64 Field Museum of Natural History — Anth., Vol. XI. 



Ninth Day (Nalosh tala, Fourth Day). 1 



This day's proceedings have been observed as already statec 

 from about 2:30 in the morning only. The altar ceremonies having 

 been concluded, the altar paraphernalia are wrapped up in bundles 

 at about that time and taken out by the chief priest to the ancestra 

 home of the Lizard clan where they are put away in one of the inner 

 rooms which is almost entirely dark. On one occasion I noticed No. 

 taking out her netted gourd vessel at about this time, but she probablj 

 only took it to her house. Suds of crushed yucca roots are no\ 

 prepared in different bowls by the women, and a general washing of the 

 corn-ear mothers and of the heads of all present takes place. Some 

 wash their own heads. Those who have brought in novices for initia 

 tion during the ceremony wash the heads of the latter, and the chie 

 priestess then sprinkles with the old aspergill a little water from the 

 medicine bowl on the head of every novice. 2 Some of the womei 

 wave their corn-ear mothers towards them and express a good wis' 

 or benediction. 



Soon some women take the four pyramid-shaped headdresses thai 

 were prepared on the previous day to the Blue Flute kiva where the 

 four women, who are to act as the so-called Marau-Takas (Marau- 

 Men), are putting on their paint and getting their costumes ready 

 The two long sticks and the two wheels which two of the women use 

 later in the day, the bows and arrows, and the bundle of vines tied ui 

 the day before, are placed near the fire-place. I was told that the olc 

 buckskin which is wrapped around those wheels, was cut from the 

 clothing of slain enemies long ago. 3 The men who have attended tc 

 the fire during the ceremony, clean out the fire-place. First, however 

 one of them takes out a burning stick, places it on a trail about twelve 

 yards south-east of the kiva and sprinkles a pinch of corn-meal on it. 

 Returning into the kiva he throws a little sweet -corn-meal on the 

 fire-place. He then takes out the embers and ashes and deposits 

 them a short distance west of the kiva and with it a nakwakwosi. One 

 of the men then builds a new fire. 



Meantime about twenty young men have gone to the corn-fields 

 in the valley and shortly before sunrise bring to the kiva bunches oi 



1 Also called Tikivee (Dance) because the public dance takes place on this day. 



2 This "baptizing" of novices I have also noticed at the initiation into the Powamu fraternity 

 (See my paper on "The Oraibi Powamu Ceremony," page 102). Whether this is an original Hopi 

 rite or perhaps adopted from early Spanish missionaries, might be a question. The Hopi priests, 

 course, disavow the latter, and in my opinion it is highly improbable that they would have adopted 

 religious rites of this nature from a people whom they considered and treated as enemies. 



» I have been told the same concerning the rolls on some old bandoliers. (See also ' 'The Oraibi 

 Soyal Ceremony," pages 22, footnote, and 23 by Dorsey and Voth). 



