Enter a name, company, place or keywords to search across this item. Then click "Search" (or hit Enter).
The Valley Nisenan (20 pages)
Go to the Archive Home
Go to Thumbnail View of this Item
Go to Single Page View of this Item
Download the Page Image
Copy the Page Text to the Clipboard
Don't highlight the search terms on the Image
Show the Page Image
Show the Image Page Text
Reset View and Center Image
Zoom Out
Zoom In
Rotate Left
Rotate Right
Toggle Full Page View
Flip Image Horizontally
More Information About this Image
Get a Citation for Page or Image - Copy to the Clipboard
Go to the Previous Page (or Left Arrow key)
Go to the Next Page (or Right Arrow key)
Page: of 20
266 University of California Publications in Am. Arch. and Ethn. — [Vol\24 3 929] Kroeber: The Valley Nigenan = 267
de by the Patwin. Into the Akit enter a. number of dances and of
pirit impersonators, most of the latter being unreported from the
Patwin and Maidu, while the most sacred impersonations of these
groups, such as the Moki, Sili, and Yohyoh, are unknown to the Nisenan. In innumerable specific features, and the emphasis placed on
hem, the Nisenan variably agree or disagree with the two other
peoples. : : :
From the hill Nisenan'there is a sharp differentiation, since according to Powers* and Gifford’* these do not possess a secret society, and
hence, strictly, no Kuksu eult. Gifford has s that most of the
“lil etree 1870-72, by a movement
which was repercussion of the first or Californian
host Dance. Some of their other dances are remembered as brought
in somewhat earlier from the north, presumably from the hill Maidu;
and the remainder, or oldest and locally native stratum, while bearing
some resemblances to features of the Maidu Kuksu cult, such as performance in the dance house, use of the foot drum, occurrence of
skunk and creeper dances, are not organized into a system. In other
words, the hill Nisenan took over some Kuksu cult elements; and quite
likely the Kuksu tribes now and then borrowed from them elements
which they worked into their own system. It is only in this sense that
it is possible to agree with Gifford’s interpretation that the “oldest
stratum’’24 of hill Nisenan dances belongs to the “‘God-impersonating
‘Gult.’? These people evidently had neither true, disguised impersonations of spirits, nor a society, nor any system of relating dances’ into
a scheme; they did have certain performances and paraphernalia that
elsewhere formed part of such an organized cult.
Resemblances are conspicuously few to adjacent Patwin and Miw
fewer to Patwin than to more distant Wintun-Wintu. © This me
that the Patwin and Miwok have specialized. The Maidu-Nis
retained a widely spread and presumably old typ: system.
From the point of view of the valley Maidu and Nisenan, th
means that they have mainly retained the set of kinship terms. ‘
by their hill kinsmen instead of modifying these along the lines of
Patwin whom they specifically resemble in most of their culture.
other words, generic linguistic affiliation more than generic cultur
affiliation has determined their kinship system.
War.—Ya't designated a brave man or war leader ; k’6i, war.
Mokosumni were often eager to fight against Kadema, Yiik’ili, ar
other Nisenan villages; but they were cowardly and quit as soo }
they lost a man. Slings and spears were specific war weapons,
former used by those that had no bows. The sling was said not to
have been used for hunting water fowl. It was made of a piece a
skin with a string at each end; stones could be hurled across the riy
with it. :
Dead people’s eyes, presumably from foes, called k’6’yim ca'we
were used to bewitch the enemy. Medicine men tied them up with
feathers and put them into a hole. This made the foe ‘‘like drunk
weak, foolish, or crazy. The hill Nisenan did the same. The
formant seemed to know nothing of scalps nor of a victory dance oy
heads.
KUKSU CULT
The Kuksu cult or religious organization of the valley Nisenan
of the type known from the Maidu and Patwin, but strikingly diff
ent in many details. There seem to be two societies with separate
initiations: a general society taking in only males but all or most of.
these, and a Kuksu society consisting of a limited number of men and.
women. This is also the scheme of the Patwin, except that these.
possess a third society, the Wai-saltu or North-spirits, which seems not
to be represented among the Nisenan.?1_ The Nisenan general societ ;
conducts most of the dances, but the most. important of these among.
the Patwin and Maidu, the Hesi, does not occur, its place being taken”
by the Akit, which ranks next to the Hesi among the Maidu but is not,
From the Pomo and Yuki, the valley Nisenan, Maidu, and Patwin
differed in that their organization which made the ‘elaborate dances is
the less esoteric part of their system, whereas their Kuksu and Wai“saltu societies, which on the whole correspond most closely to the
Pomo-Yuki ghost or spirit society, are more esoteric, limited in membership, but open to women. Loeb’s interpretation that the ghost and
resurrection initiation is the oldest portion of the cult, the showy
dances being a subsequent addition,** may therefore hold for the
Pomo, or for the world at large if religious initiations everywhere are
22 p. 326.
23 p, 257.
‘24 §till more does the ‘‘second stratum’? from the north resemble Kuksu
elements: witness the kamin, lole, luhuyi, yomuse dances.
25 Pomo Folkways, this series, 19:338, 354, 371, 384, 1926.
21 The situation for the Maidu is not clear, Dixon’s data having been collected)
before anyone suspected that there might be more than one society. His reference
to Kuksu as head and initiator (p. 323) may indicate that there was a separate
Kuksu society. 4
>