Devereux] MOHAVE ETHNOPSYCHIATRY AND SUICIDE 73 



her was currently (1938) suffering from this condition. Interpreter 

 E. S. agreed and added derisively: "Nowadays they' just get drunk." 



Etiology. — According to Tcatc : 



Atcoo : r lianylenk means "hawks copulate." " I do not know how it starts. 

 Hawks have nothing to do with it. (By contrast, in discussing priapism — see 

 section on Sudhu : rk, pp. 76-77 — Hivsu : Tupo : ma expressed the culturally more 

 plausible opinion that this illness is caused partly by the atcoo : r hawks and 

 partly by an excessive sexual urge and by masturbation. ) 



Sym'ptomatology. — According to Tcatc : 



When a person has this illness, it comes on him in spells. His mind somehow 

 turns (changes). He thinks that he sees pretty girls in the nude and then, 

 though fully awake, he ejaculates. He just falls down, foams at the mouth, 

 and even urinates. Then it just passes off again. (In between attacks) such 

 people are sane and all right. Only during their spells are they strange. A 

 woman, too, can be that way ; she may think that she is "going through inter- 

 course" and that she is reaching the climax. She thinks she sees men in the 

 nude, and that the men are "using her" sexually. [Have you ever heard of the 

 globus hystericus?] I never heard of it.^* I am quite ashamed to talk of this 

 illness. 



According to Hivsu : Tupo : ma : 



Such persons dream of having intercourse every night and have nightly 

 pollutions. No, strictly speaking, they only have an orgasm, without pollu- 

 tion^' (Ferenczi, 1926). This causes the penis to be constantly erect and also 

 causes a retention of urine. In addition, such people have awful fits. During 

 these attacks they feel as though they were copulating. A man who has such 

 an attack draws in his breath, producing the (aspirated) sound "ah . . . ah." 

 He clutches the ground and falls down just anywhere. He may even fall into 

 the fire. He might also fall into water and might even drown.^" During the fit 

 he acts as though he were engaging in intercourse. He wants coitus so badly 

 that he gets sick from it. We call this illness atcoo : r hanyienk. It is, strictly 

 speaking, not real insanity (yamomk). Subsequently two informants mentioned 

 priapism as a symptom of sudhu : rk (pt. 2, pp. 76-77). 



CASE 5 (Informant: Hivsu: Tupo: ma) : 

 A man named Ahay Kuu : p had such fits. 



CASE 6 (Informants: Hivsu: Tupo: ma and Tcatc): 



Tcavakoug, of the O : otc gens, acquired in 1900, at the age of 35, the power 

 to treat dysentery. He was a nonalcoholic epileptic. During one of his atcoo : r 

 hanyienk seizures he fell into the fire, burning his hand quite badly. He did 

 not seem to have any feeling (sensitivity) when he burned himself. Thereafter 

 he concealed his burned hand in a tobacco bag attached to a spoon which hung 



*' Hawks, like owls, are closely connected with death and ghosts. 



«But cf. part 5, pp. 216-218. 



" Significantly, Hivsu : Tupo :ma also said that very young boys who masturbate, or 

 have intercourse, have an orgasm, but do not ejaculate. However, the occurrence of or- 

 gasms without ejaculation was specifically denied by a sexually experienced boy (pt. 6, 

 pp. 260-286). 



** Hysterics are careful not to harm themselves during their "fits." 



