112 Field Columbian Museum — Anthropology, Vol. IV. 



THE ALTAR, 1902. 



The rites followed in erecting the altar of 1902 were quite similar 

 to those of the previous year. A brief r^sum^ of the order of the 

 procedure of the second year is here added for the purpose of com- 

 parison with the order on the previous year. 



Hawkan, Watanah, Watdngaa, and Chanitoe, after the ceremonial 

 smoking which followed the bringing of the sods to the lodge, 

 removed the skull and other paraphernalia back toward the western 

 portion of the lodge, and placed them in the same relative position 

 that they had occupied in the Rabbit-tipi. Sage was put upon the 

 ground behind the skull for the Lodge-Maker's bed. With the usual 

 movements with the pipe-stem by Hawkan, Watangaa's wife, Hisenibe, 

 prepared the cedar tree, the hole for which Nakaash had dug after 

 Hocheni had made the usual passes with the pipe-stem. The latter 

 also made the movements with the pipe-stem for the ditch which was 

 dug by Waakat'ani and Nishnat^yana. 



In placing the cottonwoods and the willow and cedar trees, and in 

 the paint of the ditch and of the sides, etc., there is nothing to be 

 added to the account already given for the performance of the pre- 

 ceding year. 



THE SYMBOLISM OF THE OFFERINGS-LODGE. 



The Offerings-lodge itself, with its various accessories as they 

 existed at this time, may now be described. 



MAN-ABOVE. 



The lodge proper stands in the center of the camping-circle. 

 (See Plate LX.) The center-pole (nawahtaheh, reach-pole) of the 

 lodge is about twenty feet in height. The pole itself was of cotton- 

 wood: for in the dramatization it represents a mythical cottonwood 

 upon which the woman climbed in her chase after the porcupine to 

 the upper regions, and so, consequently, it bears also the prayers of 

 the people to heaven, and is the symbol of the Man-Above. The 

 center fork also typifies the Arapaho and all life-elements. 



At equal distances apart, and at a radius of about twenty-two feet 

 from the center-pole, were sixteen uprights of cottonwood, terminat- 

 ing in a fork. These poles are called nenSsunueh (split-poles). These 

 outer uprights were connected by cross-pieces (tchebbetiithana, 

 cross-hanging). Resting on top of these cross-pieces and in the fork 



