Howard] THE PONCA TRIBE 139 



over there [two hills about 1 mile west of the Mormon monument]. All the 

 people came out to greet him. They asked for the others and he told them what 

 had happened. "I don't know what happened to the others," he said. The 

 families of the other warriors thought that their boys had been killed and they 

 all mourned. 



The next day the second rider came in. He too had no news of the others. 

 On the third day another warrior came in. He didn't know anything about the 

 others. He hadn't seen them. The fourth day they finally all returned. The 

 leader gave the wonderful speckled horse that he had captured to his brother. 

 It was the fastest buffalo runner the Poncas ever owned. 



N4SKI-T4GA'S WAR PARTY 

 As told by JLR 



Once there was a Ponca war party of seven men. Their leader was a man 

 called Nqski-tqga, which means "Big-head." They called him this because he had 

 a big funny-shaped head. This war party traveled several days and didn't see 

 the enemy. They traveled until their moccasins wore out. They came to some 

 timber and went into it. They went to a clearing and began to mend their 

 moccasins. 



They had just begun to sew when they were attacked on all sides by the enemy. 

 Nqski-tq.ga escaped by running faster than the enemy. He ran as hard as he could, 

 but the enemy were right behind him. They had horses and he knew they would 

 soon catch him. 



He was running across a flat place when he noticed a prairie wolf hole. He 

 quickly jumped into this hole and covered himself with weeds. These holes are 

 quite large, big enough for a man to hide in. He waited a short while, and sud- 

 denly he heard a roar above him. The horses were going right over the place 

 where he was hidden! 



He waited in the wolf hole until dark, then he got out and began to run again. 

 He ran all that night. The next day he hid under a cutbank. Finally he got 

 home safely. 



He waited for the others to come back to camp, but they never showed up. 

 They were all killed by the enemy. Because of this the people of the tribe turned 

 against Nqski-f ga and called him a poor war leader. They said that he always 

 managed to get back safely himself, but the men who went with him never did. 

 He was finished. 



Only when the Ponca had been attacked in their villages or when 

 their territory had been invaded in force did the Ponca tribe fight as 

 a unit. On such occasions all of the men of the tribe, including the 

 chiefs, entered the conflict. Sometimes even the women took part. 

 J. O. Dorsey writes: 



When the foe had made an attack on the Omahas (or Ponkas) and had killed 

 some of the people it was the duty of the surviving men to pursue the offenders 

 and try to punish them .... When the Ponkas rushed to meet the Brule and 

 Oglala Dakotas, June 17, 1872, Hu4qgi-huq, a woman, ran with them most of the 

 way, brandishing a knife and singing songs to incite the men to action. The 

 women did not always behave thus. They generally dug pits as quickly as possible 

 and crouched in them in order to escape the missiles of the combatants. [Dorsey, 

 1884 a, p. 312.] 



JLK, also described a defensive battle: 



