FEWKE9] PALULUKONTI, OR ANKWANTI 43 



Second Act 



The i-recond act, a })urt'alo dance, was one of the best on this eventful 

 night. Several men wearing helmets representing buffalo heads, with 

 lateral horns and shaggv sheepskins, and wool painted black hanging 

 down their backs, entered the room. They carried zigzag slats of 

 wood, symbolic of lightning, and performed a characteristic dance to 

 the beat of a drum. These buflalo personations were accompanied 

 by a masked man and boy representing eagles, who danced before 

 them, uttering calls in imitation of birds. 



The same buffalo dance, but more complicated, was celebrated 

 earlier in the winter in the public plaza of Walpi, at which time the 

 men were accompanied bj- girls dressed as Buffalo maids who did not 

 appear in the second act in the kivas. No representation of the eagles 

 was seen in this public dance. 



The Buflalo maids bore disks decorated with sun emblems on their 

 backs, and carried notched sticks representing "sun ladders"'" in 

 their hands. It is appropriate that this dance should be given by 

 men from the Tanoan pueblo. Hano, as it was probably introduced 

 b}' men of the same stock from the Rio Grande region, by whom this 

 village was settled. 



nird Act 



A new set of actors made their presence known at the entrance to 

 the kiva soon after the departure of the Buffaloes, but these were 

 found, on their entrance, to be verj- unlike those who had preceded them. 

 They brought no sun screens nor serpent efligies with them, but were 

 clothed in ceremonial kilts, and wore masks shaped like helmets. 

 The}' were called Piiiikon katcinas, and were accompanied by two men 

 dressed like women, one representing their grandmother and the 

 other their mother. The former personated Kokyan wiiqti,'' or Spider 

 woman, and wore a closely fftting mask with white crescentic eves 

 painted on a blackened face, and white hair made of raw cotton. She 

 danced before the tire in the middle of the room, gracefulh- posturing 

 her body and arms, while the others sang and danced to the beat of a 

 drum. As the actors tiled out of the room Spider woman distributed 

 to the spectators seeds of corn, melon, and the like.'" 



o Ancient Hopi ladders were notched logs, some of which are still extant on the East mesa. In 

 the winter solstice ceremony at Hano there stand, back of the altars, notched slats of wood called 

 ",sun ladders," which are supposed to be efficacious in rites recalling the sun or aiding an enfeebled 

 sun to rise out of his "home." The prayer-sticks carried by the Buffalo maids are imitations of these 

 sun ladders. 



(•This part was taken by Nanahe, a Hopi who has for many years made his home at Zuni and 

 returned to Walpi to be present at the dance. 



cThe mother and grandmother of Piiiikon katcinas naturally appear as representatives of the 

 ancients of some clan with which this special form of the katcina cult originated. Hahai wiiqti. 

 who does not appear in this act. but in the first and fifth, is represented by Kokyan wiiqti, probably 

 the 3ame supernatural under a different name. 



