Jesse Walter Fewkes

“ The germinative element of the Alósaka cult, which we may regard as an ancient phase, was introduced into Awatobi and the other Hopi pueblos by a group of clans from the far south. These clans, called the Patuñ, or Squash, founded the pueblo of Micoñinovi, [5] where the Alósaka cult is now vigorous, and were prominent in Awatobi where it was important. There is one episode of the elaborated New-fire ceremony which is traced to these southern clans; this concerns a figurine, called Talatumsi, kept in a shrine under the cliffs of Walpi and especially reverenced by the Aaltû or Alósaka priests. ”

“ Such simple designs as the cross, the circle, or the triangle, in primitive symbolism, may often be regarded as simply qualitative and are so used in pictography, their true meaning in specific cases depending on their association with other figures. ”

“ The entrance to this shrine faces the east, and the bowlder lies a few feet lower down on the cliff than the foundation of the old mission church of San Bernardino de Awatobi. By interrogating Indians regarding the images, he has found that they represent beings called Alósakas, the cult of which, once practised at Awatobi, still survives in the rites of the modern Hopi pueblos. Many legends concerning Alósaka have been collected, but only during the last few years has the author witnessed ceremonies connected with their cult. ”

“ In certain associations a circle is a sun symbol, in others an earth symbol; an equal-armed cross with a figure of a rapacious bird sometimes represents the sun, in other instances the four cardinal points, which, with the Hopi, are purely terrestrial directions or positions on the horizon. ”

“ Near Walpi there are two other pueblos—one Tanoan, the other peopled by descendants of Tanoan clans, neither of which has exerted an influence on the other pueblos. These Tanoan colonists have brought their own katcinas to the East Mesa of Tusayan, and while they possess no altar of this cult they contribute their distinctive katcinas to the Walpi Powamû. In the January ceremony they do the same, and while the Walpi priests are celebrating in that month a true Hopi Flute or Snake rite, Hano and Sitcomovi contribute masked katcinas which complicate the ceremony. ”

“ The eagle or a raptorial bird is the sun bird; the sun fertilizes the earth, and the ceremonial acts of the Bird-man at the Winter Solstice dramatize fertilization. In short, the conclusion to which studies of the ceremonial acts of the Bird-man, reinforced by those of comparative symbolism, have led me, is that the Bird-man personates the sun or a solar deity.
Ceremony with the Alósaka Screen
After the bird personator had retired, a short interval elapsed, all the spectators of the previous rites remaining seated. ”

“ A visit to this shrine was made by the two phallic societies, Tataukyamû and Wüwütcimtû, directly after the kindling of the new fire in the chief kiva at Walpi. They were led by a man personating Alósaka, and after praying at the shrine they marched in single file to the site of Old Walpi, on the terrace below the present pueblo, and encircled the mounds of this old habitation four times, sprinkling prayer-meal as their leader, Alósaka, directed.527 This place is called a sípapû, and below it are thought to dwell the ancients. The prayers were addressed to the old men who have died. ”

“ It will be seen from the preceding account that the Alósaka rites are well developed in the ceremonies of the New-fire and Winter Solstice, in which the clans from the south who joined the Hopi are well represented, or in which religious societies and ceremonial paraphernalia brought by the Patuñ, Píba, Pátki, and related clans have preeminence. ”

“ Two marks represent eyes. This disk is worn on the backs of men personating the sun, in many rites, and is found painted on the screens used in the Palülükoñti ceremony. It is the ordinary sun symbol in Hopi pictography.
Many conventional modifications of this symbol are common. The painted design is often omitted and the disk reduced to a circle, while the feathers are dropped, or concentrated in clusters in the four quadrants. In the sand picture of Powalawû [12] the sun symbol is made of concentric zones of sand of different colors with arrow-shaped extensions in the four quadrants. ”

“ Hence the Powamû rites at Walpi became more complicated than those performed elsewhere at the same time, because of the proximity of two pueblos in which there are variations in the katcina cult that are peculiar to them; and as it is probable that the katcina rites in other pueblos have not been affected by Ása and Hano clans, we should expect to find in them a less complex presentation of the rites of the katcina cult. ”

“ A pantomimic prayer or symbolic representation by which man shows his wishes to the gods by acting out what he desires instead of verbally petitioning them. This ceremony comes fairly within a definition of religious rites found in Tylor’s Primitive Culture (p. 363) : “In part they [religious rites] are expressions and symbolic performances, the dramatic utterance of religious thought, the gesture language of theology.” ”

“ The interpretation of savage rites as a sign language to the gods, and the relation of the altar to primitive ceremony have been ably discussed by Major Powell, to whom the writer is greatly indebted for a proper understanding of the significance of primitive altars. ”

“ This screen (plate XXVI) was estimated to be between four and five feet long, by about three feet wide, and was decorated on the side turned toward the fireplace and the raised floor of the kiva. The entire middle of the screen was occupied by a picture of Alósaka, identical with that on the sun-shield used in the Walpi Soyáluña. [13] The head of this figure bore two curved horns, with two fan-shaped lateral attachments; the chin was painted black; in the right hand an ear of corn was represented, and in the left a moñkohu or whitened slab of wood with attached feathers. ”

“ This episode at Walpi has been elsewhere described, [7] but as at Oraibi it immediately precedes certain rites directly related to the Alósaka cult, a few notes on the personation of the Bird-man in the latter pueblo will be introduced. ”