Howard] THE PONCA TRIBE 47 



Charles, S. Dak., PLC was observed eating a large piece of meat which 

 he held on a wooden stick. He commented that this was the "old 

 Indian way" employed before the Ponca had plates. 



Usually the meal is served at the table, but at ceremonies, especially 

 where many are present, people sit on the ground or floor picnic 

 style. It is the usual form for the ceremonial dinner that follows a 

 Peyote meeting or a funeral. The present-day Ponca, like other tribes 

 of the Midwest, have the custom of deprecating the food they offer 

 their guests. Thus, a visitor, invited in for "coffee," is usually offered 

 a full meal with dessert. Then, after this sumptuous repast, his host 

 may comment "We don't have much, we're just Indians." 



The smoking of tobacco served as both a ceremonial act and as a 

 form of indulgence to the Ponca. The tobacco originally cultivated 

 by the Ponca was probably Nicotiana quadrivalis Pursh. (Gilmore, 

 1919, pp. 113-114.) It is no longer grown by either band of the 

 tribe. Three types of additive or kinnikinnick which were mixed 

 with the true tobacco were mentioned by PLC and OK. One of 

 these was the inner bark of the red dogwood {Cornus amoTnuTn). 

 Informants of Gilmore (1919, pp. 107-108) also mentioned three 

 types, two of which were identified as red dogwood and redbrush 

 {O. stolonifera). J. O. Dorsey (1884 a, pp. 309-310) mentions red 

 willow as most common, with sumac leaves being used occasionally 

 and arrow wood (probably G. asperifolia Michx.) only rarely. A 

 small amount of kinnikinnick is still made by the Northern Ponca. 

 Until recently the Teton Dakota paid regular visits to the Niobrara 

 Eeservation to trade for it. I bought a large sack of it from OK 

 in 1949. He carefully instructed me to mix it with chopped "Horse- 

 shoe Plug" chewing tobacco before smokmg it. Later, at the Omaha 

 Indian powwow at Macy, Nebr., Mrs. James Poor-horse, a Southern 

 Ponca woman, asked for some of this, and was elated when I gave her 

 some "because it smokes so good, and is hard to get in our country." 



Cigarettes are commonly smoked for pleasure by the Ponca of both 

 sexes at the present time in place of the pipes formerly used. In 

 the Peyote ceremony the cigarettes used in the ritual are equated 

 with the calumet used in the older Ponca rites, and prayers are offered 

 with them in the same way. The former method of praying with the 

 pipe is described by J. O. Dorsey (1894, p. 375) : ^^Abisitde, ... is 

 a word which refers to an old Omaha and Ponka custom, i.e., that 

 of blowing the smoke downward to the ground while praying. 

 The Omaha and Ponka used to hold the pipe in six directions while 

 smoking: toward the four winds, the ground, and the upper 

 world." Though accurate so far as it goes, Dorsey's statement 

 fails to note that in addition to the four cardinal points, zenith, and 

 nadir, the pipe is puffed a seventh time without moving it. This 



