Howard] THE PONCA TRIBE 85 



brother." Though the custom of honoring the eldest child was said 

 by PLC and JLR to have lapsed, I noted that it was generally the 

 eldest son who acquired the father's peyote "fireplace" (i.e., the right 

 to conduct the ceremony) among the Southern Ponca. 



A brother and his sister were allowed to play together until they 

 were about 10 years old. At this time they separated and assumed 

 the attitude of extreme respect and avoidance which they were to 

 maintain toward each other for the remainder of their lives. They 

 no longer played together and did not even speak to one another in 

 public. If a brother wished to tell his younger sister to come home 

 with him when they were visiting at someone else's home, he would 

 ask a third person to relay the message. If no one was present whom 

 he could ask to do this, he would announce in a loud voice "I am going 

 home now." His sister, if she knew what was best for her, would 

 take the hint and follow him. 



At the present time this relationship has been relaxed, and I often 

 observed brothers and sisters teasing one another, in the manner of 

 "Whites. Brother-brother and sister-sister relationships were, and 

 still are, very close. The older brother or sister is frequently charged 

 with the care of the younger one by the parents. 



Concerning the relationship of grandparent and grandchild Whitman 

 (1937, p. 47) notes: "The relationship between grandparents and 

 grandchild is, among the Oto and the Ponca, a cherishing one." It 

 was generally the grandfather who made a Ponca boy his first bow 

 and arrows, and the grandmother who beaded his first dancing cos- 

 tume. Grandparents, also, could take the time to teach the children 

 the tribal games and tell them the folktales which the parents, 

 busy gaining a hvelihood, did not have time to do. 



A relationship of a different type pertained between an uncle 

 (mother's brother) and his nephew, and an aunt (father's sister) and 

 her niece. Such relationships were of the "joking type." This 

 behavior apphed not only to the mother's brother-sister's son and 

 father's sister-brother's daughter but also, at least to some degree, to 

 all other relationships where the kinship terms "uncle" and "nephew" 

 or "aunt" and "niece" were used. The most obscene and cruel 

 jokes were played upon a nephew by his uncle. It was considered 

 bad form for the nephew to become offended, even if the uncle put a 

 cocklebur under the boy's saddle blanket and thus caused him to be 

 bucked off his pony. In return the nephew could appropriate any 

 article belonging to his uncle without asking. Teasing of nieces by 

 "aunts" was usually not so cruel. An "aunt" might chide her 

 "niece" about boy friends or something of the sort (Skinner, 1915 c, 

 p. 800; also PLC, JLR, and WBB). Whitman (1939, p. 183) records 

 WBB's having received "squaw medicine" and sober advice from his 

 mother's brother, showing that this relationship had a serious side as 



718-071—65^ -7 



