618 ZUNI KITUAL, POETRY [eth. ann. 47 



There is always a formal request for aU the regular blessings — long 

 life, old age, rain, seeds, fecundity, riches, power, and "strong spirit." . 

 This formal request closes the prayer. Any special request, such as 

 those for summer storms and winter snows, safety in war, rescue from 

 disease, precede this. Requests that are strictly personal never figure 

 in prayer. One prays always for "all good fortime," never for 

 special and particular Ijenefit. The only exceptions are in the case 

 of prayers in sickness and the prayer of a widower to his dead wife 

 with the request that she should not pursue him. 



Zuiii prayers are distinctly matter of fact. They deal with external 

 events and conditions rather than inner states. Outside of the request, 

 their content is limited to two fields: Natural phenomena, such as 

 sunrise, sunset, dawn, night, the change of seasons, the phases of the 

 moon, rainstorms, snowfall, the growth of corn; and ritual acts, 

 especially the making of prayer sticks, setting up of altars, and 

 transfer of authority. Rituals of a more intimate and personal 

 character, such as fasting and abstinence, are never mentioned. In 

 their prayers Zunis do not humble themselves before the supernatural ; 

 they bargain vnth. it. 



There are regular stereotj^ped phrases for all things commonly 

 alluded to in prayer. The sun always "comes out standing to his 

 sacred place," "night priests draw their dark curtain," the corn 

 plants "stretch out their hands to all directions calling for rain," the 

 meal painting on an altar is always "our house of massed clouds," 

 prayer sticks are "clothed in our grandfather, turkey's, robe of cloud." 

 Events are always described in terms of these stereotypes, which are 

 often highly imaginative and poetic.- These fixed metaphors are the 

 outstanding feature of Zufii poetic style. There are not very many of 

 them ; they are used over and over again, the same imagery appearing 

 repeatedly in one prayer. A prayer recorded by Gushing more than 

 50 years ago contains all of the same stereotypes and no turns of 

 expression different from those in use to-day. A comparison of 

 Cushing's texts ' with mine shows a rigidity of style in oral tradition. 



The sentence structure is that of continued narrative iii the hands 

 of a particularly able story-teller. Zuni is a language that is very 

 sensitive to skillful handlmg. Oratory is a recognized art, and prayer 

 is one of the occasions on which oratory is used. The best prayers 

 run to long periods — the longer the better, since clarity of expression 

 is not necessary, nor particularly desirable. 



Zuni, like Latin, is a highly inflected language and can handle 

 effectively involved sentences that can not be managed intelligibly in 



3 Some of the most striking passages have been quoted. (See pp. 4S3-486.> 



s Unfortunately Cushing has pubhshed only short texts which do not do justice to Zuni style. One long 

 text which he recorded is to be published iu the Journal of American Folk-Lore with a parallel modern 

 version. 



