Tooker] 



ETHNOGRAPHY OF THE HURON 91 



hunting, fishing, war, trade, remedies, dances, games, and songs (JR 

 8: 121; 10: 169-171, 175; 15: 177-179). The dream was the "God 

 of the Hurons" " ( JR 10 : 171 ; 15 : 177 ; cf. JR 17 : 15 ; 23 : 171) and tlie 

 authors of these dreams, the spirits, were "the real masters of the coun- 

 try." The hitter regulated and decreed everything, in dreams and 

 otherwise (JR 17: 161). 



When dreaming of something that was far away, the Huron 

 thought that the soul issued forth from the body and proceeded to 

 the place where those objects were that were pictured in the dream. 

 They said it was not the sensitive soul that issued forth but only 

 the rational one, which was not dependent upon the body for its 

 workings (JR 33: 191).'* 



Women especially, and men rarely, dreamed at night of such things 

 as representations of the death of relatives and other imaginary terrors 

 [S 75; Sagard and Champlain (passim) both emphasize the curing of 

 women rather than men, perhaps a reflection of this tendency for 

 woment to be more prone to dreams, if tlie statement is true].^^ 



MEDICINE MEN 



If the sick person did not know the cause of his illness, he consulted 

 a medicine man [called arendiouane (JR 8: 123), areiuUowane (JR 

 10: 35), arendiwane (JR 10: 197), arendioane (JR 13: 187), arendio- 

 ouane (JR 14:29, 59), arendimane (JR 15: 137), arendioouanne (JR 

 33 : 221)'^ or the diagnosticians who were called ocata ( JR 17 : 211) or 

 saokata (JR 33: 193) " and the "apothecaries" and those who cured 



^Connelley (1899 a: 118; 1899 b: 43) reports an actual God of Dreams among the 

 Wyandot. Dreams, of course, were of great impcitince to ths Wyandat at this time. 



'■•Also compare ConneUey's (1899 a: 118; 1899 b: 43) statement that the Wyandot 

 medicine man could detach his soul from his body and send it to the God of Dreams for 

 Information. While his soul was away, the medicine man was in a trancelike condition. 

 Similarly, Parker (1913 : 61 n.) notes the Iroquois belief that "the soul may pass from a 

 living body aud enter any object or go to any place to acquire wisdom and returning reveal 

 it to the person in dreams and visions." 



'5 Although both Sagard and Champlain indicate that many more woman than men had 

 dreams and consequently curing ceremonies performed for them, later writers, the Jesuits 

 and anthropologists, mention no such sex distinction. It is possible that Chpjiiplain's and 

 Sagard's statements are based on inadequate information. It is also possible that Sagard, 

 at least, was thinking of something similar to the 'Ohgiwe Society ("The Singers for the 

 Dead"), an Iroquois medicine society composed of women that deals with dreaming of the 

 dead (Beauehamp 1922: 162-163; Fenton and Kurath 1951; Morgan 1901(1) : 275-276; 

 Parker 1909: 178; Shimony 1961 a: 231-233; Speck 1949: 120-122). Certain other 

 medicine societies are dominated by women (Fenton 1936: 17; Parker 1909: passim). 



'8 This word is a compound of arendi- or orenda-, roughly meaning 'supernatural power,' 

 and -wane or -wanen, 'large,' 'great,' 'powerful,' and thus means 'his orenda is power- 

 ful' or 'one whose orenda is powerfur (Hewitt 1902: 38; 1910 c: 178). The Seneca 

 cognate has apparently lost its meaning of 'supernatural power' and is now used only in 

 the meaning 'song' (Chafe 1961 a : 156 ; cf. Hewitt 1902 : 43, "the Iroquois orenda, a 

 subsumed mystic potence, is regarded as related directly to singing and with anything used 

 as a charm, amulet, or mascot, as well as with the ideas of hoping, praying, or submitting" 

 and ibid. : 40, "Let it be noted, too, that this is the only word signifying to sing, to chant, 

 in the earlier speech of the Iroquoian peoples"). 



" Hewitt (1910 c : 178) translates this word, sa'iotkatta, in Huron, as "one who examines 

 another by seeing," literally, "one customarily looks at another." The cognate aksdkto is 

 still used by the Iroquois to designate a fortuneteller (Shimony 1961 a : 270). 



