Chapter I: Beliefs

It is generally believed that, among the Indians of North America, the priests and the shamans, "medicine men," or doctors, are the same. This is not the case with the Pawnees. Among them the priestly office was entirely distinct from that of the doctor, and had nothing in common with it. The priest was in a sense the medium of communication with _Ti-ra´-wa_; he prayed to the deity more efficaciously than could a common person, acted, in fact, as an intercessor; he knew the secrets of the sacred bundles, and when he asked anything good for the tribe, or for an individual, it was likely to be granted. His education and the power given him from above brought him into specially close relations with _Ti-ra´-wa_, who seemed to watch over him and to listen to him when he interceded for the tribe. He was an intermediary between _Ti-ra´-wa_ and the people, and held a relation to the Pawnees and their deity not unlike that occupied by Moses to Jehovah and the Israelites.

The office of the "medicine man," shaman or doctor, had to do only with sickness or injury. He was the healer. Disease was caused by bad spirits, and it was the doctor's part to drive off these evil influences.

In the lodge or house of every Pawnee of influence, hanging on the west side, and so opposite the door, is the sacred bundle neatly wrapped in buckskin, and black with smoke and age. What these bundles contain we do not know. Sometimes, from the ends, protrude bits of scalps, and the tips of pipe stems and slender sticks, but the whole contents of the bundle are known only to the priests and to its owner--perhaps, not always even to him. The sacred bundles are kept on the west side of the lodge, because, being thus furthest from the door, fewer people will pass by them than if they were hung in any other part of the lodge. Various superstitions attach to these bundles. In the lodges where certain of them are kept it is forbidden to put a knife in the fire; in others, a knife may not be thrown; in others, it is not permitted to enter the lodge with the face painted; or again, a man cannot go in if he has feathers tied in his head.

On certain sacred occasions the bundles are opened, and their contents form part of the ceremonial of worship.

No one knows whence the bundles came. Many of them are very old; too old even to have a history. Their origin is lost in the haze of the long ago. They say, "The sacred bundles were given us long ago. No one knows when they came to us." Secret Pipe Chief, one of the very oldest men in the tribe, and its High Priest, said to me:

"All the sacred bundles are from the far off country in the southwest, from which we came long ago. They were handed down to the people before they started on their journey. Then they had never seen anything like iron, but they had discovered how to make the flint knives and arrow points. There was nothing that came to us through the whites. It all came to us through the power of _Ti-ra´-wa_. Through his power we were taught how to make bows and stone knives and arrow heads.

"It was through the Ruler of the universe that the sacred bundles were given to us. We look to them, because, through them and the buffalo and the corn, we worship _Ti-ra´-wa_. We all, even the chiefs, respect the sacred bundles. When a man goes on the warpath, and has led many scouts and brought the scalps, he has done it through the sacred bundles. There were many different ceremonies that they used to go through. The high priest performs these ceremonies.

"The high priestship was founded in this way: The black eagle spoke to a person, and said to him, 'I am one of those nearest to _Ti-ra´-wa_, and you must look to me to be helped; to the birds and the animals--look to me, the black eagle, to the white-headed eagle, to the otter and the buffalo.'

"The black eagle sent the buzzard as a messenger to this person, and he gave him the corn. The secrets of the high priestship and the other secrets were handed down at the same time. The buzzard, because he is bald, stands for the old men who have little hair. The white-headed eagle also represents the old men, those whose hair is white. These are the messengers through whom _Ti-ra´-wa_ sends his words to the people. The Wichitas also had these secrets, and so have the Rees."

The Pawnees believe that they were created by _Ti-ra´-wa_, but that there had been people on the earth before them. They say, "The first men who lived on the earth were very large Indians. They were giants; very big and very strong. The animals that lived then were the same that we know now, and of the same size. These giants used to hunt the buffalo on foot. They were so swift and strong that a man could run down a buffalo, and kill it with a great stone, or a club, or even with his flint knife. Then, when he had killed it, if it was a big buffalo bull, he would tie it up, throw it over his back, and carry it into camp, just as a man to-day would carry in an antelope. When one killed a yearling, he would push its head up under his belt, and let its body swing by his side, just as we would carry a rabbit.

"These people did not believe in _Ti-ra´-wa_. When it would thunder and rain, they would shake their fists at the sky and call out bad words. In these days all people, wherever they live--all Indians, all white men, all Mexicans and all black men--when they smoke up, speak to _A-ti´-us Ti-ra´-wa_, and ask that he will give them the right kind of a mind, and that he will bless them, so that they may have plenty to eat, and may be successful in war, and may be made chiefs and head men. When we smoke toward the earth we say, 'Father of the dead, you see us.' This means that this is _Ti-ra´-wa's_ ground. It belongs to him, and we ask him that he will let us walk on it, and will let us be buried in it. We believe that after we are dead we will live again with _Ti-ra´-wa_ up in the sky. We fear nothing after death worse than we know now. All will live again with _Ti-ra´-wa_ and be happy. A thief, one who steals from others in the camp, one who is bad, dies, and that is the end of him. He goes into the ground, and does not live again. One reason why we believe that there is a life after death is that sometimes, when asleep, we dream and see these things. We see ourselves living with _Ti-ra´-wa_. Then, too, we often dream of our people whom we have known, and who have died. We dream of being dead ourselves, and of meeting these people and talking with them, and going to war with them.

"Now, these giants did not believe in any of these things. They did not pray to _Ti-ra´-wa_, and they thought that they were very strong, and that nothing could overcome them. They grew worse and worse. At last _Ti-ra´-wa_ got angry, and he made the water rise up level with the land, and all the ground became soft, and these great people sank down into the mud and were drowned. The great bones found on the prairie are the bones of these people, and we have been in deep cañons, and have seen big bones under ground, which convinces us that these people did sink into the soft ground.

"After the destruction of the race of giants, _Ti-ra´-wa_ created a new race of men, small, like those of to-day. He made first a man and a woman. They lived on the earth and were good. To them was given the corn. From this man and this woman the Pawnees sprung, and they have always cultivated the corn from the earliest times."

There can be no doubt as to the belief of the Pawnees in a future life. The spirits of the dead live after their bodies have become dust. The stories of the Ghost Bride and the Ghost Wife, already given, are examples of this belief. Secret Pipe Chief told me of himself:

"I was dead once. Just as I died, I found my way leading to an Indian village. I entered it, and went straight to the lodge of my friends and my relations. I saw them, and when I saw them I knew them again. I even knew my old relations, whom I had never looked on when I was alive. I went into a lodge, but I was not offered a seat, and I thought that I was not welcome. I came out of the lodge, and went out of the village toward the west. Then I came back to life again. In the morning I had died, and I came to life in the afternoon. That must be the reason that I still live, and am getting old. I was not welcome yet. They did not receive me. From this I am convinced that there is a life after we are dead."

Sometimes ghosts appear to them, but more often they merely speak to them; only a voice is heard. They believe that the little whirlwinds often seen in summer are ghosts. The reason for this is that once a person shot at a whirlwind with his arrow. The arrow passed through it, and it all disappeared and came to nothing. Then the man was convinced that it was a ghost, and that he had killed it.

The different bands of the Pawnees had not all the same beliefs. Thus the Skidi band offered up the human sacrifice--a captive taken in war--to the morning star. This is thought to have been a propitiatory offering to avert the evil influences exerted by that planet. At the present day the Indians speak of the sacrifice as having been made to _Ti-ra´-wa_. None of the other tribes had this form of worship, and in this fact we have another indication that the separation of the Skidi from the Pawnees had been a long one. The _Ka-wa-ra-kish_ band of the Pita-hau-erat, are said to have been "the only ones of the Pawnees who did not worship _Ti-ra´-wa_. They worshiped toward the west."

Mention has been made of the _Nahu´rac_, or animals, which possess miraculous attributes given them by _Ti-ra´-wa_. The Pawnees know of five places where these animals meet to hold council--five of these _Nahu´rac_ lodges. One of these is at _Pa-hük´_, on the south side of the Platte River, opposite the town of Fremont, in Nebraska. The word _Pa-hük´_ means "hill island." Another animal home is under an island in the Platte River, near the town of Central City. It is called by the Pawnees _La-la-wa-koh-ti-to_, meaning "dark island." The third of these sacred places is on the Loup Fork, opposite the mouth of the Cedar River, and under a high, white cut bank. It is called _Ah-ka-wit-akol_, "white bank." Another is on the Solomon River, _Kitz-a-witz-ük_, "water on a bank;" it is called _Pa´howa_ sometimes. This is a mound, shaped like a dirt lodge. At the top of the mound, in the middle, is a round hole, in which, down below, can be seen water. At certain times, the people gather there, and throw into this hole their offerings to _Ti-ra´-wa_, blankets and robes, blue beads, tobacco, eagle feathers and moccasins. Sometimes, when they are gathered there, the water rises to the top of the hole, and flows out, running down the side of the mound into the river. Then the mothers take their little children and sprinkle the water over them, and pray to _Ti-ra´-wa_ to bless them. The water running out of the hole often carries with it the offerings, and the ground is covered with the old rotten things that have been thrown in. The fifth place is a hard, smooth, flinty rock, sticking up out of the ground. They call it _Pa-hûr´_, "hill that points the way." In the side of the hill there is a great hole, where the _Nahu´rac_ hold councils. This hill is in Kansas, and can be seen from the Burlington & Missouri River Railroad. It is known to the whites as Guide Rock.