THE CIPAULOVI SNAKE CEREMONY 
GENERAL REMARKS 
It has elsewhere been shown that the Snake dance is announced six- 
teen days before its celebration, after a formal smoke by the chiefs on 
the preceding night. The nine days of active ceremonials are composed 
of seven days of secret observances and two of public exhibitions in 
which dances in the plaza occur. One of these takes place on the 
eighth day, and has been called the Antelope;! the other, on the ninth, 
is known as the Snake dance proper. The nomenclature of these nine 
days at Walpi has likewise been given, and the same holds in regard 
to the days of Snake ceremonials at Cipaulovi, Cunopavi, and Oraibi. 
On August 16, the ciictala, or first day at Cipaulovi, I visited both 
Antelope and Snake kivas of this pueblo, but found no altar there. 
This was exceptional, as compared with Walpi, at the very outset, for 
in this pueblo the altar is made on the assembly day (yiinya). The 
Antelope chief was present in the kiva, and a bundle of sticks was 
noticed at the rear end of the room, leaning against the wall. These 
sticks were the crooks which were later set about the altar in a way 
which will be described. The chief said the altar would not be made 
for four days—a statement which I afterward verified—and he added 
that the Snake dance would occur in eight days. While I was talking 
with the Antelope chief, the Snake chief came in, and smoked in a 
formal way; and at the close of the smoke the Antelope chief gave 
him three strings with red stained feathers tied at their ends (known 
as nakwdkiwocis), and a small white feather. When the Snake chief 
received them, be sprinkled a little sacred meal on the bundle of sticks 
and returned to his own kiya. 
So far as I could judge, this ceremony corresponded to the delivery 
of the prayer-sticks (pahos) to Kopeli, the Snake chief, when he went 
on the snake hunt which I have elsewhere described at length,’ for the 
Snake priests immediately set forth on a snake hunt northward from 
the pueblo. For the next four days this simple ceremony of delivery 
of the feathered strings to the Snake chief was repeated, and the Snake 
priests hunted reptiles in the remaining world-quarters, west, south, 
and east, in the prescribed cireuit. 

1'The ‘“‘Oraibi Flute Altar”’ (see the Bibliography at the close of the article). Strictly speaking, 
this dance should be called the Corn dance; but as the corn-growing element of the Snake ceremonial 
is limited to the Antelope priesthood, I retain the name Antelope dance for the public exhibition on 
the eighth day. 
2 Journ. Amer. Eth. and Archveol., Vol. rv, pp. 40, 41. 
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