Omahas

“ This much alarmed the Omahas. They had heard how the Poncas had been moved off without warning and without reason. Standing Bear was not being allowed to stay; he had lost his country forever. The same thing might happen to the Omahas.
They had a similar treaty with the United States. They thought that they owned their lands. They had been improving them and living on them for years. They had spent much money of the tribe, for tools and buildings, and were becoming like white men. The Government had issued papers to them, showing which land each man possessed. ”

“ The Omahas possess a sacred shell, which is regarded as an object of great sanctity by the whole nation. It has been transmitted from generation to generation, and its origin is unknown. A skin lodge is appropriated to it, and in this lodge a man, appointed as a guard to the shell, constantly resides. ”

“ With uneven step and with eyes that saw nothing, Mahowari passed from among his kinsmen and tottered up the valley toward his lonesome shack and tepee upon the hillside. It was far past noon when the last of the older Omahas left the scene of the dance.
The greater number of the white men who had witnessed the last thunder dance of the Omahas went homeward much pleased. The show had turned out quite funny indeed. “Ha, ha, ha! Did you see how surprised the old cuggy looked? He, he, he!” Life, being necessarily selfish, argues from its own standpoint. ”

“ In the organization of societies units of different orders are discovered." Among the Omahas and other tribes of the Siouan family, the primary unit is the gens or clan, which is composed of a number of consanguinei, claiming descent from a common ancestor, and having a common taboo or taboos. But starting from the tribe or state as a whole, we find among the Omahas two half-tribes of five gentes each, the first called "Hañga-cenu," and the second, "Ictasanda." ”

“ Under his command the Omahas obtained great character for military prowess, nor did he permit an insult or injury to one of his tribe to pass unrevenged. The Pawnee republicans had inflicted a gross indignity on a favorite and distinguished Omaha brave. The Blackbird assembled his warriors, led them against the Pawnee town, attacked it with irresistible fury, slaughtered a great number of its inhabitants, and burnt it to the ground. He waged fierce and bloody war against the Ottoes for many years, until peace was effected between them by the mediation of the whites. ”

“ There is no military class or gens among the Omahas, though the Ponka ₵ixida gens, and part of the Nika [p] aᴐna gens are said to be warriors. Among the Omahas, both the captains and warriors must be taken from the class of cenujiñga, as the chiefs are afraid to undertake the work of the captains. The chiefs, being the civil and religious leaders of the people, cannot serve as captains or even as subordinate officers of a war party. ”

“ The Omahas regarded all animate and inanimate forms, all phenomena, as pervaded by a common life, which was continuous and similar to the will-power they were conscious of in themselves. This mysterious power in all things they called Wakonda, and through it all things were related to man, and to each other. In the idea of the continuity of life, a relation was maintained between the seen and the unseen, the dead and the living, and also between the fragment of anything and its entirety. ”

“ There were not many Indians at the trading house at this time; however, there were some Otos, Missouris, Omahas and a couple of Joways, and Ongpa or Onpa-Tanga (the big elk) , the principal chief of the Omahas, was daily expected; [85] I would gladly have waited to see him, had time permitted my doing so. Mr. Bodmer took the portraits of an Omaha and an Oto Indian. These two tribes do not differ in their manners, dress, and personal appearance. They wear their hair short, nay, sometimes the head is completely shorn, except a tuft behind, and in front ”

“ Sometimes the amanhe gives a skin tent to the wamanhe, who then goes elsewhere, as he has a lodge of his own.
Only those men are celibates who cannot get wives. There are no single women, as the demand is greater than the supply.
PERSONAL HABITS, POLITENESS, ETC. § 104. Personal habits.—The Omahas generally bathe (hi¢á) every day in warm weather, early in the morning and at night. Some who wish to do so bathe also at noon. "Jackson," a member of the Elk gens, bathes every day, even in winter. He breaks a hole in the ice on the Missouri River and bathes, or else he rubs snow over his body. ”

“ The conjecture will be confirmed if we can shew that savages have actually imposed certain restrictions on the murderer of a fellow-tribesman from a definite fear that he is haunted by the ghost of his victim. This we can do with regard to the Omahas, a tribe of the Siouan stock in North America. Among these Indians the kinsmen of a murdered man had the right to put the murderer to death, but sometimes they waived their right in consideration of presents which they consented to accept. ”

“ The Ponkas still claim a share in it, and have a tradition about it, which is denied by La Flèche and Two Crows. The Ponkas say that the tree from which the pole was cut was first found by a Ponka of the Hisada gens, and that in the race which ensued a Ponka of the Makan gens was the first to reach the tree. The Omahas tell the following:
At the first there were no chiefs in the gentes, and the people did not prosper. ”

“ Ú¢iqě, or Refugees.—They have no special rights, as such; but they share the privileges of the people with whom they dwell, and with whom they sometimes intermarry. Omahas have joined the Ponka tribe, as in the case of Mantcu-sĭnde-¢iñge, and Ponkas have been incorporated into the Omaha tribe, as in the cases of Jabe-skă, [P] enicka, and Mr. La Flèche himself.
§ 103. Isínu.—An isínu is an unmarried youth, or man who dwells in the lodge of one of his friends or kindred. He may be the kinsman of the husband or of the wife. ”

“ Having overtaken the man, he killed him with the club. And when the others took parts of the scalp, Icibajĭ did not take any of it."
§ 212. When one of the principal captains was killed, that always stopped the fight, even if he belonged to the side of the victors.
If any one heard that one of his kindred was killed or captured, he would try to go to him, and both generally perished together. When the Omahas were fleeing from the Dakotas, in a fight which occurred about A. D. 1846, some one told an old man that his son had been killed. "Ho!" said he, "I will stop running." ”

“ The Omahaws are said to have formerly been a much larger tribe than they are at present, and a terror to their neighbours, being able to muster not less than a thousand warriors. But in the year 1802, they were attacked by the small-pox, and the tribe was reduced to about three hundred souls. The survivors, unwilling to remain in a place that had proved so fatal to them, burned their village, and became, for a time, a wandering people. But they have since returned to their country, north of the River Platte, and built a village on the southwest bank of the Missouri. ”

“ Omatoko, however, who was either a personage of real authority in his tribe, or felt himself entitled to assume authority under the circumstances of the case, soon convinced them that his countrymen understood the orders which he gave them, and were, moreover, ready to obey him. At his command two of them took on their shoulders the basket, in which Lion had been carefully laid on a heap of dried grass, and trotted nimbly off with it; Frank, who had witnessed the manoeuvre, running by the side, and steadying the litter with his hand, whenever any piece of rough ground had to be traversed. ”

“ He was an Indian warrior, belonging to the tribe of Delawares. Those who knew about him said he was one of the fiercest red men that ever went on the warpath. A few years before, there had been a massacre of the settlers, and Omas was foremost among the Indians who swung the tomahawk and fired his rifle at the white people. ”

“ But their friends managed in a sly way to conceal them for some time, though they did not dare to let their managery be known to the rest of the tribe. They were found, arrested, and burned alive.
“The Mohaves believe that when their friends die they depart to a certain high hill in the western section of their territory. That they there pursue their avocation free from the ills and pains of their present life, if they had been good and brave. But they held that all cowardly Indians (and bravery was the good with them) were tormented with hardships and failures, sickness and defeats. ”

“ Omaguas is situated on a height on the left bank, and is screened from the river, at this season, by a small island, which is covered in the full. The entrance now is by a narrow creek, to the southward of the town. The number of inhabitants is two hundred and thirty-two, of the tribes of Omatguas and Panos. They are peons and fishermen; cultivate chacras; and live in the usual filthy and wretched condition of all these people. I gave some calomel, salts, and spermaceti-ointment to the governor’s wife, who was a pitiable object — a mere skeleton, and covered with inveterate-looking sores. ”

“ In several tribes there seems to have been a division of labor among the gentes and subgentes, that is, each social division of the tribe had its special religious duties.
In the Omaha tribe we find the following: the Elk gens regulated war; it kept the war tent, war pipes, and the bag containing poisons; it invoked the Thunder-being, who was supposed to be the god of war, and it sent out the scouts. The Iñke-sabĕ and Hañga gentes were the leading peace gentes; they regulated the buffalo hunt and the cultivation of the soil. ”

“ Two Crows and Joseph La Flèche never heard of the miʞa skă and mazanhe [Pg 416] among their own people; but they said that when the Omaha traveled, some used to take with them their respective “makan” or medicines, evidently their personal fetiches, for they used to say, “Our medicines are wise; they can talk like men, and they tell us how many horses we are to receive from the people to whom we are going.”
When the Omaha went against the Pawnee during the boyhood of the present Big Elk, one of the captains, named Gi‘anhabi, had a war club of the kind called “weaqȼade.” ”

“ Linna reached the spot where the warriors were standing directly after one of the number had sent a bullet through the bear. Young as she was, she understood the peril of her friends, and set out to do all she could for them.
She knew that Omas, her father, was a great warrior. He belonged to the Delaware tribe, which years before had been soundly beaten by the Iroquois and reduced almost to slavery; but among the conquered people were many without superiors in bravery, skill, and prowess. Omas was one of the most noted examples. ”

“ Oham’s Camp, Oct.15.—The Zulus cannot comprehend the Transvaal affair, and it has been industriously circulated among them that the English have been beaten and forced to give back the Transvaal. They do not understand gracious acts of restoration after we have been beaten. Four times this year has Umnyamana called his army together and menaced Oham, who has several times had to have parties of his followers sleeping around his kraal in the hills adjacent, so as to give him timely notice to fly. ”

“ Oomah continued, a strange light brightening his face, “I will take you 40down the river to the border of the region where the white men live. We will travel at night and hide by day. From our places of concealment we will watch them but they shall not see us.”
“What would Choflo say?” one of the more timid ones asked.
“We will not ask Choflo,” another promptly replied. “He says too many things and always makes us do the things we hate to do.”
“You forget,” Oomah advised them, “that Choflo is leader of the tribe. So long as he lives he must be obeyed.” ”

“ But there were dangers upon the road which led to this bliss; for Omahá, the evil spirit, hovered near the dying man, ready to snatch and carry off the soul as soon as it should leave its earthly tenement. To prevent such a calamity, the friends who attended the burning of the body shouted and gesticulated to distract the Evil One's attention and enable the heart, in which the soul resided, to leap out of the flames and escape to heaven. If the body was interred, they thought the devil would have more chance of capturing the heart, which would then be sent back to earth to annoy the living. ”

“ Ripley, the doubts of Omas finally vanished, never to return. The once mighty warrior, foremost in battle and ferocity and courage, became the meek, humble follower of the Saviour—triumphant in life, and doubly triumphant in death.
On the third day after the meeting in the woods, the party arrived at the little town of Stroudsburg, on the Upper Delaware, none having suffered the least harm. The skill of Omas kept them supplied with food, and his familiarity with the route did much to lessen the hardships which otherwise they would have suffered. ”

“ The illustrious house of Omeya had swayed the scepter at Damascus for nearly a century, when a rebellion broke out, headed by Aboul Abbas Safah, who aspired to the throne of the caliphs, as being descended from Abbas, the uncle of the prophet. The rebellion was successful. Marvau, the last caliph of the house of Omeya, was defeated and slain. A general proscription of the Ommiades took place. Many of them fell in battle; many were treacherously slain, in places where they had taken refuge ”