Bowers] HIDATSA SOCIAL AND CEREMONIAL ORGANIZATION 321 



remarry. There was one important exception to this rule; the widow 

 could marry the deceased husband's brother or one who owned the 

 same bundle rights without bringing bad luck to the husband since 

 they were familiar with, and had participated in, the ceremony. 

 Since this rarely happened, widows of bundle owners generally 

 remained unmarried as in the case of Mrs. Good Bear who took the 

 vow when her husband died and was never asked to marry thereafter.^" 

 The ceremony has frequently been compared with the Mandan 

 Okipa as though the two ceremonies were identical. This is not the 

 case. The entire drama involved quite different culture heroes and 

 settings. By comparison with the complex Mandan Okipa, the 

 Hidatsa Naxpiks is a very simple rite. Maximilian wrote: 



They likewise celebrate the Okippe (which they call Akupehri), but with several 

 deviations. Thus, instead of the so-called ark, a kind of high pole, with a fork 

 on the summit, is planted in the centre of the open circle. [Natives insist that 

 this is not true; that the ceremony was always performed at the edge of the 

 village. These dancing spots can still be identified at several of the old village 

 sites.] When the partisans of the war parties intend to go on some enterprise 

 in May or June, the preparations are combined with the Okippe of several young 

 men, who wish to obtain the rank of the brave, or men.^i . . . The partisan 

 [pledger] is bound to build the medicine lodge. During the ceremony the spec- 

 tators eat and smoke; the candidates take nothing, and, like the partisans, are 

 covered all over with white clay. The latter, when they dance during the cere- 

 mony, remain near their pits, and then move on the same spot, holding in their 

 hands their medicines, a buffalo's tail, a feather, or the like. 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. [Maxi- 

 mihan, 1906, vol. 23, pp. 377-378.] 



I doubt that the ceremony was called Akuperi since that is the 

 term by which the Mandan Okipa ceremony is known today. His 

 description of the Naxpiks ceremony, which is the only one employ- 

 ing the forked post, is essentially the same as described to me except 

 that, in later years, the principal torture feature was performed on 

 the third day and fathers didj not subject their sons to torture unless 

 requested by the son (and then at an older age). 



The Charles McKenzie account of 1805 (McKenzie, 1889, vol. 1, 

 pp. 354-357) from his observations of a performance at Hidatsa 

 village indicates that the torture feature was more severe at that time 

 than in 1879 when Good Bear performed the ceremony. He mentions 

 simultaneous "assembly line" piercing of the flesh of a number of 



"> I asked several men why they did not marry her and each said that she was holy and they would 

 have bad luck. 



" Maximilian is correct that the rites stim ulated military activities; those who had good dreams were 

 always quick to test the potency of their dreams by going out to take possession of the property promised 

 them by the supernatural. 



