Chafb] SENECA THANKSGIVING RITUALS 3 



transcendent importance: "Four words* the Creator has given for 

 bringing happiness. They are amusements devised in the heaven 

 world, the Osto'wagoVa, Gone'owo"', Ado^'we" and Ganawe°'gowa" 

 (Parker, 1913, pp. 40^1 ; see also Fenton, 1936, p. 16). The Thanks- 

 giving Dance is performed twice during the year, during the two 

 calendrical ceremonies which include all of the Four Rituals. One of 

 these is the New Year's or Midwinter Ceremony, in January or Feb- 

 ruary, when the Thanksgiving Dance takes place on the fifth day 

 at Tonawanda, the seventh at Cattaraugus, and the eighth at Alle- 

 gany. The other is the Green Corn Ceremony, in late August or 

 early September, when it is held on the first day at Tonawanda and 

 Cattaraugus, but the third day at Allegany. 



The Thanksgiving Dance, described in Speck (1949, pp. 138-141) for 

 the Sour Springs Cayuga, and in Fenton (1947, pp. 6-10) for the 

 Seneca, is performed by a speaker, two singers, and a varying number 

 of dancers from the assembled crowd. The singers sit facing each 

 other, straddling a bench placed lengthwise in the center of the long- 

 house floor. This is the position of the singers during the Feather 

 Dance also (Kurath, 1951, pp. 125-126), but while in the latter both 

 singers have turtle rattles which they pound on the bench, in the 

 Thanksgiving Dance the lead singer uses a water drum and the other 

 singer a horn rattle (Conldin and Sturtevant, 1953, pp. 274-283). 

 As in the Feather Dance, some of the performers wear costumes of 

 a generalized "Indian" type. The ritual has three major parts. It 

 begins with a group of songs, after which the speaker takes his place, 

 standing next to the singers, and begins the second part, an alter- 

 nation of spoken intervals with monotone songs led by the speaker. 

 This middle part is called the ^ahtahkwayitahkwa'^ , lit. 'used for put- 

 ting down a shoe', probably with reference to the special dance step 

 that occurs here. The third and final part is another, shorter group 

 of songs, usually or always repetitions of songs from the first group. 



A representative performance of the Thanksgiving Dance took 

 place on the Tonawanda Reservation on February 6, 1960. The 

 morning of that day began with a recital of the Thanksgiving Speech 

 in the longhouse, after which those present, principally Faith Keepers 

 (Fenton, 1936, p. 6) and Chiefs, moved to the old cookhouse,^ where 

 the Tobacco Invocation (discussed further below) was recited. Per- 

 sonal Chants were then performed by five of the men present, after 

 which everyone moved back to the longhouse, where a number of 

 others had already gathered. The speaker next burned tobacco in 



* The noun root, in niy6iwa:kc:h\n some contexts means 'word'. Here It Isen'iivalent to what I am calling 

 ' ritual'. The other three are the fosfdwxtko:wa:h 'Feather Dance', '(T^i.'U'e' 'Personal Chant', and kanc- 

 hwifko:wa:h 'Bowl, Dish, or Peach Stone Game', also called kaji'kekha:f ('characterized by a bowl'), 

 kaye.'tat ('game'), or kayetowa:neh ('great game'). 



• A new cookhouse has been built at Tonawanda for the serving o( meals, but the old building la still 

 used for ceremonial purposes. 



