388 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1945 



their detached and distant positions in the sky defy mere man's ability 

 to guess. Even though we have been told that the sun is almost a 

 million miles in diameter I doubt very much that it looks that big 

 to most of us. Certainly it did not to the American Indian. Nor did 

 it look to him as though it were 93,000,000 miles away. 



The astronomer with his optical instruments and mathematical cal- 

 culations has given us the explanation of a vast universe with widely 

 separated bodies pursuing their orderly and intricate orbits and pro- 

 ducing a series of predictable and explainable results, which to the 

 unaided eye are not always what they appear to be. Most of us who 

 are laymen accept these statements on faith and dismiss the general 

 subject of the universe on the grounds that it is all too remote to be of 

 intimate concern to us, except for that portion of our own planet which 

 furnishes the stage for our activities. Insofar as the sun fits into the 

 universal scheme, we also accept academically the assurances given us 

 that the seasons, the growth of plants, weather and other phenomena 

 are the result of the apparent motion of the sun. The average man 

 among the American Indians felt much the same way about it. He 

 accepted on faith what his mentors told him and as a rule did not bother 

 to check the information. The main difference between us lies in the 

 details of the information we receive. 



It has probably not occurred to many of us that the periodicity of 

 the sun producing such fundamental time units as the day and the 

 year has developed with us a time consciousness which is all out of pro- 

 portion to that of most Indian tribes. It was not typical of Indians 

 to count the passing years and no Indian unless very young knew his 

 age in years. We must except from this general statement, however, 

 some of the tribes of Middle America. Perhaps it would be better for 

 us if we were not so aware of our ages. One often hears, with reference 

 to Indians, such pat expressions as "So many winters had passed over 

 his head," or that a man was "so many winters old." Such expressions 

 came into being only after contact with the whites. 



What the Indians of North America would say was "I was so big 

 when such and such an event took place," such as a famine, a war, or 

 other conspicuous happening. Among the Hupa of California, age is 

 judged by the amount of wear on the teeth. Instead of speaking of 

 age in terms of time units, a Hupa would say, his second teeth have 

 just come in, his teeth are worn smooth, or his teeth are worn to the 

 gums. This method was universally applicable since before the com- 

 ing of the whites the Indians seldom lost their teeth through decay 

 or other causes, and among California tribes, eating acorn meal 

 leached through sand and ground in stone mortars produced con- 

 spicuous wear on the teeth. 



In short, the tribes north of Mexico, because of a lack of pre- 

 occupation with time units as marked by astronomical phenomena, 



