the Shawnee Prophet
The Journey of the Prophet’s Acolyte
by Stella (Blowsnake) Stacey, a.k.a. Mountain Wolf Woman
transcribed and translated by Sheila Shigley
Given that Stella is difficult to understand, the following translation is tentative, and may be modified over time.
Arrows (⥢) link to the corresponding interlinear text.
Gerd Fraenkel's Preamble. The Prophet wants all the men able to accomplish something to come to him, because he wants to teach them the good ways. The drunkard also arrives, admits his sin, and tells the Prophet that he has lost his way and forgotten his mission.
Part 1
⥢So the man in that story, there was a man, the one who sometimes drank, his nose had even been bitten off, ⥢he had been fooled, they almost killed him. ⥢So then, they took him to get clothed, he said, the first one there was saying, when he got there, again he said, ⥢"The reason for which I came, I have forgotten. That ⥢so many are doing this on (my) behalf, that I should have come for this reason, ⥢O you sitting one, that I came for this reason, that this should be done so for me, so very many doing this on (my) behalf. ⥢And, that this should be done for such as I, it should not be," he said.1
Part 2
⥢"So this is terrible, that I should cause you to be upset like this, but, when it’s not possible to do something well, [you would be upset then?], ⥢the man that bit off your nose, well, they are hunting for him. ⥢After a point, nothing could be known. ⥢So, when (or if) he is found, they will kill him. ⥢But where he has gotten to [?] not a single one knows. ⥢But, then, a man, the last one, the one you shall kill, ⥢this one's sisters will come to see you. ⥢When they shall come to see you, they will bring you clothing. ⥢R̨a, the man you came to kill, this is their man." ⥢He said, "(By) what they dress you (in), they have forgiven you, and that dead man shall be no more. ⥢Those women who come, will be your relatives, that’s what they're saying."
⥢Öne, and these women, they came, ⥢(and) when they came they washed his face for him, ⥢and made it clean, and gave him footwear, leather footwear, shoes, shirt, a blanket [or robe] as well and, ⥢there a deer tail roach, an eagle rokéré they put on him, a man’s entire outfit they did for him. ⥢So, "Replacing the Ghost," as they used to say, in this way they did it for him: ⥢when a man has been killed, a(nother) man they put in his place. ⥢And there these women took him for a relative. ⥢So, he would go back home, they told him that it would be desirable for him to go.2
Fraenkel: "About half of the following story was so badly blurred that it was unintelligible. Yet it was possible to establish that 5292 is the continuation of 5291, namely the story of the bitten man who went off in a canoe aching all over until he came to a Menominee place where the women received him."
Part 3
⥢There a man, whose nose had been bitten off, well, he must have gone downriver. ⥢There must have been boats right there. ⥢Going along, then, he was exhausted, he was exhausted ⥢and his entire body hurt as well, because they had nearly killed him, ⥢and (all the places) where they had bitten his nose were extremely painful. ⥢So, what should he do then, how on earth, a person who is to live (survive), one who is to find it (life?), ⥢in order to reach an Indian village (way over there) he jumped, ⥢he jumped into a boat to use it. ⥢So then [standing?], women came out of those houses toward the river. ⥢And when he came to the shore and was looking around, ⥢that man saw them. ⥢But [in turn?] when he talked to them [?], when he was speaking [towards those houses?], ⥢there, two men came out and approached.3
Part 4
This part of the story was preceded by an episode whose tape was unintelligible. This story will have related how the men who came out of the Menominee village murdered the acolyte.
⥢And so it was that those men whose nose[s] had been chopped, thus, they had killed him, they had stabbed him, and they had thrown his body into the water. ⥢So there in the water, where he was hocarara, it was pouring on him. ⥢Someone, a man, spoke there, "Heeeeei! What might be the matter with you? ⥢Why are you fooling around? ⥢Whyever you're doing what you're doing you've forgotten," the one said. ⥢"And then when you were asleep they woke you up, that's what it seems. [?] ⥢A-hoho, you have to give an oh-ho." [?] ⥢This is what he planned to do (?). This is what he said. ⥢There they talked together, they were saying that. ⥢"Why haven't you healed yourself up? ⥢Are you going to remain there submerged like that?" ⥢He was telling him to scrub himself. ⥢So that he did, he healed himself up. ⥢His body was all slashed to pieces, fallen down, and his stomach had been ripped open. ⥢And lying in the water there, his intestines and fat, became gožu’o in the water, and ⥢he started trying to cough (?), he tried to cough there, and he consumed the fat in that way. ⥢And so his stomach, then, the fat he gathered together in the belly where it was really dark, and then, ⥢then he had fixed himself up: wherever he had been injured, he healed himself. ⥢They had killed him and again he renewed his life. ⥢Behind him they told why. ⥢There they woke him up, and ǧoe they were. ⥢These [said], "Why weren't you healing yourself?" they said to him, and so he did that, but they had even knocked out one of his eyes. ⥢"Well, I haven't forgotten, it's just that my eye isn't healed, in a little while I'll fix my eye, and then I will have made my eyes pure."
⥢"Those men are going to know me, whoever they are that did it, those wicked ones, it shall be said that they were killed." ⥢Thus saying, if the other eye is not fixed up. ⥢That he did, that wicked man. "The wicked one(s), why they have been bothering me, I have forgotten, so I will do something to the wicked one(s) like that [they did to me]." ⥢The likes of which they have done to me I have never known before. And so they nearly killed me [...].4
Gerd Frankel says that the present story is followed by an episode in which the revived man "came to the [Shawnee] Prophet and was thankful that he had now found himself and could go on with the original purpose of his visit to the Prophet."
Commentary
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| Tenskatawa, the Shawnee Prophet |
Overview. This story is an episode situated between the first episode in which the waylaid man was seeking the Shawnee Prophet, and the conclusion of the story in which, after being set upon and killed, was revived and was able to complete his mission to the Prophet. An interesting aspect of the story is that the aspiring acolyte in many ways replicates the Prophet's own rebirth into a holy office. Tenskatawa had damaged one of his eyes when he was a reprobate, and later seemed to have died and was even prepared for burial when, after a sojourn in the Otherworld, his spirit returned and he was revived. The Hōcąk account of this incident adds the detail that his apparent death was effected by an ambush:
On one occasion (when he was drunk) quite a number of people jumped on him and nearly killed him. When he awoke the next morning he asked his wife who had done it and she told him. “Well, they will hear of me soon. However, I want to go and take a bath first and cool off and then take my revenge, when I get back.” When he was in bathing a man came to him and said, “They have told me to come after you, so let us go.” Then he went back with him and he took him to the place from which he had originally started. Then the Creator said, “How are you getting on with the work which you were to do?” Then he remembered what he had been doing. Then the Creator said, “Is it for this that I created you?” Then he took his mouth and showed it to him and he saw that it was crooked and sticking out in all directions. Then he took his understanding (and showing it to him), he said, “Did I create you thus?” Then he looked into his ears and they were crooked and ragged. Thus he made him see all his bad characteristics and his evil mind. Then he took out his heart and showed it to him. It was all furrowed up and bad to look upon. “Did I create you thus?" said the Creator. “Now, then, you will do better the next time,” and he sent him back.5
In this account we have several parallels including his being set upon by enemies and being immersed in water when discovered by mysterious agents who attend his deliverance. The idea of the purifying effects of water in connection to the pursuit of holiness appears to reflect the influence of white religion, specifically the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist (see Comparative Material below). It is only after this act of rebirth that the acolyte is seen to be fit for the great task of following in the footsteps of the great prophets of the ages. In our story, the rebirth is more precisely a resurrection, as it seems clear that the acolyte was actually killed and later brought back to life. The intersection of these ideas recalls that in actual human birth, just before a new life enters the world, the mother's water breaks, suggesting the idea that the newborn is washed over by water as the last step to emerging into life as a full human being.
Just as in the story of the Shawnee Prophet's redemption, here we find a mysterious agent who appears, undescribed himself, on what is clearly a mission to revive the slain acolyte and return him to the mission of contacting the Shawnee Prophet. In the narrative, however, this transmutes into a group of agents, but they themselves become instrumental in the revival of the slain man, and at least at this point in the narrative, there is no ascension to the Creator in heaven before the would-be seer is restored to earth. In other variants of the Shawnee Prophet story, he is thought to be dead, and during this period he ascends to the Creator who recharges him with his destined mission on earth. Only then is he revived. So our present story combines both these elements, making the revitalization during a "bath" but during a period when the man is dead. There is no ascension to the Creator, but rather his implied agents effect the resurrection through powers no doubt granted by him for this mission. The acolyte simply is not of high enough status to have seen the Creator himself. It is enough that he should see the Shawnee Prophet.
The finale tells of the acolyte's fervent commitment to avenge himself. This too has its parallel in the legend of the Shawnee Prophet: "On one occasion (when he was drunk) quite a number of people jumped on him and nearly killed him. When he awoke the next morning he asked his wife who had done it and she told him. 'Well, they will hear of me soon. However, I want to go and take a bath first and cool off and then take my revenge, when I get back'."6 The next episode to this story will no doubt address this matter.
"the reason for which I came, I have forgotten" — it seems more likely that he is not saying, "I have forgotten why I came here," but something rather more cosmic: "I have forgotten why I was placed on this earth by Earthmaker."
"O you sitting one" — this is a reference to the Shawnee Prophet Tenskatawa, whom we may visualize as seated in a prominent position while the supplicant stands before him.
"for this reason" — as the context will make clear, the supplicant is asking that he might be avenged for having his nose bitten off.
"for such as I" — meaning, an alcoholic. Being a drunkard was contrary to the very first article of the precepts of the Prophet, but Tenskatawa himself had suffered through this stage of his evolution, and so was understanding even though he was disapproving.
"sisters" (hinų́gwacábᵉra) — these are the women of his generation and of his clan. The expression hinų́gwacábᵉra means, "our women." The corresponding expression for brothers, wągwacábᵉra, means "our men." It is interesting to note that the Proto-Indo-Europeans, who may have had the same Crow-Omaha kinship system as the Hōcągara,7 also had the exact same concept of sisterhood.
I.E, swesor was compounded of the reflexive base *swe-, "his, one's own" (see sui), and -sor, "woman", from I.E. ser, "woman", ... Accordingly sister orig. meant "the woman belonging to one's own kindred".8
This parallel arises from a patrilinear clan system in which sisters were married out to another clan, but were still regarded by her male relatives as being a member of their clan, and therefore "their" woman.
"öne" — an unknown word, perhaps an exclamation.
"an eagle rokéré" — (hi)rokéré means "flap," as in "door flap." It's something that hangs down, in this case, perhaps a wing or a hanging feather.
"these women took him for a relative" (že’é 'nųgᵋną́ka e wą́kcápireže) — wąkcáp means, "male relative," to this whole group of women. This fact would seem to put him in the same clan as the women, making him not their husband, but their brother. This is affirmed by the fact that they are said by the Prophet himself to be his sisters (hinų́gwacábᵉra). That they would replace the dead man with his killer certainly suggests that the deceased was not thought to be a decent man. As a brother, he would be a member of their clan, which would also oblige him to defend any of these women were they to be an object of abuse by anyone outside their clan.
"it would be desirable" — when a man gets married, he temporarily resides with his wife's parents. After a time, he must return to his village, taking his wife and children with him. This is because Hōcągara are patrilocal. Just because he replaced a brother or even some other male relative, he would not be expected to reside there unless he was a foreigner. The underlying assumption seems to be that he was assaulted by a member of his own tribe, and although he now takes the deceased's place, he cannot be expected to live there.
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| Francis Comte de Castelnau |
| A Menominee Village, 1842 |
"an Indian village" — Fraenkel tells us in his preamble that it could be understood from the blurred half of this tape that the village in question was of the Menominee tribe. The Menominee tribe is the only nation with whom the Hōcągara have a friendship relation. So members of this tribe could not only be expected not to be hostile, but to afford a Hōcąk visitor a good measure of hospitality.
"nose[s]" — the practice of chopping and biting the end off an opponent's nose was sufficiently common that there were men who bore the name "Cutnose". One was a Hōcąk chief who was close to Henry Gratiot. The notorious Pacan had a "son [who] in a quarrel with his sister's husband, a young chief, bit off his nose."9 Even the much respected elder Little Priest, "In a brawl ... had one side of his nose sliced off."10 Jipson says, "One side of his nose had been destroyed and he was frequently called "Old Cut Nose."11 The loss of the nose was considered perhaps the worst degree of effacement:
In one of the (434) drunken broils, which have not been unfrequent in the latter part of his life, a fight occurred between himself and another person, in which the nose of the chief was severely bitten. The Reverend Mr. Lowry, superintendent of the school, on hearing of the accident, paid the chief a visit of condolence, hoping that an opportunity might offer, which might enable him to give salutary advice to the sufferer. He was lying with his head covered, refusing to be seen. His wife, deeply affected by the misfortune, and terrified by the excited state of her husband's mind, sat near him, weeping bitterly. When she announced the name of his visitor, the chief, still concealing his mutilated features, exclaimed that he was a ruined man, and desired only to die. He continued to bewail his misfortune as one which it would be unworthy in a man and a warrior to survive, and as altogether intolerable. His only consolation was found in the declaration that his young men should kill the author of his disgrace; and accordingly the latter was soon after murdered, though it is not known by whom. Had not this injury been of a kind by which the vanity of Wakaun Haka was affected, and his self-love mortified, it might have been forgotten or passed over; we do not say forgiven, as this word, in our acceptance of it, expresses an idea to which the savage is a stranger. Regarding an unrevenged insult as a trader views an outstanding debt, which he may demand whenever he can find the delinquent party in a condition to pay it, he is satisfied by a suitable compensation, if the injury be of a character to admit of compromise. Had his wife, for instance, eloped with a lover, or his brother been slain, the offender might have purchased peace at the expense of a few horses; but what price could indemnify a great chief for the loss of his nose? Happily, the wound proved but slight, and Wakaun Haka lost neither his nose nor his reputation.12
So the cut-noses of this story represent to a Hōcąk audience a group of habitual drunkards and brawlers, the kinds of sinners who the Prophet wishes to either reform or remove from among the tribes.
"hocarara" — a hapaxlogomenon (an unknown word). The initial syllable, ho-, seems to be what the Helmbrecht-Lehmann team calls the "inessive applicative." "This is a grammatical element of the verb unknown in English. In most cases, it can be translated as 'in something' or 'into something'." So the elements of the word seem to be, ho-cara-ra. Cara remains a hapaxlogomenon. Words ending in -ra can often be translated as the present participle. The context would suggest that ho-cara should mean "sub-merged," cara then meaning something like "contained in."
"pouring" — in order for this to be the case, his body must have been cast either into a stream of running water, or underneath a waterfall. The association of pouring water with birth is found in the breaking of a pregnant woman's water just before labor starts the process of birth.
"a man" — the word here is wąk, which in most contexts means "man, male," but like the Old Norse word mann, it can not only mean, "male, man, person, human being," but also may refer to a supernatural being. The man, and his associates, referred to here, appears to be an agent of the Creator who is on a mission to create a new prophet. As seen in more detail above, this process replicates the events that led to the transformation of the Shawnee Prophet himself from a reprobate into a powerful seer.
"A-hoho, you have to give an 'oh-ho'" — the first exclamation is one of dismay. It's a compound of a, which is similar to the English "bah", being dismissive and derogatory; and hoho, an ambivalent expression of strong emotion, which in this case is negative. The second exclamation seems to be hoho, with the initial /h/ dropped from external sandhi. This second reference to hoho is an assertion that the rescued man should accept his recovered situation with a positive affirmation.
"gožu’o" — an unknown word.
"in that way" — if the effort to cough (hóǧuą́įcga) is what is actually taking place, perhaps the idea is that with the contraction of his lungs he is sucking the fat back in around his abdomen.
"where it was really dark" — this would seem to mean, "deep in his belly".
"they" — Stella suddenly switches from the singular referring to the aforementioned "man" (wąk), to what appears to be a small group of Spirit agents whose task it is to ensure that the acolyte employs the right procedure to achieve his own resurrection from the dead.
"ǧoe" — an unknown word.
"and so he did that" — this is an uncertain reading.
"eyes" — the Shawnee Prophet himself had an injured eye.
"my eyes pure" — that is, he will have restored his vision.
"it shall be said that they were killed" — an uncertain reading. It may be, "It will be known that I killed them." In any case, it is clear that he is asserting that these bad men will themselves be killed in revenge.
"[...]" — the rest of this sentence, which seems to elaborate this final point, is incoherent.
Comparative Material. "Replacing the Ghost" — this is a hitherto unknown rite. Something similar is performed by the Osage, where the nose becomes an important focal point. The Osage rite has to do with the adoption of captive enemies into their tribe. When the Osage adopt such an enemy into the nation, the tip of his nose is slit, and the blood is quickly wiped off. The Nu’xe ("Ice") leader applied buffalo fat over the captive's body and the O’pxon ("Elk") leader painted his face with two diagonal black stripes to represent Thunder, the god of war.13 The rite concludes with the Tzi-sho leader declaring the captive to be ni’wathe, "made to live."14 The small tincture of spilled blood symbolizes the blood of his former tribe, which is thus expelled from him.15 The attention to the nose seems to have the same valence in each tribe: non-domesticity requires attention to the nose first and foremost. The role of the Ice leader is made obvious in his title. In Osage, "ice" is nóⁿxe, but this very same word is a homonym meaning "spirit, sanity."16 So the Ice/Spirit leader is a de facto psychopomp, leading the soul of the candidate through a process of rebirth. The Ṭsí-zhu chief pronounces the title, Ní-wathe, "Giver of Life," signifying that the captive has been granted his life. The word ni means "alive," and "to live."17 An expansion of this stem gives us ni-óⁿ, "breath."18 Similarly, in Dakota we have ni-yá, "to breathe; breath, life";19 and ni, "to live."20 In Hōcąk, ni means "breath, to breathe," and metaphorically, "to live." So in Central Siouan, *ni meant "to live," and probably derived from the more basic sense of "to breathe." It should be obvious at this point why the nose is the point of focus: it is more than any other the organ of breath and breathing, and this is the essence of life. In Central Siouan, the notions of life and breath coincide nicely with nose and head. The head was conceived as the seat of the soul. So we find that in Osage, p̣̣̣a means both "snout, the projecting nose of an animal," and "head, the whole of the head."21 In Dakota the word pa means, "the head, the nose,"22 and in Hōcąk the same word has this exact same double meaning. So the head and the nose are denoted indifferently by the same word, *pa. It probably once meant "apex," as the word still means "point, pointed" in Hōcąk. The *pa understood either way, contains the *ni, understood either way. At this point, we see that the whole of the process of transformation of the acolyte by death and regeneration while submerged in water also fits into this scheme of convenient homonyms: the word for water in Hōcąk is also ni. This connection is also featured prominently in the Osage rite: "The leader of the Poⁿ-ka Wa-shta-ge now directs his Sho´-ka to bring water which is placed before the leader, who recites the wi´-gi-e relating to the life-giving power of the water. The captive is given the water, of which he drinks and then cleanses his face."23
The rebirth of the acolyte in the flowing waters recalls the baptism of Jesus which, when performed on those who wish to be Christians, is seen as a kind of rebirth:
Mark 1:9 r In those days Jesus s came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10 And when he came up out of the water, immediately he t saw u the heavens being torn open v and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. 11 And w a voice came from heaven, x “You are my beloved Son;1 with you I am well pleased.”
The initiation into the holy life recounted in our story may owe something to the de facto initiation story of Jesus himself, as seen here in the first of the Synoptic Gospels.
Links: ...
Stories: about seers: The Seer, The Shawnee Prophet and His Ascension, Witches, The Shawnee Prophet — What He Told the Hocągara, A Prophecy About the End Time, A Prophecy, Great Walker and the Ojibwe Witches, The Shawnee Prophet Predicts a Solar Eclipse, A Prophecy About the First School, Winnebagos Go to See the Prophet, The Claw Shooter, Waruką́ną, The Tap the Head Medicine, The Diving Contest; about the Shawnee Prophet: The Shawnee Prophet — What He Told the Hocągara, The Shawnee Prophet Predicts a Solar Eclipse, The Shawnee Prophet and His Ascension, Winnebagos Go to See the Prophet, A Prophecy About the End Time; The War of Indian Tribes against White Soldiers; mentioning drunkenness: The Drunkard's Self-Reflections, Chief Wave and the Big Drunk, Whiskey Making, Soft Shelled Turtle Gets Married, Chief Wave Tries to Take the Whiskey, The Brawl in Omro, Jerrot's Temperance Pledge — A Poem, The Shawnee Prophet — What He Told the Hocągara, Version 1, Little Fox and the Ghost, Version 1, Migistéga's Death, Version 1, The Spanish Fight, Snowshoe Strings; mentioning the Menominee: Origin of the Name "Winnebago" (Menominee), The Hocąk Arrival Myth, Bear Clan Origin Myth (v. 2b) (Origins of the Menominee), The Fox-Hocąk War, First Contact, The Magical Powers of Lincoln's Grandfather, The Annihilation of the Hocągara I (v. 2), Annihilation of the Hocągara II, Two Roads to Spiritland, A Menominee Visit, The Two Children, A Waterspirit Blesses Mąnį́xete’ų́ga, Gatschet's Hocank hit’e (Extracts ...), Introduction.
Themes: a seer makes true predictions down to unusual details: The Shawnee Prophet — What He Told the Hocągara, Witches, The Shell Anklets Origin Myth, The Fox-Hocąk War, How Little Priest went out as a Soldier, A Prophecy, The Shawnee Prophet Predicts a Solar Eclipse, Pete Dupeé and the Ghosts, The Claw Shooter, Waruką́ną, Mijistéga’s Powwow Magic and How He Won the Trader's Store; someone returns from the dead: Ghost Dance Origin Myth II, The Resurrection of the Chief's Daughter, Sunset Point, Pete Dupeé and the Ghosts, White Fisher, The Blessings of the Buffalo Spirits, The Boy who was Blessed by a Mountain Lion, The Shaggy Man, The Two Brothers, The Two Boys, Eats the Stinking Part of the Deer Ankle, White Wolf, The Red Man, The Chief of the Heroka, The Man Whose Wife was Captured, Waruǧábᵉra, The Lost Blanket, The Old Man and the Giants; a man is adopted into a family who live in a distant village: Sun and the Big Eater, The Big Eater, Grandfather's Two Families, Moiety Origin Myth, Origin of the Decorah Family, The Captive Boys.
Notes
1 Stella Stacy, "Forgiveness for a Killer [2 of 4]," reading by Sheila Shigley, from audio tapes in the American Philosophical Society. Fraenkel, Gerd. Mss. Rec. 29, recorded 13 July 1959, 1 .mp3; 00:00:21.90 - 00:01:20.79. Copy made by Gerd Fraenkel of an original tape held at the Archives of Languages of the World, Indiana University. This program comes from original tape 528.13. APS accession number 7241; APSdigrec_2189; Recording Number: 02; Program Number: 41.
2 Stella Stacy, "Forgiveness for a Killer [1 of 4]," reading by Sheila Shigley, from audio tapes in the American Philosophical Society. Fraenkel, Gerd. Mss. Rec. 29, recorded 20 July 1959, 1 .mp3; 00:00:52.87 - 00:02:54. Copy made by Gerd Fraenkel of an original tape held at the Archives of Languages of the World, Indiana University. This program comes from original tape ?. APS accession number 7207; APSdigrec_2190; Recording Number: 02; Program Number: 42.
3 Stella Stacy, "Forgiveness for a Killer [2 of 4]," reading by Sheila Shigley, from audio tapes in the American Philosophical Society. Fraenkel, Gerd. Mss. Rec. 29, recorded 20 July 1959, 1 .mp3; 00:00:28.57 - 00:01:38. Copy made by Gerd Fraenkel of an original tape held at the Archives of Languages of the World, Indiana University. This program comes from original tape 529.2. APS accession number 7254; APSdigrec_2191; Recording Number: 02; Program Number: 43.
4 Stella Stacy, "Forgiveness for a Killer [3 of 4]," reading by Sheila Shigley, from the audio tape in the American Philosophical Society. Fraenkel, Gerd. Stacy, Stella. "The man who had all been beaten up came alive again, fixed himself, came to the Prophet," Mss. Rec. 29, recorded 7 July 1959, 1 .mp3; 00:00:32 - 00:03:22. Copy made by Gerd Fraenkel of an original tape held at the Archives of Languages of the World, Indiana University. This program comes from original tape 529.3. APS accession number 7227; APSdigrec_2192; Recording Number: 02; Program Number: 44.
5 Paul Radin, The Winnebago Tribe (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1990 [1923]) 23 [1923 ed.: 71].
6 Radin, The Winnebago Tribe, 23 [1923 ed.: 71].
7 German Dziebel, "Crow-Omaha Kinship: Revitalizing a Problem or Generating a Solution?" Kinship 1, #2 (2021): 1-23. For a contrary view, see Bradley Ensor, "Commentary on German Dziebel: Crow-Omaha and the Future of Kin Term Research," Kinship 1, #2 (2021): 24-67.
8 Dr. Ernest Klein, A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language (Amsterdam, London, New York: Elsevier Publishing Co., 1971) 687b, s.v. "sister."
9 Augustin Grignon, "Seventy-two Years’ Recollections of Wisconsin," Wisconsin Historical Collections, III (1857): 197-295 [264].
10 Note by Lyman C. Draper in General Robert Anderson, "Reminiscences of the Black Hawk War," Wisconsin Historical Collections, X (1888): 167-212 [186].
11 Norton William Jipson, Story of the Winnebagoes (Chicago: The Chicago Historical Society, 1923) 231; citing Charles Bent, History of Whiteside County, Illinois, from Its First Settlement to the Present Time (Morristown: L. P. Allen, 1877) 524-525.
12 Thomas Loraine McKenney (1785-1859) and James Hall (1793-1868), History of the Indian Tribes of North America: with Biographical Sketches and Anecdotes of the Principal Chiefs. Embellished with One Hundred Portraits from the Indian Gallery in the War Department at Washington, Vol. I and Vol. II (Philadelphia: D. Rice & Co., 1872) (I:434).
13 James R. Duncan and Carol Diaz-Granados, "Of Masks and Myths," Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology, 25, #1 (Spring, 2000): 1-23 [6]. The actors in the roles of this rite differ from those identified by La Flesche. Very little is known of the Ice Clan, which is seldom mentioned in the list of gens of the Osage Tribe.
14 Francis La Flesche, War Ceremony and Peace Ceremony of the Osage Indians (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1938) 83.
15 Louis F. Burns, Osage Indian Customs and Myths (Tuscaloosa, Alabama: University of Alabama Press, 2005 [1984]) 86; Alice C. Fletcher and Francis La Flesche, The Omaha Tribe (Lincoln: The University of Nebraska Press, 1992 [1904-1905]) 61-62.
16 Francis La Flesche, A Dictionary of the Osage Language, Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 109 (Washington, D. C.: United States Printing Office, 1932) 117b, ss. vv. noⁿ´-xe.
17 Francis La Flesche, A Dictionary of the Osage Language, 230, s.v. "alive," and 290 s.v. "to live." = 40
18 La Flesche, A Dictionary of the Osage Language, 109 s.v. ni-óⁿ, 237, s.v. "breath (the)."
19 Stephen R. Riggs, A Dakota-English Dictionary (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1992 [1890]) 342a, s.v. ni-yá.
20 Riggs, A Dakota-English Dictionary, 340b, s.v. ni.
21 La Flesche, A Dictionary of the Osage Language, 124a, s.v. pa.
22 Riggs, A Dakota-English Dictionary, 402a, s.v. pa. 45.
23 La Flesche, War Ceremony and Peace Ceremony of the Osage Indians, 83.