Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples Part 15

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 209.]

A sign for _medicine-man, shaman_, is thus described: "With its index-finger extended and pointing upward, or all the fingers extended, back of hand outward, move the right hand from just in front of the forehead, spirally upward, nearly to arm's length, from left to right." (_Dakota_ IV.)

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 210.]

Fig. 210, from the _Dakota Calendar_, represents the making of medicine or conjuration. In that case the head and horns of a white buffalo cow were used.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 211.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 212.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 213.]

Fig. 211 is an Ojibwa pictograph taken from Schoolcraft, _loc. cit._, representing _medicine-man, meda_. With these horns and spiral may be collated Fig. 212 which portrays the ram-headed Egyptian G.o.d Knuphis, or Chnum, the spirit, in a shrine on the boat of the sun, canopied by the serpent-G.o.ddess Ranno, who is also seen facing him inside the shrine. This is reproduced from Cooper's _Serpent Myths_, p. 24.

The same deity is represented in Champollion, _Gram._, p. 113, as reproduced in Fig. 213.

Fig. 214 is an Ojibwa pictograph found in Schoolcraft, I, pl. 58, and given as _power_. It corresponds with the sign for _doctor_, or _medicine-man_, made by the Absarokas by pa.s.sing the extended and separated index and second finger of the right hand upward from the forehead, spirally, and is considered to indicate "superior knowledge." Among the Otos, as part of the sign with the same meaning, both hands are raised to the side of the head, and the extended indices pressing the temples.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 214.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 215.]

Fig. 215 is also an Ojibwa pictograph from Schoolcraft I, pl. 59, and is said to signify _Meda's power_. It corresponds with another sign made for _medicine-man_ by the Absarokas and Comanches, viz, The hand pa.s.sed upward before the forehead, with index loosely extended.

Combined with the sign for _sky_, before given, page 372, it means knowledge of superior matters; spiritual power.

The common sign for _trade_ is made by extending the forefingers, holding them obliquely upward, and crossing them at right angles to one another, usually in front of the chest. This is often abbreviated by merely crossing the forefingers, see Fig. 278, page 452. It is ill.u.s.trated in Fig. 216, taken from the Prince of Wied's _Travels in the Interior of North America; London_, 1843, p. 352.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 216.]

To this the following explanation is given: "The cross signifies, 'I will barter or trade.' Three animals are drawn on the right hand of the cross; one is a buffalo; the two others, a weasel (_Mustela Canadensis_) and an otter. The writer offers in exchange for the skins of these animals (probably meaning that of a white buffalo) the articles which he has drawn on the left side of the cross. He has, in the first place, depicted a beaver very plainly, behind which there is a gun; to the left of the beaver are thirty strokes, each ten separated by a longer line; this means, I will give thirty beaver skins and a gun for the skins of the three animals on the right hand of the cross."

Fig. 217 is from Kingsborough, III, pt. 1, p. 25, and ill.u.s.trates the sign for to _give_ or _to present_, made by the Brule-Dakotas by holding both hands edgewise before the breast, pointing forward and upward, the right above the left, then throwing them quickly downward until the forearms reach a horizontal position.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 217.]

Fig. 218 is taken from the _Dakota Calendar_, representing a successful raid of the Absarokas or Crows upon the Brule-Sioux, in which the village of the latter was surprised and a large number of horses captured. That capture is exhibited by the horse-tracks moving from the _village_, the gesture sign for which is often made by a circle formed either by the opposed thumbs and forefingers of both hands or by a circular motion of both hands, palms inward, toward each other. In some cases there is a motion of the circle, from above downward, as formed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 218.]

Fig. 219, from Kingsborough I, pt. 3, p. 10, represents _Chapultepec_, "Mountain of the Locust," by one enormous locust on top of a hill.

This shows the mode of augmentation in the same manner as is often done by an exaggerated gesture. The curves at the base of the mountain are intelligible only as being formed in the sign for _many_, described on pages 359 and 488.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 219.]

Fig. 220, taken from Pipart, _loc. cit._, is the Mexican pictograph for _soil cultivated_, i.e., tilled and planted. Fig. 221, from the same authority, shows the sprouts coming from the cultivated soil, and may be compared with the signs for _gra.s.s_ and _grow_ on page 343.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 220.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 221.]

The gesture sign for _road, path_, is sometimes made by indicating two lines forward from the body, then imitating walking with the hands upon the imaginary road. The same natural representation of road is seen in Fig. 222, taken from Pipart, _loc. cit._, page 352. A place where two roads meet--cross-roads--is shown in Fig. 223, from Kingsborough. Two persons are evidently having a chat in sign language at the cross-roads.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 222.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 223.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 224.]

If no gesture is actually included in all of the foregoing pictographs, it is seen that a gesture sign is made with the same conception which is obvious in the ideographic pictures. They are selected as specially transparent and clear. Many others less distinct are now the subject of examination for elucidation. The following examples are added to show the ideographic style of pictographs not connected with gestures, lest it may be suspected that an attempt is made to prove that gestures are always included in or connected with them. Fig. 224, from the _Dakota Calendar_, refers to the small-pox which broke out in the year (1802) which it specifies. Fig. 225 shows in the design at the left, a warning or notice, that though a goat can climb up the rocky trail a horse will tumble--"No Thoroughfare." This was contributed by Mr. J.K. Hillers, photographer of the United States Geological Survey, as observed by him in Canon De Ch.e.l.ly, New Mexico, in 1880.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 225.]

SIGNS CONNECTED WITH ETHNOLOGIC FACTS.

The present limits permit only a few examples of the manner in which the signs of Indians refer to sociologic, religious, historic, and other ethnologic facts. They may incite research to elicit further information of the same character.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 226.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 227.]

The Prince of Wied gives in his list of signs the heading _Partisan_, a term of the Canadian voyageurs, signifying a leader of an occasional or volunteer war party, the sign being reported as follows: Make first the sign of the pipe, afterwards open the thumb and index-finger of the right hand, back of the hand outward, and move it forward and upward in a curve. This is explained by the author's account in a different connection, that to become recognized as a leader of such a war party as above mentioned, the first act among the tribes using the sign was the consecration, by fasting succeeded by feasting, of a medicine pipe without ornament, which the leader of the expedition afterward bore before him as his badge of authority, and it therefore naturally became an emblematic sign. This sign with its interpretation supplies a meaning to Fig. 226 from the _Dakota Calendar_ showing "One Feather," a Sioux chief who raised in that year a large war party against the Crows, which fact is simply denoted by his holding out demonstratively an unornamented pipe. In connection with this subject, Fig. 227, drawn and explained by Two Strike, an Ogalala Dakota, relating to his own achievements, displays four plain pipes to exhibit the fact that he had led four war parties.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 228.]

The sign of the pipe or of smoking is made in a different manner, when used to mean _friend_, as follows: (1) Tips of the two first fingers of the right hand placed against or at right angles to the mouth; (2) suddenly elevated upward and outward to imitate smoke expelled.

(_Cheyenne_ II). "We two smoke together." This is ill.u.s.trated in the Ojibwa pictograph, Fig. 228, taken from Schoolcraft I, pl. 59.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 229.]

A ceremonial sign for _peace, friends.h.i.+p_, is the extended fingers, separated (R), interlocked in front of the breast, hands horizontal, backs outward. (_Dakota_ I.) Fig. 229 from the _Dakota Calendar_ exhibits the beginning of this gesture. When the idea conveyed is peace or friends.h.i.+p with the whites, the hand shaking of the latter is adopted as in Fig. 230, also taken from the _Dakota Calendar_, and referring to the peace made in 1855 by General Harney, at Fort Pierre, with a number of the tribes of the Dakotas.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 230.]

It is noticeable that while the ceremonial gesture of uniting or linking hands is common and ancient in token of peace, the practice of shaking hands on meeting, now the annoying etiquette of the Indians in their intercourse with whites, was not until very recently and is even now seldom used by them between each other, and is clearly a foreign importation. Their fancy for affectionate greeting was in giving a pleasant bodily, sensation by rubbing each other on the breast, abdomen, and limbs, or by a hug. The senseless and inconvenient custom of shaking hands is, indeed, by no means general throughout the world, and in the extent to which it prevails in the United States is a subject of ridicule by foreigners. The Chinese, with a higher conception of politeness, shake their own hands. The account of a recent observer of the meeting of two polite Celestials is: "Each placed the fingers of one hand over the fist of the other, so that the thumbs met, and then standing a few feet apart raised his hands gently up and down in front of his breast. For special courtesy, after the foregoing gesture, they place the hand which had been the actor in it on the stomach of its owner, not on that part of the interlocutor, the whole proceeding being subjective, but perhaps a relic of objective performance." In Miss Bird's _Unbeaten Trades in j.a.pan, London_, 1880, the following is given as the salutatory etiquette of that empire: "As acquaintances come in sight of each other they slacken their pace and approach with downcast eyes and averted faces as if neither were worthy of beholding each other; then they bow low, so low as to bring the face, still kept carefully averted, on a level with the knees, on which the palms of the hands are pressed. Afterwards, during the friendly strife of each to give the _pas_ to the other, the palms of the hands are diligently rubbed against each other."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 231.]

The interlocking of the fingers of both hands above given as an Indian sign (other instances being mentioned under the head of SIGNALS, _infra_) is also reported by R. Brough Smyth, _Aborigines of Victoria_, _loc. cit._, Vol. II, p. 308, as made by the natives of Cooper's Creek, Australia, to express the highest degree of friends.h.i.+p, including a special form of hospitality in which the wives of the entertainer performed a part. Fig. 231 is reproduced from a cut in the work referred to.

But besides this interlocked form of signifying the union of friends.h.i.+p the hands are frequently grasped together. Sometimes the sign is abbreviated by simply extending the hand as if about to grasp that of another, and sometimes the two forefingers are laid side by side, which last sign also means, _same, brother_ and _companion_. For description and ill.u.s.tration of these three signs, see respectively pages 521, 527, and 317. A different execution of the same conception of union or linking to signify _friend_ is often made as follows: Hook the curved index over the curved forefinger of the left hand, the palm of the latter pointing forward, the palm of the right hand being turned toward the face; remaining fingers and thumbs being closed.

(_Dakota_ VIII.) Fig. 232.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 232.]

Wied's sign for medicine is "Stir with the right hand into the left, and afterward blow into the latter." All persons familiar with the Indians will understand that the term "medicine," foolishly enough adopted by both French and English to express the aboriginal magic arts, has no therapeutic significance. Very few even pretended remedies were administered to the natives and probably never by the professional shaman, who worked by incantation, often pulverizing and mixing the substances mystically used, to prevent their detection.

The same mixtures were employed in divination. The author particularly mentions Mandan ceremonies, in which a white "medicine" stone, as hard as pyrites, was produced by rubbing in the hand snow or the white feathers of a bird. The blowing away of the disease, considered to be introduced by a supernatural power foreign to the body, was a common part of the juggling performance.