HOPI KATCINA ALTARS—FEWKES 471 
certain secret rites are performed. Our knowledge thus far is limited 
to four of the five Katcina altars; and there still remains the altar 
of Cufopavi, regarding which nothing has yet been recorded.’ 
Our knowledge of Katcina altars of the Rio Grande in the other 
pueblos is very scanty, owing largely to the exclusion of ethnologists 
from the kivas. Katcina dances in the open plazas are repeatedly 
figured but the secret rites and accompanying altars, if any, are 
not known. 
In the following pages the author presents a morphological study 
of the four known Katcina altars of Hopi. The illustrations of the 
most complex, that of Oraibi, have been taken from the excellent 
memoir of Voth on the Powamu of that pueblo; the others are 
from personal studies made in 1890-1895. 
The structure of the Oraibi Katcina altar is as follows: The 
reredos consists of two upright wooden slats united above by a cross- 
piece which in the illustration (pl. 2) is surmounted by a row of 
four segments of circles with rain cloud pictures representing the 
four directions, and colored with appropriate pigments, beginning 
with yellow or north at the right. The decoration of the cross- 
piece is obscure, but on the uprights there are figures recalling 
sprouting vegetation, and circles with differently colored quadrants. 
Two idols, probably of wood, stand between the vertical slats of 
the altar, filling nearly the whole space. That on the left evidently 
represents the Sky God (Cotokinungwu) for it has a conical apex 
to the head, a painted chin, and near its left hand stands a wooden 
slat of zigzag form, a prescribed symbol of lightning.? This image 
has several short parallel marks of different colors on the body, and 
wears horsehair, stained red, about the loins. 
The other figurine wears a coronet with triangular-shaped rain 
cloud symbols, which remind one of the headdress of the Lakone- 
i Journ. Amer, Ethnol. and Archeol., Vol. II, No. 1. Sitcomovi and Hano have no 
Niman Katcina, nor do they celebrate the Tusayan ritual in its entirety. The word 
Katcina is used to designate both a dance and a participant in a dance. Between July 
and January there are no Katcina rites in Tusayan. 
21 have been interested to discover what proportion of the whole number of Hopi cere- 
monials have been described, and thé results are such as to allay any conceit that we 
know much about the subject. Without considering the abbreviated ceremonials there are 
in the ritual 12 which are of nine days duration. There are five variants of this ritual, 
differing in altars, paraphernalia, and rites, so that we may say there are performed in 
Tusayan about 60 ceremonials, each nine days long, to be investigated. Of these there 
are 40 of which we know nothing, save their existence; 15, fragments of which have been 
described ; and 5 which have been fairly well studied. There are about 30 Hopi altars 
which have never been figured or described, or as far as I know seen by ethnologists. It 
thus appears that there is plenty of material in this province to occupy the students of 
primitive ritual for some time to come. An adequate comprehension of the Hopi Katcina 
ritual requires a consideration of five different modifications of the same altars. 
’'The image of Cotokinunzwu in the Oraibi flute altar (q. vy.) has zigzag figures down 
the legs, which would appear to associate this deity with lightning. 
