54 Field Columbian Museum — Anthropology, Vol. VL 



lage. On the tenth day, the second, and on the fifteenth day the third 

 of the meal lines on the four walls of the house is scraped off, and the 

 meal carried out with the water to the same place outside of the village 

 as that on the fifth day. 



On the twentieth day, on which the child receives its name, more 

 elaborate ceremonies take place in the lying-in house. Early in the 

 morning of that day the same attendant — the mother-in-law of the 

 lying-in woman, or her substitute, proceeds to the house of the patient, 

 bringing with her some soap-weed root and some water. The mother 

 of the lying-in woman, or her substitute, has in the mean while built 



a fire at one or several 

 places in the house, and 

 placed some water and 

 the food to be used for 

 breakfast thereon. The 

 mother-in-law then pre- 

 pares some suds of the 

 vucca roots which she has 

 brought. In these suds 

 she washes the two ears 

 of corn, which are usually 

 white. Hereupon she 

 washes the head of the 

 lying-in woman, then her 

 own; the mother's mother 

 then follows, and then the head and body of the child is washed by the 

 father's mother. See Fig. 3. Sometimes the father and others also wash 

 their own heads. After she has bathed the child, she holds it in her left 

 arm, rubs a little meal on its forehead, cheeks, chin, and into its mouth, 

 and then taking the two corn ears in her right hand she holds them on 

 the breast of the child. See Fig. 4. While she does this she says: "To 

 old age your life being preserved, may you become an old man (old 

 woman), but N. N. you shall be named." (Woyomii uh kdtci navokawinta- 

 kang wdhtakwuwani (wiihtihaskiwuwani) nikang N. N. yan um mdchiwni.) 

 Other women have in the mean while come in, each one bringing 

 with her a little water with which she also bathes the child's head and 

 body, giving it a name in the same manner as the grandmother. 

 The child thus receives as many as five, eight, ten, or even more 

 names, only one of which usually " sticks " (hiirzhti), as the Hopi say. 

 Each new name is greeted by the mother with "Thanks!" (dskwali!) 

 These women all belong to the same clan as the mother and child. 

 Some leave as soon as they are through, others remain. Sometimes the 



Fig. 3. Washing the child on the twentieth day. 



