CEREMONY OF THE BOWL
In addition to the Sun Dance, the Hidatsa had two four days
ceremonies of supplication by ordeal in which the principal
features were piercing and fasting. The more important of these
was Midhahakidutiku , Taking Up The Bowl, based on the legend of
the sacred bowl, which symbolizes Old Woman Who Never Dies and
figures so prominently in Hidatsa mythology.
According to the legend as passed down by the chief Roadmaker,
uncle of Lean Wolf, in the days when the Midhokats were encamped
near a beautiful lake to the northeast, one of their young men
was fasting on the shore far from the village, and crying to the
spirits to pity him. Just before the sun went behind the world,
he saw something on the shore where the waves lapped the sand,
and when he came closer her perceived that it was an earthen
vessel marked with the track of a brant around it rim.
He took it to his lodge, for he thought it must be a vessel of
mystery. That night he had a vision, and the bowl spoke to him
in the words of a woman, saying, "My child, I am Old Woman Who
Never Dies. Hold me sacred, and I will bring you good fortune,
for I have many friends among the spirits. The corn and the
buffalo paunch are my food. I shall teach you the songs and
rites of a ceremony that will cause your people to prosper and
bring rain upon your crops. Make offerings to me of buffalo
paunches, and hang them before me on cottonwood stakes. Prepare
a pipe and tobacco for Itsihkawahidish and Adhapushish, who aid
me in making medicine, for they are men and like the smoke. All
the birds and animals living on this lake are of my medicine.
Let no man who has blood on his hands enter the lodge where this
ceremony takes place, nor permit any woman to be present."
Then she revealed to him the rites of Taking Up The Bowl.
A man who desires this ceremony performed climbed to the top of
his earthen lodge and appealed to Old Woman Who Never Dies:
"Bowl, I cause you to be taken up, that my children may grow
strong. Let the rain come upon us." Or he might go to the hills
and utter this prayer, crying like a child. Already he had
provided offerings, and food, robes, and clothing.
When all was ready he sought the Keeper of the Bowl, and offered
him the pipe, apprising him of the object of his visit. The
Keeper told him that he was doing right to take up the bowl, and
accepted the pipe, lighted it, and prayed to the sacred vessel,
which was kept in the honor place of his lodge: "Bowl, we are
about to take you up again with prayers and fasting. Open your
ears that you may hear our songs. Give us your aid."
He silently repeated songs and prayers until the morning of the
ceremony, when he went to the suppliant's lodge, where , after
purifying the interior with incense, he prepared a canopy of
buffalo robes in the honor place. Beneath it he laid a robe upon
which was placed a bowl case - a basket of osiers and box elder
bark - the symbol of Old Woman Who Never Dies. A woman's dress
of mountain sheep skin was placed over the case, and was
partially covered with a newly tanned elk hide, soft and white.
On top of this was a war bonnet of eagle feathers dyed red, and
at each side were placed presents of robes and clothing. In
front hung several buffalo paunches on cottonwood stakes.
To the right of this altar a bed of sage was laid for the sacred
vessel, which was completely enclosed in the inner skin of a
buffalo paunch stretched tight over the top, so as to form a
drum. Small bunches of sage were inserted under the sinews that
bound the skin. The drumsticks were about two feel long, with
one end bent into a circle. The vessel thus prepared was
symbolic of Itsihkawahidish and Adhapushish.
Toward evening the people assembled, and, with the keeper of a
sacred pipe in advance bearing this talisman, marked four times
around the village singing, "The rain is coming, it is here."
They entered the lodge of the suppliant, and while the Keeper of
the Bowl burned incense of sage, sweet grass, and fir needles,
the pipe bearer laid the sacred pipe before the altar. The
singers, eight or nine in number, gathered about the bowl, the
medicine men sitting at their right, and those who had come to
fast ranging themselves to the left of the altar, each laying
down an armful of sage, which was to serve as his bed during the
four days and four nights of fasting.
The ceremonial dress was a buffalo robe worn hairy side outward,
and the participants painted themselves blue with clay from
which pottery is made.
When all had entered, the singers chanted a wordless song, the
burden of which was that the mystery power had come. They stood
up imitating the various birds that belong to the bowl, - ducks,
geese, brant, and smaller birds, - while the fasters, rising,
wailed to Itsihakawahidish and Adhapushish, as though they were
lost children crying for their parents. Several other prayer
songs, without words, were sung, after which the Keeper of the
Bowl sang "Hi-hi-wa-hi," signifying that the spirits had come.
The singers swayed from side to side, and at the end of the song
settled down, mimicking the actions of water fowl and giving
their cries.
The Keeper of the Bowl burned incense, and, taking some of the
food previously brought in by relatives of the fasters, held it
to the Four Winds and then offered it to Old Woman Who Never
Dies with the prayer:
"Old Woman Who Never Dies, your mystery powers are good. Now
eat. Our young men have provided this food, that you may make
them strong."
The fasters now divided the food, and each of them took a bowl
of it to one of the medicine men, a clansman of his father. When
the latter had finished eating, the faster placed his hands on
the medicine man's shoulders and stroked his arm to the wrists,
as though receiving some power or virtue from him. His relative
then sang to the spirits, imploring them to aid the faster.
The fasters next carried food to the spectators and the medicine
men, while the suppliant provided for the singers and the Keeper
of the Bowl. Before eating, each one offered the food to the
Four Winds and the altar. After the others had eaten and smoked,
the Bowl and the suppliant and such of the fasters as chose came
to the Keeper and the singers and were pierced as in the Dahpike.
Slits were cut into the flesh of each breast and the inserted
rawhide ropes were fastened to the cross timbers of the
supporting posts of the lodge.
The devotees in a frenzied dance made violent efforts to free
themselves. Buffalo skulls were sometimes hung by thongs passed
through slits in the thighs or shoulders, and other fasters were
pierced through the flesh of the shoulders and suspended, their
feet clear of the ground.
The singers encouraged the dancers and kept their spirits at the
highest pitch by wild singing and drumming. The fasters endured
the torture as long as they were able; if they failed to tear
themselves loose, or fainted with the intense pain, the Keeper
of the Bowl and the singers cut the thongs and laid the
exhausted dancers on their beds of sage, where they remained
until the end of the ceremony, fasting and praying for visions.
While women were not permitted inside the lodge during the
ceremony, some of them came and slept in the outer entrance,
hoping to have dreams that might be favourably interpreted. They
departed at the first sign of dawn, that their presence might
not be discovered. |
