280 THE HAKO, A PAWNEE CEREMONY [eth. Ann. 22 



Tilt' leadership accorded to the corn indicates that an earlier Im la 

 of the ceremonj^ is to be sought among a people dependent upon agri- 

 culture, and tlie peculiar treatment of water would seem to have arisen 

 in a semi-arid region. Again, the development in the purpose of the 

 ceremony from the simple longing for offspi-ing to the larger desire of 

 estaljlishing intertribal relationships was most likely to have taken 

 place among peoples whose settled mode of life had fostei-ed an appre- 

 ciation of the benefits to be derived from peace and secuiity. 



Efforts to spread this cei-emony among tribes less sedentar_y than 

 those of the Mexican plateau and the Southwest may, on the one 

 hand, liavc^ been prompted 1)y prudential r(>as()ns, while on the other 

 hand its adoption and promulgation over the wide territory oceui)ied 

 by the so-called hunting tribes marks tlie growth of politie.il ideas 

 and gives a higher j)laee to tliese tribes in the line of social develop- 

 m(!nt tlian has usually been accorded them. 



PURPOSE OF 'I^lIE <EREMOXY 



The i^urpose of this ceremony was twt)f(ild: first, to benefi, cer- 

 tain individuals by bringing to them the promise of children, long 

 life, and plentj'; second, to affect the social relations of those who 

 took jjart in it, by establishing a bond between two distinct groups of 

 persons, belonging to different elans, gentes, or tril)es, which was to 

 insure between them friendship and peace. 



In every tribe where the ceremony was known this twofold pui'- 

 pose was recognized, and by no trilial variation in the details of the 

 rite was il lost sight of or obscured. 



From a studj' of this ceremony it seems probable that its original 

 instigation was a desire for offspring, that the clan or kinshii) group 

 miglit increase in number and strength and he perpetuated through 

 the continuous birth of children. 



The cei'emonial forms here used to e.\i)ress this desire were undoubt- 

 edly borrowed from earlier ceremonies through which the people liad 

 been familiarized with certain symbols and rites representing tlie 

 creative powers. Thus, the mah; and fennile cosmic forces, symbol- 

 ized in greater or less detail by daj' and night, snn and moon, the 

 heavens and the earth, are found in the Ilako ceremony. 



The eagle and the ear of corn also represent in general the male 

 and female forces, but each is specialized in a manner peculiar to 

 thes(^ rites. There are two eagles; the white, representing the male, 

 the father, the defendei-; and tlie brown, representing the female, the 

 mother, the nestmaker (see jiages L'SS, 28!t). In the treatment of these 

 eagles tln^ dual forces are still furt hei' I'cpi'esented. The featliers of the 

 whit(M)i- male eagle are hung upon a stem painted green to symbolize 

 the eai-th, the female principle ; wliile those of t he brown or female eagle 

 are hung upon the stem painted l>iue to symbolize the heavens, the 



