Calendar history of the Kiowa Indians. (1898 N 17 / 1895-1896 (pages 129-444))Mooney, James
History
Calendar history of the Kiowa Indians. (1898 N 17 / 1895-1896 (pages 129-444))
Mooney, James
Kiowa Indians; Kiowa language -- Glossaries, vocabularies, etc.
In the spring of 1870, before the last sun dance, the son of the noted
chief Set-ängya ("Sitting-bear"), the young man having the same name as
his father, had made a raid with a few followers into Texas, where,
while making an attack upon a house, he had been shot and killed. After
the dance his father with some friends went to Texas, found his bones
and wrapped them in several fine blankets, put the bundle upon the back
of a led horse and brought them home. On the return journey he killed
and scalped a white man, which revenge served in some measure to assuage
his grief. On reaching home he erected a tipi with a raised platform
inside, upon which, as upon a bed, he placed the bundle containing his
son's bones. He then made a feast within the funeral tipi, to which he
invited all his friends in the name of his son, telling them, "My son
calls you to eat." From that time he always spoke of his son as
sleeping, not as dead, and frequently put food and water near the
platform for his refreshment on awaking. While on a march the remains
were always put upon the saddle of a led horse, as when first brought
home, the tipi and the horse thus burdened being a matter of personal
knowledge to all the middle-age people of the tribe now living. He
continued to care for his son's bones in this manner until he himself
was killed at Fort Sill about a year later, when the Kiowa buried them.
Although a young man, Set-ängya's son held the office of _Toñhyópdă´_,
the pipe-bearer or leader who went in front of the young warriors on a
war expedition.
The Anko calendar records two incidents. The first was a drunken fight
between two Kiowa, in which one killed the other, indicated by the rude
representation of two heads with a bottle between them. The other event
was the killing of four or five negroes in Texas by a party led by
Mamä´nte ("Walking-above)," who brought back the scalps with the
woolly-hair attached. It is shown on the calendar by means of a figure
with bullet and arrow wounds, drawn below the heads and the bottle. An
attempt has been made to indicate the peculiar woolly hair of the negro;
the trousers are blue, like those worn by soldiers, Anko thinking they
were probably soldiers, because, as he says, "Negroes can't go alone."
[Illustration: FIG. 149--Summer 1871--Set-t'aiñte arrested; Koñpä´te
killed.]
In this winter Ansó-gíăni or Anso`te, "Long-foot," the great medicine
keeper, died of extreme old age. He had been in charge of the _taíme_
for forty years; consequently there was no sun dance for two years until
his successor was selected.
SUMMER 1871
For this summer the Anko calendar records the death of Koñpä´te,
"Blackens-himself," who was shot through the head in a skirmish with
soldiers. He was the brother of the noted raider, White-horse. The event
is indicated by the rude representation of a head struck by a bullet. As
there was no dance this summer, the medicine lodge is not represented on
either calendar.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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