The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees: Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1885-1886, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1891, pages 301-398Mooney, James
Religion
The Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees: Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1885-1886, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1891, pages 301-398
Mooney, James
Cherokee Indians -- Religion; Cherokee language -- Texts; Indians of North America -- Medicine
The symbolic color system of the Cherokees, which will be explained
more fully in connection with the formulas, is as follows:
East red success; triumph.
North blue defeat; trouble.
West black death.
South white peace; happiness.
Above? brown unascertained, but propitious.
------ yellow about the same as blue.
There is a great diversity in the color systems of the various tribes,
both as to the location and significance of the colors, but for
obvious reasons black was generally taken as the symbol of death;
while white and red signified, respectively, peace and war. It is
somewhat remarkable that red was the emblem of power and triumph
among the ancient Oriental nations no less than among the modern
Cherokees.[9]
[Footnote 9: For more in regard to color symbolism, see Mallery’s
Pictographs of the North American Indians in Fourth Report of the
Bureau of Ethnology, pp. 53-37, Washington, 1886; Gatschet’s Creek
Migration Legend, vol. 3, pp. 31-41, St. Louis, 1888; Brinton’s Kiche
Myths in Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 19,
pp. 646-647, Philadelphia, 1882.]
IMPORTANCE ATTACHED TO NAMES.
In many of the formulas, especially those relating to love and to
life-destroying, the shaman mentions the name and clan of his client,
of the intended victim, or of the girl whose affections it is desired
to win. The Indian regards his name, not as a mere label, but as a
distinct part of his personality, just as much as are his eyes or
his teeth, and believes that injury will result as surely from the
malicious handling of his name as from a wound inflicted on any part
of his physical organism. This belief was found among the various
tribes from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and has occasioned a number
of curious regulations in regard to the concealment and change of
names. It may be on this account that both Powhatan and Pocahontas are
known in history under assumed appellations, their true names having
been concealed from the whites until the pseudonyms were too firmly
established to be supplanted. Should his prayers have no apparent
effect when treating a patient for some serious illness, the shaman
sometimes concludes that the name is affected, and accordingly goes
to water, with appropriate ceremonies, and christens the patient with
a new name, by which he is henceforth to be known. He then begins
afresh, repeating the formulas with the new name selected for the
patient, in the confident hope that his efforts will be crowned with
success.
LANGUAGE OF THE FORMULAS.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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