THE KATCINA ALTARS IN HOPI WORSHIP 
By J. WALTER FewkeEs, Chief, Bureau of American Ethnology 
[With 3 plates] 
INTRODUCTION 
The present article is the fifth of a series published in the annual 
reports of the Smithsonian Institution on the composition of Hopi 
worship. The Hopi, the name meaning peaceful, belong to the Pueblo 
stock and are agricultural Indians. They are descendants of the 
Arizona cliff dwellers and have preserved to the present many sur- 
vivals of their ancient worship. The object of the series of five 
papers above referred to is to record a few of their rites in sun, fire, 
and ancestor ceremonies that have survived to the present time. The 
Pueblos performed their secret ceremonies in subterranean rooms 
called kivas that were entered from the roof. 
It is customary for the priest in the course of the ceremonies to 
erect an altar, so called, on which is placed their f#pond, or sacred 
badge of office, surrounded by various fetishes, idols, and wooden 
objects bearing symbols. Here are placed all sacred objects possessed 
by the fraternity of priests who celebrate the rite. There are four 
Hopi villages or pueblos that perform the rituals independently, 
the sacred paraphernalia differing in each. From a study of these 
altars it is possible for us to learn the aim of their various cere- 
monies. The present paper compares the four Katcina altars for 
this purpose. 
That element of pueblo worship known as the Katcina forms fully 
one-half of the Hopi ritual, beginning with the arrival of the Kat- 
cinas or masked dancers in January or February, and lasting until 
their departure in July, inclusive. It is distinguished from other 
components by the presence of masked participants called Katcinas, 
supposed to be personators of the ancients, or “others.” The yearly 
departure of these worthies from the villages is celebrated in July 
by a great religious observance called the Niman or Farewell Katcina 
ceremony; their arrival by several rites, one of the most striking of 
which is called Powamu, or “ Bean Planting.” At the times of their 
arrival and departure there are erected in the kiva of each of the 
four villages which celebrate them, the same altars, about which 
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