The Ghost-dance religion and the Sioux outbreak of 1890 : $b Fourteenth annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology, part 2.Mooney, James
Religion
The Ghost-dance religion and the Sioux outbreak of 1890 : $b Fourteenth annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology, part 2.
Mooney, James
Dakota Indians -- Wars, 1890-1891; Ghost dance
INTERIOR OF SMOHALLA CHURCH]
I and my two assistants were seated on a mattress about 10 feet in
front of the prophet, which fortunately placed us near the door
and incidentally near fresh air. There were two other witnesses,
Indians from distant villages, who sat at one side with Smohalla’s
son looking on.
Smohalla’s son was said to be in training as his successor. He was
a young man, apparently about 23 years old, tall, slender, and
active in movement, and commonly kept himself apart from the body
of the people. He was much darker than his father. His dress was
brilliant in style and color. He ordinarily wore a short gown or
surplice, sometimes yellow and at other times sky blue, with ornate
decorations of stars or moons appliqué, cut from bright-colored
cloths. The sleeves were extravagantly trimmed with beads and
silver ornaments. He knelt at the right of the group as the place
of honor. On his left was Coteeakun, the head man of the Indian
village at Union gap, on the Yakima reservation. The third man was
Coteeakun’s brother, a most intelligent and progressive Indian.
(_MacMurray MS._)
From Charles Ike, an intelligent half-blood interpreter on Yakima
reservation, who is also the regular interpreter of the Smohalla
ritual services at the Yakima village of Paʾkiut, we obtain additional
interesting details concerning the ceremony as there performed, with
the underlying religious teachings.
As at present taught, the religion finds adherents among probably all
the tribes along the Columbia from near the British border down to
the Wushqûm tribe at The Dalles, with the exception, perhaps, of the
Klikatat, who are nearly all Catholics. The two chief centers are at
Pʿnä or Priest rapids, where Smohalla in person regularly preaches to
about 120 hearers, and at Paʾkiut, at Union gap on Yakima reservation,
where, until his death a short time ago, Tianä′ni has regularly
conducted the services for about 300 of his tribe. At each place is a
church or meeting-house built as already described.
The former high priest of the doctrine among the Yakima, and the
right-hand man of Smohalla himself, was Kotai′aqan, already mentioned,
the son of the great war chief Kamai′äkan. It is even asserted that he
was the originator of the system. However this may be, it is certain
that he had much to do with formulating both the dogmas and the ritual.
In temper he was more gentle than Smohalla, and more disposed to meet
civilization half-way. On his death, about 1890, he was succeeded by
his stepson, Tīanä′ni, or “Many Wounds,” who filled the office until
about October, 1892, when he was murdered near his home by two drunken
Indians. He was succeeded in the chieftainship by a younger son of
Kotai′aqan named Sha′awĕ (or Shaw-wawa Kootiacan), and in his priestly
functions by a man known to the whites as Billy John.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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