Ceremonial of Hasjelti Dailjis and Mythical Sand Painting of the Navajo IndiansStevenson, James
Religion
Ceremonial of Hasjelti Dailjis and Mythical Sand Painting of the Navajo Indians
Stevenson, James
Navajo Indians -- Rites and ceremonies
The construction of the second sweat house began at sunrise and was
completed at nine o’clock. Several large rocks were heated and placed in
the sweat house and as before white sage and _Bigelovia Douglasii_ were
thrown in, the fumes of which were designed as medicine for the sick man.
After the invalid entered the sweat house, buckskin blankets, etc., were
drawn over the entrance. The song-priest, accompanied by two attendants,
sat a little to the south. He sprinkled meal around the west base of the
house and over the top from north to south and placed the wands around its
base in the manner heretofore described (the twelve wands and medicine
used were the special property of the theurgist). The song-priest holding
the rattle joined the choir in a chant. To his right were two Navajo jugs
filled with water and an Apache basket partly filled with corn meal. A
bunch of buckskin bags, one of the small blue medicine tubes, a mountain
sheep’s horn, and a piece of undressed hide lay on the meal. Near by was a
gourd half filled with water in which meal was sprinkled; near this was a
small earthenware vase containing water and finely chopped herbs. At the
conclusion of the chant the song-priest passed his rattle to one of the
choir and stirred the mixture in the bowl with his forefinger, and after a
few remarks to the invalid, who was still in the sweat house, he threw
some of the mixture in upon the hot rocks. This was repeated four times,
when the song-priest returned to his former position. The sweat-house
priest took from his shoulders a Navajo blanket and spread it near the
door a little to the right. A call from one of the attendants was a signal
for Hasjelti and Hostjoghon to appear. The two men personating these gods
were behind a tree south of the sweat house, their bodies, arms, and legs
painted white. Foxskins were attached pendent to the backs of their
girdles. As the gods approached the sweat house, the patient came out and
sat upon the blanket, and Hasjelti took a mountain sheep’s horn, in the
right hand and the piece of hide in the other and rubbed the sick man,
beginning with the limbs; as he rubbed down each limb, he threw his arms
toward the eastern sky and cried "yo-yo!" He also rubbed the head and
body, holding the hands on opposite sides of the body. After this rubbing,
the sick man drank from the bowl of medicine-water, then arose and bathed
himself with the same mixture, the filled gourds being handed to him four
times by Hasjelti, each time accompanied with his peculiar hoot.
Hostjoghon repeated the same ceremony over the invalid. There was a
constant din of rattle and chanting, the gods disappeared, and immediately
thereafter the theurgist gathered the twelve wands from the base of the
sweat house. He removed the blue reed from the basket and laid it a little
to the left of the priest of the sweat house, who in turn handed it to an
attendant to be deposited with the wood of the sweat house in a
neighboring tree.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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