Tooker] ETHNOGRAPHY OF THE HURON 97 



"Victory! I see the enemies coming toward us from the south. I 

 see them take to flight, I see all of you making prisoners of them." 

 On the basis of this advice, the warriors departed toward the south 

 (JK 26: 175-177). 



Some other medicine men could find lost objects (JR 10: 195) and 

 could locate the thief (JR 33: 221).^^ A man who had been robbed 

 might ask a medicine man to come to the house. The latter gave orders 

 for a feast and then performed magic to discover the thief. This he 

 could do, they said, if the tliief was present at the tune m the house, 

 but not if he was absent ( S 141 ) . 



Some medicine men could work wonders, as change a rod into a 

 serpent or bring a dead animal back to life (JR 33: 221).^^ 



ACQUISITION OF POWER 



These medicine men probably obtained their power through visions 

 [my inference]. In olden times, a man who wished to become a 

 arendiwane fasted for an entire month in a separate house and saw 

 no one except a man who carried wood to him and who also had fasted 

 (JR10:199).*o 



Those who wished to become medicine men had to be deprived of 

 all their possessions, had to abstain from w^omen, and had to obey all 

 that the spirit suggested ( JR 15 : 181) .»^ 



One Indian dreamed one night that he could become an arendkoane 

 if he could fast 30 days. When he awoke, he resolved to keep this 

 fast. However, he was invited to a feast of awataerohi [for a de- 

 scription of this ceremony, see below under "Curing Ceremonies"] ; 

 he was one of a few who could sing in this ritual. At this feast, he 

 ate and sang so much he became mad and ran naked in the snow with 

 a turtle rattle, "or more correctly, with the fool's cap in his hand," 

 and sang night and day. The next day he went to the village of 

 Wenrio where they made three or four feasts for his health, but he 



88 Some Iroquois fortunetellers specialized in finding lost or stolen objects, as clothing, 

 cattle, horses, and spouses (Shimony 1961 a: 270; see also Parker 1913: 49 n. ; Waugh 

 1916: 29). 



6» Wonder worlsing is, of course, a common ability of North American Indian medicine 

 men. Although one suspects that it was more frequently practiced in the past, it still is 

 a part of Iroquois culture. For example, at Newtown, a medicine man of the Idos Society 

 (Society of Mystic Animals) juggles hot stones, sees through a mask that has no eyeholes, 

 and causes a doll to appear as a living person (Parker 1909: 172). At Coldspring, men 

 wearing masks also used by the False Faces appear in one ritual of the Idos Society and 

 juggle hot stones or ashes (Fenton 1937 : 226 ; 1940 b : 421). 



•0 Vision seeking was apparently not greatly elaborated in Huron culture, although it 

 seems to have been present (see note 93, p. 100), The Jesuit statement that in olden times 

 the medicine man fasted for a month may indicate that the vision quest was more,prevaIent 

 before the 17th century. 



*i In the light of other American Indian cultui-es, this statement seems a little extreme. 

 What may have been meant is that the spirit might order a man to give up certain of his 

 possessions, not all of them, and that before performing certain rituals he had to abstain 

 from sexual Intercourse. The statement that the medicine man had to obey his spirit Is 

 probably correct as it stands. 



