The pictures give a good idea of the paraphernalia of the first two groups, which dance together. The chorus accompanies them with a drum, singing a loud and effective song. During the dance it is customary to discharge firearms and to imitate in a way the hunt of the bison, and this part of the ceremony was formerly carried out in a much more realistic way than at present.
The men of the chorus are gaudily painted, bearing sticks or poles to which ribbons, calico, and feathers are attached.
The Buffalo dance is a foreign addition to the Hopi calendar. It is said to be a Tewan ceremonial dance, and some of the Walpi women say they introduced it into Zuñi. The Hano people claim that their Mucaiasti is the best on the East mesa; in former years it was celebrated with much more éclat than at present. There is a tradition that a Buffalo maid was brought to Tusayan from the Eastern pueblos by the Sun, whose emblem she bears on her back in the dance.
Winter Tawa Paholawû
This meeting of the Sun priests or Tawawimpkiya is a complemental ceremony, at or near the winter solstice, of the summer meeting, which occurs in July.[1] No altars are employed, but a number of prayer-sticks are made and later are deposited in special shrines.
The Winter Sun prayer-stick-making takes place in the same room as the Summer, in a house near the Moñ kiva, under the entrance to the ancestral residence of the Patki clan. The only fetish employed is a rude stone frog, over which is a stretched a string extended along a line of meal on the floor, symbolic of the pathway of blessings. The men who participate in this rite are all members of the Patki clan.
Powamû
The Powamû festival, ordinarily called the Bean-planting, is one of the most elaborate of all the katcina exhibitions, and at Walpi is controlled by Naka, chief of the Katcina clan. One object of this festival is a purification or renovation of the earth for future planting, but the main purpose is a celebration of the return of the katcinas. The festival differs considerably in the six Hopi pueblos and is apparently more complicated at Oraibi.
Planting of Beans
In the early days of Powamû, beans are planted in all the kivas of the three villages, Walpi, Sichumovi, and Hano, and forced to grow in superheated rooms until the morning of the final day, when they are pulled, tied in small bundles, and distributed, with dolls, bows and arrows, turtle shells, rattles, etc., to the children, by masked persons from each kiva.
- ↑ See Journal of American Ethnology and Archæology, vol. II, 1892.
