White] THE PUEBLO OF SIA, NEW MEXICO 269 
danced. There was a great deal of ‘‘kidding”’ and good humor about 
all this. Some of the spectators recruited by the dancers were Indians 
from Santo Domingo. Some of the dancers merely walked around 
instead of dancing. I noted a young Sia man who had been chosen 
by a Navaho ‘girl’ as her partner. She gave him some feathers to 
hold in his right hand and showed him how to move them. Then she 
put her arm over his shoulder and he put his arm around her waist 
and they danced. 
During the dance a string of beads of one of the Navaho women 
broke and three or four male spectators came out to pick up the 
beads; finally, one of them removed all of the girls’ necklaces. 
It was impossible to take note of everything that happened when 
the dance ended, but I noted that the young man mentioned above 
put something into the hand of his partner (was this payment for the 
dance?). Then, as he left her, he put his hands together, cupped them 
as if he were holding water, then swiftly put them to his face to draw 
the breath (ianyi, blessing) from them. 
There were relatively few spectators to this dance. It had been 
“put on just for fun’’; it was not a pueblo ceremony under the author- 
ity of the Tiamunyi or War chief. Quite a number of people did not 
bother to go out of their houses to watch it. 
FIESTA FOR THE SAINT 
The Catholic mission at Sia is dedicated to Nuestra Sefiora de la 
Asuncion; the feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin is held 
annually on August 15. The Fiesta at Sia is so much like that of 
other Keresan pueblos, and it has been described so many times— 
there is even one published account for Sia (Lange, 1952)—a detailed 
description is not necessary here. (See White, 1942 a, pp. 246-255, 
for an account of the technical ceremonial details of the dance at Santa 
Ana; there is good reason to believe that an almost identical procedure 
is followed at Sia. See also, Parsons, 1923 b, for Santa Ana; White, 
1935, pp. 159-160, Bourke, 1884, pp. 10-53, Densmore, 1938, pp. 92— 
110, and Lawrence, 1927, “The Dance of the Sprouting Corn,” for 
Santo Domingo; White, 1932 a, for Acoma; Boas, 1925, pp. 211-212, 
Goldfrank, 1923, and Vogt, 1955, for Laguna; and Lange, 1959, 
pp. 341-353, for Cochiti; Bandelier described it in ‘‘The Delight 
Makers,”’ 1918, pp. 136 ff.; and a brief account in Poore, 1894, pp. 
437-439. Stevenson, however, did not describe this ceremony.) 
The principal features of the Fiesta of August 15 are a Mass con- 
ducted by a Catholic priest in the Mission and dancing by Sia Indians 
in the plazas. But many other things are associated with it. Itisa 
general social occasion for all residents of the region. Many Navaho 
Indians come from miles in their wagons, and camp in Sia, or on the 
