Bowers] HIDATSA SOCIAL AND CEREMONIAL ORGANIZATION 37 



adopted agriculture and settled at the Knife River. The Awatixa, 

 with a long history of life in earth lodge villages, chose to remain 

 agriculturalists as did the Awaxawi who were few in number and 

 unable to maintain an independent village organization. The 

 Nuitadi Mandan, finding conditions intolerable with the Arikara, 

 who had moved in on them after the smallpox epidemic, indicated a 

 preference for the Awatixa and Awaxawi near whom they had lived 

 for a long time and with whom some households were related through 

 marriage. 



The Awatixa, Awaxawi, and Nuitadi Mandan then organized a 

 council headed by Four Bears, son of Two Tails of the original council, 

 who was at that time the most distinguished war leader. He was 

 entrusted with the physical defense of the people, and Missouri 

 was selected to organize the ceremonies of establishing the new vil- 

 lage which was to be built upstream from the mouth of Knife River 

 but below the Hidatsa-proper. Although the selection of the site 

 is clothed in traditions, the Like-a-Fishhook Bend was an ideal site 

 for defense. The role of the supernatural in determining where to 

 build is indicated by the complete absence of references to the many 

 advantages of the site for the summer village. It was on a low bend 

 overlooking the Missouri with the river at the edge of the village, 

 steep banks on three sides, an abundance of timber growing in the 

 valley and reaching up to the edges of the village on two sides, suitable 

 soil for gardens in the timber, and a broad, flat, grassed prairie with 

 an unimpaired view which extended back from the unprotected side 

 of the village where horses could be better protected while grazing. 



During the period 1837 to 1845 the Hidatsa were unable to operate 

 as a tribal unit. The more sedentary Awatixa and Awaxawi pre- 

 ferred to continue the old cultural pattern based on agriculture. 

 The Hidatsa-proper, with a short traditional history of agriculture 

 on the Missouri after separating from the River Crow with whom 

 they had still maintained close contacts on the Missouri above Knife 

 River, preferred to accept an invitation to rejoin the Crow. When 

 the final decision was made and the site of the new village had been 

 selected, the Hidatsa-proper were ready to move upstream in the 

 spring and separate permanently from their more agricultural rela- 

 tives. Some Awatixa and Awaxawi families, however, decided to 

 abandon agriculture and move upstream, while several Hidatsa- 

 proper famihes moved downstream to continue agriculture. 



BoUer (1868, p. 242) gives essentially the same account of the 

 events leading up to the building of Fishhook Village. He wrote: 



... At last they determined to seek the Crows and unite with them again. 

 They deserted their village, abandoned their corn-fields, left the bones of those 



710-195—65 1 



