66 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 195 



do SO, although both JLR and OK associated them with the chiefly 

 class, PLC is the only Ponca dancer at the present time who custom- 

 arily wears a war bonnet. The otterskin hat, rather than the war 

 bonnet, was the Ponca "chief's" headdress, while a similar headdress 

 of fox fur marked the experienced warrior. 



The more traditional woman's dancing costume of the present day 

 (fig. 3, right) is probably derived from the Central Algonquian woman's 

 dress noted by Skinner (1915 c, p. 784). It consists of a long skirt, 

 preferably of blue broadcloth, with bands of ribbonwork just above the 

 hem. On her upper body the woman wears a loose silk blouse. Some- 

 times this has a large rectangular "middy" collar in the back. Both 

 skirt and blouse were formerly decorated with many small German- 

 silver brooches. This woman's costume style seems to be the feminine 

 equivalent of the male "straight" outfit. It was formerly traditional 

 among the Omaha as weU. 



In place of this traditional dress many Southern Ponca women, 

 particularly younger women and teenage girls, prefer a white buckskin 

 dress of Kiowa, Comanche, or Cheyenne cut (pi, 24, a, h). This 

 item of apparel corresponds to the male "feathers" outfit. With 

 it the contemporary Ponca girl wears a beaded coronet or "Princess 

 crown" of Pan-Indian origin. 



According to PLC, a chief's daughter could wear an eagle feather 

 erect at the back of the head, though others denied this and said it 

 was a recent addition to the woman's costume introduced by the 

 wives and daughters of Poncas who served in the First World War. 

 A chief wore a downy eagle plume erect in a socket at the back of his 

 otterskin hat (LEL, Ed Primeaux). This custom has been continued 

 up into the present era by the Peyote leader, who is called the "Road 

 chief," 



Although for most dances, ceremonies, and public events both men 

 and women turned out in their finest attire, some rites called for special 

 costuming. Writing of the dress of Ponca Sun dancers, George A. 

 Dorsey (1905, pp. 82-83) comments: 



All dancers at all times wore their hair loose, and were naked, except for a 

 loose, white skirt, over which hung in front the loose end of a red or blue loin-cloth. 

 None of them at any time wore moccasins. Besides the paint which the dancers 

 of each group wore in common, the members of each group wore or carried dis- 

 tinctive objects of a special nature , . . . Each dancer carried in one hand a 

 bunch of sage, and all wore wrist and ankle bands of cotton, which are symbolic of 

 clouds. 



A special item of Sun dance attire which appears in one old photo- 

 graph of the Ponca ceremony is a necklace of fur with a rawhide 

 representation of a sunflower laced to the front. This showed 

 that the Sun dancer, like the floral depiction he wore, followed the Sun 

 with his gaze during the day. This costume piece is also known to 



