ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDIES IN OKLAHOMA 



AND IOWA 



By TRUMAN MICHELSON 

 Ethnologist, Bureau of American Ethnology 



The field season of 1932 was devoted to anthropological researches 

 among the Arapaho, Cheyenne, Kickapoo, Kiowa, Sauk, and Fox. 

 As I have stated previously (Bull. 105, Bur. Amer. Ethnol., 

 p. 104), the Kickapoo have a religious performance at night which 

 in name corresponds to the Fox WapAiiowiweni (wapAnoyiwAgi 

 = Fox wapAnowiwAgi) but of which further details were unknown. 

 By good fortune I found a Kickapoo informant who had witnessed the 

 performance among the Kickapoo of Coahuila and who gave a very 

 good account of it. In connection with the ceremony the trick of 

 jamming one's arm in boiling water without injury still persists in 

 Mexico, whereas in Oklahoma this has been lost. 



The work among the Sauk was confined to witnessing a part of the 

 celebrated Metawiweni (medicine dance; mystic rite would be a close 

 rendition), which I had never seen previously. I was fortunate enough 

 to witness the " shooting " portion thereof, in which the members 

 " shoot " each other with the otter-skin bags and gourd-rattles, with 

 the result that the " victim " falls on his face apparently unconscious 

 and then recovers. There was only one exception ; a lively old gentle- 

 man when " shot " cried out and staggered but did not fall, and then 

 recovered amid the plaudits of the crowd. I heard one Sauk say, 

 " He's powerful ; they can't put him down." One woman (apparently 

 the novitiate) beat a drum and carried it, both of which are unheard 

 of among the Fox Indians. I was not allowed to be very close and so 

 could hear only portions of the prayers. At present it seems hardly 

 probable that a full account of the Sauk ceremony can be obtained 

 owing to the conservative character of the members ; so we must fall 

 back upon the more or less fragmentary accounts of the older writers, 

 such as Forsyth, Beltrami, Stanley, and of Skinner in more recent 

 times. Yet if we pool all these sources we have ample evidence to 

 identify the Sauk Metawiweni in the main with the Ojibwa Midawiwin 

 (Grand Medicine Society). 



The object of the work among the Kiowa was to obtain certain 

 sociological data. The Kiowa were willing informants, and a number 

 of personal narratives were obtained ; from them it is easy to recognize 

 the tremendous power a Kiowa male has over his sister, even if she 



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