1008 TUSAYAN FLUTE AND SNAKE CEREMONIES [ETH. ANN. 19 
portions of the Snake dance and the Flute ceremony due to Horn clans 
common to the Horn-Snake and the Horn-Flute groups of clans. 
There is good reason to believe that the Flute clans, and hence the 
Flute societies, came to Tusayan from the south, whereas the Horn and 
Snake clans came from the north, or Tokonabi. 
OPHIOLATRY IN THE SNAKE DANCE 
The Snake dance is a celebration or worship of the cultus hero and 
clan mother (Teiiamana) of the Snake clan, but not of the Great 
Plumed Snake (Paliiliikon), which the legends say was introduced by 
the Patki clans from the south. These legends are supported by the 
fact that the effigies of the Plumed Snake are used in the Soyaluia and 
Paliiliikonti ceremonies by the Patki and other southern clans, and not 
by the Snake society in its worship. No reference to Paliiliikon occurs 
in the legend of the Snake clans, but a figure of it is painted on the 
kilts of the Snake priests. These facts have led to the belief that the 
worship of a Great Snake was foreign to the ritual of Walpi when its 
population was composed only of Snake, Horn, and Flute clans; that 
it came to Walpi after the Snake clan was established in that pueblo, 
and hence presumably after the Snake dance had been introduced. 
The presence of reptiles in the Snake ceremony is generally supposed 
to show that this rite is a form of snake worship. It is rather a worship 
of the ancestors of the Snake clans, which are anthropo-zoémorphic 
beings, called the Snake youth and the Snake maid; but neither of 
these represent the Great Snake, nor has their worship anything to do 
with that of this personage, who was introduced into Hopi mythology 
and ritual by the Rain-cloud clans. As personated in the Antelope 
kiva at Walpi, these ancestral beings have no reptilian characteristics, 
and the snakes which are introduced in the ceremonies are not 
worshiped, but are regarded as the ‘‘elder brothers” of the priests. 
It is not supposed that these reptiles have any more power to send 
rain than the ‘‘ elder brothers” or shades of deceased members of any 
other society. They are intercessors between man and the rain gods, 
and if the proper ceremonies with them are performed in prescribed 
sequence and in traditional ways, the rains must come because they 
came in the ancient times in the house of the Snake maid. The idea 
of magic permeates the whole ceremony, which is not an appeal to a 
great Snake deity to grant any definite request, but a compulsion of 
the rain and growth supernaturals to perform their functions, which 
is brought about by the use of proper charms. 
The Hopi conception of the rain gods involves no limitation of these 
supernaturals to definite numbers. There is no suggestion of a single 
anthropomorphic being which sends the rain, but Rain-cloud spirits 
are associated with the six cardinal points, and are regarded as ances- 
tral beings. 
