4 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 



dinavia during the war. This was published in the American An- 

 thropologist under the title "Anthropology During the War : Scan- 

 dinavia." 



During the month of July 1945, Dr. William N. Fenton was en- 

 gaged in a study of place names and related activities of the Corn- 

 planter Senecas. When completed, this series, on which M. H. Dear- 

 dorff of Warren, Pa., and C. E. Congdon of Salamanca, N. Y., have 

 collaborated, will comprise the Indian names of places throughout 

 the valley of the Allegheny Kiver. Another problem on which work 

 was continued was the documenting and description of the Condo- 

 lence Council for installing chiefs in the Iroquois League, the study 

 of which the late J. N. B. Hewitt had commenced a generation ago. 

 Having collected the sacred songs and ritual chants of this ceremony 

 for the Library of Congress in the spring. Dr. Fenton returned to 

 the Six Nations Reserve on October 29, 1945, in the Recording Lab- 

 oratory sound truck for the purpose of making a documentary film. 

 Dr. Fenton was invited to sit in on the rehearsals and attend the instal- 

 lation of two Cayuga chiefs on November 20, 1945. The family of 

 one of the candidates. Chief John Hardy Gibson, has served American 

 ethnology for two generations, and with the help of Howard Skye 

 and the cooperation of the chiefs, a complete transcript of the proceed- 

 ings of the Condolence Council among the Canadian Iroquois was 

 prepared and published for the first time since Horatio Hale's ac- 

 count in the last century. This material, written up on returning 

 from the field, became the body of an illustrated lecture on "The Six 

 Nations of Canada," which Dr. Fenton was invited to deliver before 

 the Royal Canadian Institute of Toronto, January 12, 1946. In the 

 field, Ernest Dodge, of the Peabody Museum of Salem, collaborated 

 in recording some rare Iroquois flute music from James White, Onon- 

 daga of Six Nations. In addition, a complete performance of the 

 Dark Dance Rite of the Little People was recorded with Eli Jacob, 

 Cayuga of Sour Springs, as leading singer. Similar recordings were 

 made of the Death Feast ritual in the spring, and from Howard Skye, 

 an official of the ceremony. Dr. Fenton obtained a fairly complete 

 account of the fall celebration. The same informant helped translate 

 a Cayuga text of the Tutelo Migration Legend, collected by Hewitt. 

 Returning by way of Allegany Reservation, near Salamanca, N. Y., 

 material for a second album of Iroquois songs was collected from 

 singers at Coldspring Longhouse. Christian hymns in Seneca were 

 recorded near West Salamanca to extend coverage of hymn singing 

 already collected in Mohawk and Oneida. Acknowledgment is due 

 the Viking Fund of New York for support of this field work. 



An outstanding event in Iroquois studies was the organization and 

 conduct of the First Conference on Iroquois Research, held October 



