainted and
settled down before they had run half the circle, and were then
violently dragged, even (in some cases) with their faces in the dirt,
until every weight attached to their flesh was left behind.
This must be done to produce honourable scars, which could not
be effected by withdrawing the splints endwise; the flesh must be
broken out, leaving a scar an inch or more in length: and in order to
do this, there were several instances where the buffalo skulls adhered
so long that they were jumped upon by the bystanders as they were
being dragged at full speed, which forced the splints out of the
wounds by breaking the flesh, and the buffalo skulls were left behind.
The tortured youth, when thus freed from all weights, was left
torturers, having dropped their willow-boughs, were seen running
through the crowd towards the prairies, as if to escape the punishment
that would follow the commission of a heinous crime.
In this pitiable condition each sufferer was left, his life again
entrusted to the keeping of the Great Spirit, the sacredness of which
privilege no one had a right to infringe upon by offering a helping
hand. Each one in his turn lay in this condition until "the Great
Spirit gave him strength to rise upon his feet," when he was seen,
covered with marks of trickling blood, staggering through the crowd
and entering his wigwam, where his wounds were probably dressed,
and with food and sleep his strength was restored.
The chiefs and other dignitaries of the tribe were all spectators
here also, deciding who amongst the young men were the strongest,
and could run the longest in the last race without fainting, and whom
to appoint and promote accordingly.
As soon as the six or eight thus treated were off from the
ground, as many more were led out of the Medicine Lodge and passed
through the same ordeal, or took some other more painful mode, at
their own option, to rid themselves of the splints and weights
attached to their limbs, until the whole number of candidates were
disposed of; and on the occasion I am describing, to the whole of
which I was a spectator, I should think that about fifty suffered in
succession, and in the same manner.
The number of wounds inflicted required to be the same on each,
and the number of weights attached to them the same, but in both
stages of the torture the candidates had their choice of being, in the
first, suspended by the breasts or by the shoulders; and in the "last
race" of being dragged as has been described, or to wander about the
prairies from day to day, and still without food, until suppuration of
the wounds took place, and, by the decay of the flesh, the dragging
weights were left behind.
It was natural for me to inquire, as I did, whether any of these
young men ever died in the extreme part of this ceremony, and they
could tell me of but one instance within their recollection, in which
case the young man was left for three days upon the ground (unapproached
by his relatives or by physicians) before they were quite
certain that the Great Spirit did not intend to help him away. They
all seemed to speak of this, however, as an enviable fate rather than
as a misfortune; for "the Great Spirit had so willed it for some
especial purpose, and no doubt for the young man's benefit."
After the Medicine Lodge had thus been cleared of its tortured
inmates, the master or conductor of ceremonies returned to it alone,
and, gathering up the edged tools which I have said were deposited
there, and to be sacrificed to the water on the last day of the ceremony,
he proceeded to the bank of the river, accompanied by all the
tribe, in whose presence, and with much form and ceremony, he
sacrificed them by throwing them into deep water from the rocks,
from which they could never be recovered: and then announced
that the Great Spirit must be thanked by all—and that the O-kee-pa
(religious ceremony of the Mandans) was finished.
The sequel to this strange affair, and which has been briefly
alluded to, and is yet to be described, was the
"Feast of the Buffaloes."
At the defeat of O-ke-hée-de (the Evil Spirit) it will be remembered
that the young woman who returned from the prairie bearing the
singular prize, and who ascended the front of the Medicine Lodge and
put an end to the bull dance, claimed the privilege of a beautiful
dress, in which she was to lead the dance in the feast of the buffaloes
on that night.
The O-kee-pa having been ended, and night having approached,
several old men with rattles in their hands, which they were violently
character of criers, announcing that "the whole government of the
Mandans was then in the hands of one woman—she who had disarmed
the Evil Spirit, and to whom they were to look during the
coming year for buffaloes to supply them with food, and keep them
alive; that all must repair to their wigwams and not show themselves
outside; that the chiefs on that night were old women; that
they had nothing to say; that no one was allowed to be out of
their wigwams excepting the favoured ones whom Rah-ta-co-puk-chee
(the governing woman) had invited to be at the feast of the buffaloes
around the `Big Canoe,' and which was about to commence."
This select party, which assembled and was seated on the ground
in a circle, and facing the "Big Canoe," consisted (first) of the
eight men who had danced the bull dance, with the paint washed off.
To them strictly the feast was given, and therefore was the feast of
the buffaloes (and not to be confounded with the buffalo feast, another
annual ceremony, given in the fall of the year, somewhat of a similar
character, but held for a different purpose).
Besides the eight buffaloes were the old medicine man, conductor
of the ceremonies, the four old men who had beaten on the tortoise-drums,
and the one who had shaken the rattles, as musicians, and
several of the aged chiefs of the tribe; and, added to these, this new-made,
but temporary governess of the tribe, had invited some eight
or ten of the young married women of the village, like herself, to
pay the extraordinary respect that was due, by the custom of their
country, to the makers of buffaloes and to reverenced old age on this
extraordinary occasion.
The commencement of the ceremonies which fell under this
woman's peculiar management was the feast of the buffaloes (as all the
men invited to it were called buffaloes), which was handed around in
wooden bowls by herself and attendants. After this was done, which
lasted but a few minutes (appearing but a minor part of the affair),
during which a lascivious dance was performed by herself and female
companions.
This dance finished, she advanced to her first selected paramour,
and, giving some signals which seemed to be understood, passed her
hand gently under his arm, and, raising him up, led him through the
village and into the prairie, where, as all the villagers and their dogs
were shut up in their wigwams, they were free from observation or
molestation.[3]
From this excursion they returned separately, and the man took
his seat again if he chose to be a candidate for further civilities, or
returned to his wigwam. The other women were singing and going
through the whirl of the dance in the meantime, and each one inviting
her chosen paramour, when she was disposed, in the same
manner.
Those of the women who returned from these excursions joined
again in the continuous dance, and extended as many and as varied
invitations in this way as they desired; and some of them, I learned,
as well as of the men, had taken several of such promenades in the
course of the evening, which may be accounted for by the relieving
fact that though it would have been a most prejudicial want of
gallantry on the part of the man to have refused to go, yet the
trifling present of a string of beads or an awl saved him from any
odium which might otherwise have been cast upon him.
This extraordinary scene gradually closed by the men returning
from the prairie to their homes, the last of them on the ground
pacifying any unsatisfied feelings there might have been, by bestowing
the pipe of friendship with their husbands the next day, which they
were bound to offer, and the others, by the custom of the country,
were bound to accept.
It may be met as matter of surprise, that a religious ceremony
should be followed by a scene like the one just described, but before
we entirely condemn these ignorant and superstitious people, let us
inquire whether it is not, more or less, an inherent propensity in
human nature (and even practised in some enlightened and Christian
communities) to end extreme sorrow, extreme penitence, and even
mourning for kindred the most loved, in debauch?
What has thus far been related has been simple and easy, as it
has been but the description of what I saw and what I heard; but
what may be expected of me—rational and conclusive deductions from
the above premises—I approach with timidity; rather wishing to
submit the materials for the conclusions of others abler than myself
to explain them, and for whose assistance I will still continue a
few suggestions.
That the Mandans should have had a tradition of a "Deluge"
is by no means singular, when in every tribe I have visited I have
found that they regard some high mountain in their vicinity, on
which, they say, their ancestor or ancestors were saved, and also relate
other vague stories of the destruction of everything else living
on the earth, by the waters.
But that these people should hold an annual celebration of that
event, and that the season of the year for that celebration was decided
by such circumstances as the "willow-bough" and its "full-grown
leaves," and the "medicine bird," and the Medicine Lodge opened by
such a man as "Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah," who represented a white
man, and some other circumstances, is surely a very remarkable
thing, and, as I think, deserves some further attention.
This "Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah" (first or only man) was undoubtedly
prairies on the previous evening, and having dressed and painted
himself for the occasion, came into the village at sunrise in the
morning, endeavouring to keep up the semblance of reality; for the
traditions of the Mandans say, that "at an ancient period such a man
did actually come from the West, that his skin was white, that he
was very old, that he appeared in all respects as has been represented;
and, as has also been stated, that he related the manner of
the destruction of every human being on the earth's surface by
the waters, excepting himself, who was saved in his "Big Canoe" by
landing on a high mountain in the West; that the Mandans and all
other nations were his descendants, and were bound to make annual
sacrifices of edged tools to the water, for with such things his "Big
Canoe" was built; that he instructed the Mandans how to make
their Medicine Lodge, and taught them also the forms of these annual
ceremonies, and told them also that as long as they made these
annual sacrifices and performed these rites to the full letter, they
would be the favoured people of the Great Spirit, and would always
have enough to eat and drink, and that so soon as they departed in
the least degree from these forms their race would begin to decrease
and finally die out.
These superstitious people have, no doubt, been living from time
immemorial under the dread of such an injunction, and in the fear
of departing from it; and as they were living in total ignorance of
its origin, other than this vague tradition, the world will probably
remain in equal ignorance of much of its meaning, as they needs
must be of all Indian traditions, which soon run into fable, thereby
losing much of their system by which they might more easily have
been correctly construed.
It would seem from their tradition of the willow-bough and the
dove, that these people must have had some proximity to some part of
the civilized world, or that missionaries or others had been amongst
Deluge, which is in this and some other respects very different from
the theories which all the other American tribes have distinctly
established of that event.
There are other strong, and I think almost conclusive proofs, in
support of this suggestion, which are to be drawn from the diversity
of colour in their hair and complexions, as well as from their traditions
just related of the "first or only man," whose body was white,
and who came from the West, telling them of the destruction of the
human race by the water; and in addition to the above I will offer
another tradition, related to me by one of the chiefs of the tribe in
the following way:—
"At a very ancient time O-ke-hée-de (the Evil Spirit) came from
the West to the Mandan village in company with Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah
(the first or only man), and they, being fatigued, sat down upon
the ground near a woman who had but one eye and was hoeing corn.
Her daughter, who was very beautiful, came up to her, and the Evil
Spirit desired her to go and bring some water, but wished that
before she started she would come to him and eat some buffalo
meat.
"He then told her to take a piece out of his side, which she did,
and ate it, and it proved to be buffalo's fat. She then went for the
water, which she brought, and met them in the village where they
had walked, and they both drank of it; nothing more was done.
The friends of the girl soon after endeavoured to disgrace her by
telling her that she was with child, which she did not deny. She
declared at the same time her innocence, and boldly defied any man
in the Mandan nation to come forward and accuse her. No one
could accuse her, and she therefore became great `medicine,' and
she soon after went to the little Mandan village, where the child was
born.
"Great search was made for her before she was found, as it was
way be of great importance to the tribe. They were induced to this
belief from the strange manner of its conception and birth, and were
soon confirmed in their belief from the wonderful things which it did
at an early age.
"Amongst the strange things which it did on an occasion when
the Mandans were in danger of starving, this child gave them four
buffalo bulls, which filled the bellies of the whole nation, leaving as
much meat as there was before they began to eat, and saying also
that these four bulls would supply them for ever.
"Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah (the first or only man) was bent on the
destruction of this child, and after making many fruitless searches
for it, found it hidden in a dark place, and put it to death by throwing
it into the river.
"When O-ke-hée-de (the Evil Spirit) heard of the death of this
child, he sought for Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah with intent to kill him. He
traced him a long distance, and at length overtook him at the Heart
River, seventy miles below the Mandan village, with the `big medicine
pipe' in his hands, the charm or mystery of which protected
him from all his enemies. They soon agreed however to become
good friends, and after smoking the medicine pipe they returned
together to the Mandan village.
"The Evil Spirit was now satisfied, and Nu-mohk-múck-a-nah
told the Mandans never to go beyond the mouth of Heart River to
live, for it was the centre of the world, and to live beyond it would
be destruction to them, and he named it Nat-com-pa-sá-ha (the
heart or centre of the world)."
Such was one of the very vague and imperfect traditions of those
curious people, and I leave it to the world to judge of its similitude
to the Scripture account of the Christian advent.
Omitting in this place their numerous other traditions and superstitions,
I will barely refer to a few singular deductions I have made
the consideration of gentlemen abler than myself to decide upon their
importance.
The Mandans believed that the earth rests on the backs of four
tortoises. They say that "each tortoise rained ten days, making
forty days in all, and the waters covered the earth."
Whenever a Mandan doctor (medicine man) lighted his pipe, he
invariably presented the stem of it to the north, the south, the
east, and the west, the four cardinal points, and then upwards to the
Great Spirit, before smoking it himself.
Their annual religious ceremony lasted four days; four men were
called for by Nu-mohk-muck-a-nah, as has been stated, to cleanse and
prepare the Medicine Lodge, "one from the north, one from the south,
one from the east, and one from the west." Four was the number of
tortoise-drums on the floor of the Medicine Lodge; there were also
four buffalo and four human skulls arranged on the floor of the
Medicine Lodge. There were four couples of dancers in the bull-dance,
and four intervening dancers in the same dance, as has been
described; the bull-dance was repeated four times on the first day,
eight times on the second day, twelve times on the third day, and
sixteen times on the fourth day, adding four dances on each of the
four days, which added together make forty, the exact number of
days that it rained upon the earth to produce the Deluge.
There were four sacrifices of various-coloured cloths raised on
poles over the Medicine Lodge. The visits of O-ke-hée-de were paid to
four of the buffaloes in the bull-dance; and in every instance of the
young men who underwent the tortures explained, there were four
splints run through the flesh on the legs, four on the arms, four on
the body, and four buffalo-skulls attached to each one's wounds.
And, as has been related in the tradition above given, four was the
number of bulls given by the medicine child to feed the Mandans
when they were starving.
Such were a portion, but not all, of the peculiar modes of the
hospitable and friendly Mandans, who have ceased to exist, and left
almost the only tangible evidence of their having existed, in my
collection, which contains their portraits, their manufactures, and
all their modes, and which I hope to preserve with success for the
information of ages to come.
The melancholy fate of these people was caused by the introduction
of the smallpox, by that nefarious system of traffic which
rapidly increases the wealth of civilized individual adventurers and
monopolies who introduce it, but everywhere carries dissipation,
poverty, disease and death to the poor Indians.
In the fourth summer after I left the Mandans, the Missouri Fur
Company's steamer from St. Louis, freighted with whiskey and merchandise,
and with two of the partners of that concern on board,
moored at the shore of the river in front of the Mandan village,
where a traffic was carried on with those unsuspecting people whilst
there were two of the vessel's hands on board sick with the smallpox!
By this act of imprudence, and in fact of inhuman cruelty, the
disease was communicated to those unfortunate people; and such
were its awful results, with the self-destruction which ensued, that
in the short space of three months there were but thirty-two of these
people left in existence, with the exception of a few who had intermarried
and were living with the Minatarrees, a friendly and neighbouring
tribe.
A few months after the disease had subsided, the Riccarrees, a
hostile tribe, living two hundred miles below, on the bank of the
same river, moved up and took possession of the Mandan village, it
being a better built town than their own, and by the side of the Fur
Company's factory, making slaves of the remaining Mandans, who
were unable to resist.
Whilst living in this condition in the Mandan village, and but a
attacked by a war-party of Sioux, and in the midst of a desperate
battle around the pickets, in which the remaining Mandans were
taking a part, they suddenly, at a signal, passed through the pickets
and threw themselves under the horses' feet of the Sioux, and were
slain at their own seeking, rather than to live, as they said, "dogs of
the Riccarrees."
My authorities for these painful facts are letters which I hold
from Mr. K. M`Kenzie and Mr. J. Potts, written in the Mandan village
after the disease had subsided. Both of these gentlemen were
from Edinburgh, in Scotland, the former a partner in the Missouri
Fur Company, and the latter a clerk in the same Company. (See
these letters in Nos. 3 and 4 in the Appendix.
REMARKS.
In contemplating so many striking peculiarities in an extinguished
tribe, the mind reluctantly leaves so interesting a subject
without raising the question as to the origin of the people; and in
this feeling, though not within the original intention of this work, it is
difficult for me to leave the subject without advancing my belief, and
furnishing some part of my reasons for it, that many of the modes of
these people were purely Welsh, and that the personal appearance
and customs of the Mandans had been affected by the proximity or
admixture of some wandering colony of Welsh who had been thrown
at an early period somewhere upon the American coast.
I am here, perhaps, advancing a startling problem, which demands
at my hands some striking proofs, which I will in a few
words endeavour to produce.
The annual religious ceremony which has been described certainly
cannot be attributed to the Welsh, nor am I able to compare it to
it bears a resemblance to any known customs of savage or civilized
races in other parts of the world.
It is very strange, as I have before said, that those people should
have been instructed how to hold those ceremonies by a white man,
and that they should be commenced and the Medicine Lodge opened
by a white man, and that the "big canoe" should have been built
with edged tools, if they be solely of native origin; and it would be
equally or more strange if the Jesuit missionaries, who, it would
seem, were the only civilized teachers we can well suppose to have
reached these people, had instructed them in modes like those,
though it is easy to believe that their teaching might have been the
cause of the last singular tradition mentioned, certainly bearing a
visible but very imperfect parallel to the Christian Advent.
Many of the customs and traditions of the western tribes convince
us that those indefatigable preachers penetrated much further into
the American wildernesses than history has followed them, and in this
singular tribe we find the extraordinary custom which has been described,
and others to which I shall take a few moments to allude,
neither of which can with any propriety be attributed to the teaching
of those venerable missionaries.
On my arrival in their village, my first glance amongst the Mandans
forced me, from their peculiar features and complexions, the colour
of their eyes and hair, the singular mode of building and furnishing
their wigwams, etc., to believe that they were an amalgam of some
foreign with an American aboriginal stock, and every day that I
dwelt amongst them furnished me additional convictions of this fact,
and of course called on my part for greater endeavours to account for
these singularities. And the information I gathered amongst them
confirmed me in the opinion I have advanced,—that many of their
peculiarities and customs were Welsh, and therefore that there existed
amongst them the remains of some Welsh colony, however difficult
it might be to account for their having got there.
The following, I believe, will be received as interesting and important
facts, and if they fail to establish my theory, they may nevertheless
revive the inquiry as to the direction and fate of the expedition
which "sailed in ten ships, under the direction of Prince
Madoc, from North Wales, in the early part of the fourteenth century,"
and which it has been pretty clearly shown, I believe, landed
somewhere on the coast of Florida or about the mouth of the Mississippi,
and, according to the history and poetry of their own country,
"settled somewhere in the interior of America, where they are yet
remaining, intermixed with some of the Indian tribes."
I have not met in any other tribe anything in personal appearance
or customs that would seem to account for the direction of this
colony, but in several of the customs of this tribe which I have
already described, as well as in others which I shall name, there
appeared to exist striking proofs of the arrival and settlement of that
colony in the western regions of America.
The Mandan mode of constructing their wigwams, already described,
was almost precisely that of the rude mode of building their
cabins amongst the peasantry of the mountains of Wales, and, as I
am told, in some districts they are building them at the present day.
The pottery made by the Mandans, to the time of their destruction,
was strikingly similar to that manufactured in parts of Wales
at the present time, and exactly similar to that found in the tumuli
on the banks of the Ohio and Muskingum rivers; strongly suggesting
the probable fact that those people formerly inhabited the banks
of those rivers, and by a great number of moves up the Missouri had
arrived at the place where I found them.
A peculiar and very beautiful sort of blue beads were also manufactured
by the Mandans, and of which they were certainly the only
known manufacturers in America; and since publishing my large
work on the North American Indians, in which I gave some account
of this curious manufacture, I have received several letters from
from, and another the beads themselves, found in tumuli, and also in
the present progress of manufacture in Wales, precisely the same in
character, in shape, and in colour and composition, as those in my
collection brought from the Mandans.
The manufacture of these blue beads by the Mandans was
guarded as a profound secret until the time of their destruction,
although the Fur Company had made them repeated and liberal
offers if they would divulge it, as the Mandan beads commanded a
much higher price amongst the Mandans and the neighbouring tribes
to whom they bartered them, than the beads introduced by the fur
traders.
The canoes or boats of the Mandans, differing from those of all
other tribes in America, were precisely the Welsh coracle, made of a
bull's hide stretched over a frame of willow rods, bent and interlocked,
and pulled over the water by the paddle, in the same manner
as the coracle is pulled, by reaching forward with the paddle instead
of passing it by the side of the boat, which is nearly round, and the
paddler seated or kneeling in its front.
From the translation of their name, already mentioned, Nu-mah-ká-kee
(pheasants), an important inference may be drawn in support
of the probability of their having formerly lived much farther to the
south, as that bird does not exist on the prairies of the Upper
Missouri, and is not to be met with short of the heavy forests of
Ohio and Indiana, one thousand eight hundred miles south of the
last residence of the Mandans.
And in their familiar name of Mandan, which is not an Indian
word, there are equally singular and important features. In the
first place, that they knew nothing of the name or how they got it;
and next, that the word Mandan in the Welsh language (it being
purely a Welsh word) means red dye, of which further mention will
be made.
In the brief vocabulary of Mandan words which I published in
the Appendix to my large work on the North American Indians, it
has been discovered by several Welsh scholars that there exist the
following most striking resemblances, which it would be difficult to
account for in any other way than that which I am now attempting.
| English. | Mandan. | Welsh. |
| I | me | me |
| you | ne | chwe |
| he | e | a |
| she | ea | ea |
| it | ount | hwynt |
| we | noo | ne |
| hwna (masculine) | ||
| they | eonah | |
| hona (feminine) | ||
| no | negosh | nagosh |
| head | pan | pen |
| The Great Spirit | Maho-Peneta | Mawr-Penaethir |
From the above evidences, and others which might be produced,
I fully believe, what perhaps will for ever remain impossible (positively)
to prove, that the ten ships commanded by the brother of
Prince Madoc, or some portion of them, entered the mouth of the
Mississippi, and advanced up that noble river to the mouth of the
Ohio, which could easily have been navigated by vessels of that date,
and, advancing up that river, which they would naturally have
chosen, as the broadest and most gentle stream, as far as their vessels
could go, the adventurers planted themselves as agriculturists on its
rich and fertile banks, where they lived and flourished and increased
in numbers, until they were attacked, and at last besieged, by the
numerous hordes of savages who were jealous of their growing condition;
and as a protection against the Indian assaults built those
civilized fortifications, the remains of which are so numerous on the
banks of the Ohio and Muskingum Rivers.
In these defences, I believe, they were at length all destroyed
few families who had intermarried with the Indians, and whose offsprings,
being half-castes, were in such a manner allied to them that
their lives were spared.
Those, as is generally the case with the half-castes, I believe had
formed a separate village in the vicinity of the whites, supporting
themselves by their embroidery with porcupine quills, to which they
gave the beautiful dyes for which the Mandans have been peculiarly
famous, and were called by their Welsh neighbours, and in the
Welsh language, the Mandans (or red dyers).
These half-castes, having formed themselves into a separate
community, probably took up their residence, after the destruction
of the whites, on the banks of the Missouri, on which, for the want
of a permanent location and right to the soil, being on the lands and
the hunting-grounds of their more powerful enemies, they were
obliged repeatedly to move, as the numerous marks of their ancient
residences show; and continuing their moves up the river, in time
migrated to the place where I saw them, and where they terminated
their existence.
Thus much of and for the character and modes of a peculiar
people, who were proverbially intelligent, hospitable, and kind;
who, with their language, have suddenly ceased to exist; whose
character, history, modes, and personal appearance, almost solely
existing in my collections, I have considered essentially interesting
and important to Ethnology, and some of the most remarkable of
which (as I have said) I am here, from a sense of duty, emphatically
recording for the information of those who are to study Man and his
modes after I shall be gone.
Geo. Catlin.
EST. PERPET.
Here the question again arises, If the Indian tradition of the Deluge was not
of Mosaic origin, why was the "first or only man" represented by the Mandans
as a white man? and the answer is the same as that already given as to the
"willow-bough" and the "big canoe." The same teachers have made these people
believe that the first man was a white man, and they consequently so represent
him,—a peculiarity of the Mandans, not practised or thought of in any other tribe
of the American continent.
Whilst the handsome warrior was standing for the sketch here given, he told
me that it took eight men an entire day to paint the bodies and limbs of the eight
buffaloes, no part of the painting being done by their own hands.
In the foregoing account of the religious ceremonies, nothing has been described
but what I saw enacted. Here, from necessity, I am trusting to the
accounts of Mr. Kipp, of the Fur Company, and Mr. Tilton, whose letter will be
seen in the Appendix, both of whom told me they had repeatedly been invited
guests and sharers of these extraordinary hospitalities.
| O-kee-pa, a religious ceremony, and other customs of the Mandans | |