284 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BuU. 194 



Native concepts of supernatural power affected and shaped their 

 behavior. A child normally had no supernatural power except as a 

 member of a household whose members provided both physical and 

 supernatural protection. Women had less supernatural powers than 

 men because they needed less in their daily activities than did men 

 who were always facing danger in hunting or in military engagements. 

 Men were not normally born with supernatural powers. Until they 

 were old enough to seek visions and to obtain supernatural powers by 

 other means, the supernatural powers of their relatives' sacred bundles 

 protected them. Children were given some sacred objects when 5 or 

 6 years of age and were taught how to perform simple rites for their 

 own protection. This instruction was usually given by some older 

 male of the household other than the father, who contributed ritualistic 

 training only when the child was old enough to seek actively a sacred 

 bundle or dream of his own. 



Ordinarily, the older brothers took the younger ones to the fasting 

 centers when rites including fasting and personal torture were prac- 

 ticed — but the members of the father's clan inflicted the actual cutting 

 for the torture ordeal. At least in later times it was not customary to 

 inflict tortures except at the request of the individual desiring that it 

 be done to him. On some occasions, when the child was very young 

 and not well acquainted with the males of the father's clan, he might 

 ask one of his own clansmen or his own father to perform the act. I 

 found no evidence that one was ever forcibly tortured and the thought 

 of physical compulsion was contrary to native beliefs that vision quests 

 should be sought voluntarily. Informants were in agreement that 

 men formerly submitted to physical torture more frequently and 

 began at an earlier age, citing the greater number of weals observed 

 on their older relatives. 



While living at Fishhook Village, small children not more than 5 

 or 6 years of age were taken to the fasting rites with older brothers 

 and looked after until hunger and thirst could no longer be endured. 

 Rivalry between age-groups was encouraged but one was free to 

 abandon fasting whenever he so desired. Usually first fasting was 

 for a day or two. When one was able to fast for 3 days, he was 

 considered qualified to endure further personal torture. It appears 

 from accounts that a century ago physical torture was inflicted at 

 an earlier age. Maximilian (1906, vol. 23, p. 378), in speaking of 

 the Hidatsa NaxpikE ceremony (Sun Dance), advises us that — 



None but the candidates dance, and the only music is striking a dried buffalo's 

 hide with willow rods. There have been instances of fathers subjecting their 

 children, only six or seven years of age to these tortures. We ourselves saw 

 one suspended by the muscles of the back, after having been compelled to fast 

 four days. No application whatever is subsequently made for the cure of the 

 wounds, which leave large swollen weals, and are much more conspicuous among 



