Bowers] HIDATSA SOCIAL AND CEREMONIAL ORGANIZATION 173 



come to him with messages to be carried to their dead in the spirit 

 world. One about to die sometimes had many of these messages to 

 dehver, A mother would send word to a recently deceased child, 

 giving it instructions and advice of one sort or another. 



In no area of Hidatsa culture were there so many diverse views as in 

 that pertaining to the hereafter. All informants agreed that life in the 

 hereafter was very much like that on earth. Murderers were excluded 

 from the villages of the dead and became aimless wanderers much as 

 in life when, after committing a murder, the individual, should he suc- 

 ceed in escaping the wrath of the victim's clansmen and sons, was 

 excluded thereafter from the social life of his conununity There was 

 disagreement among informants relative to suicides. Some informants 

 thought that suicides never reached the land of the dead but wandered 

 about much as murderers did. However, since most suicides were 

 committed by females, the views of women in this matter probably 

 more correctly reflect the views of the Hidatsa. All my female in- 

 formants believed that no distinction was made between suicide and 

 natural death; that people did not commit suicide except during epi- 

 demics; and that in those days the Hidatsa did not believe that any 

 people would survive. Therefore, these women claimed, people com- 

 mitted suicide during the periods of epidemics simply to catch up 

 with and rejoin their recently deceased relatives, at a time when the 

 household was largely destroyed by these newly introduced diseases. 



Hidatsa behefs relative to the hereafter are based on two bodies of 

 data, their ancient traditions and mythologies and recent dreams and 

 visions. Numerous informants spoke of the return and reunion of 

 their people with those who were once left behind in very early times 

 when the Hidatsa came up out of the ground at some place to the south- 

 east. According to this tradition, the Hidatsa and all other Indians 

 were at that time living underground. Finding an opening reaching 

 to the land above, the people began moving upward to the surface of 

 the earth. One woman heavy with child broke the vine by which they 

 were ascending, separating the people. Many people believe that on 

 death the individual retm-ns to this land below. It was Mrs. White 

 Duck's opinion, given her by her father Poor Wolf, that this village 

 of the dead was downriver and underground. Bears Arm, one of my 

 principal informants, also believed that there was a reunion of the 

 dead with those who were divided when the vine broke. He thought 

 that the land below and the land above the earth constituted the first 

 and thu'd levels of the universe. He stated that the land below and 

 the land above were identical to the land on which they were now Uv- 

 ing. To the west were high mountains and to the east were the wood- 

 lands. 



