SNAKE BITES AND THE HOPI SNAKE DANCE 



By M. W. Stielinq 



Chief, Bureau of American Ethnology 

 Smithsonian Institution 



[With 1 plate] 



The most widely known American Indian ceremonial is undoubt- 

 edly the so-called Snake Dance of the Hopi Indians of Arizona. 

 Actually the Snake Dance is only the concluding feature of the 

 elaborate 9-day Snake Ceremonial, which is held in alternate years 

 at most of the Hopi pueblos primarily as a prayer for rain. During 

 the preliminary days of the ceremony live snakes, including both 

 venomous and nonvenomous varieties, are ritualistically gathered 

 from the vicinity of the pueblo and brought to the kiva. Here they 

 are utilized in the ceremonies, preparatory to fulfilling their role 

 as messengers upon being released on the final day when the public 

 ceremony is held, during which live snakes held in the mouth are 

 danced with. 



Because of the peculiar attitude of the typical white man toward 

 snakes, once the Hopi ceremony became publicized it aroused unusual 

 interest, with the result that an enormous literature on the subject 

 has been published since the first description appeared in print in 

 1881. Some of the early scientific investigators had unusual oppor- 

 tunities of observing the ceremonial in fairly complete form, so that 

 a number of excellent descriptions were written before the tourist 

 influx made the Hopi more secretive toward the whites. It is not 

 the purpose of this paper to discuss the ritual or its esoteric sig- 

 nificance. For the benefit of the interested reader a selected bibli- 

 ography is attached. The intent of this article is merely to put in 

 condensed form the answer, at least in part, to one of the most 

 frequent queries received by the Bureau of American Ethnology, 

 namely, "Are the snake dancers ever fatally bitten; and if not, why 

 not?" (For a detailed and excellent treatment of this matter see 

 Klauber, 1932.) The complete answer to this query is fairly com- 

 plicated and is largely bound up in the fact that the average white 

 man is highly superstitious regarding snakes, and the Indian is not. 



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