HOPI SNAKE DANCE IS SPECTACULAR CEREMONY

THE SNAKE DANCE, the most spectacular of all surviving ceremonies of the American Indian, is held yearly, late in July, at the different Hopi villages in northern Arizona, the dance at Walpi providing the best spectacle.

The public performance of the Snake Dance is but one episode of an elaborate nine-day ceremony held to propitiate the rain gods. Few portions of the ceremony may be witnessed by the public, as the more sacred rites are conducted in the subterranean kivas of the Antelope society and the Snake fraternity, which jointly conduct the ceremony in its entirety.

The days preceding the final ceremony are spent in various purification rites, the manufacture of prayer sticks, gathering the snakes (which are rattlers and not the benevolent bull-snake of their Smoki brethren) and various other rituals incident to the occasion.

The prayer-sticks are another petition bearing intercession to the rain god. Made of cottonwood, painted and carved in various ways and decorated with feathers, they vary in length according to the distance of the shrine for which they are intended. As to the efficacy of this manner of prayer over the more conventional petitions of the white brother, statistics are lacking.

The Hopi people welcome visitors to the Snake Dance for which they are famous on the final day, and the audience is almost as interesting as the ceremonies. Tourists and spectators from every rank of life, from the bored Englishman with a copy of London "Punch" in his hand to the cowboys and Indians of our native state.

Just before sundown on the important ninth day the Antelopes, in full regalia, with faces and bodies painted, emerge from their kiva, form a line before the Snake Kiva and then proceed to circle the plaza four times, stamping vigorously on the sipapu, the sacred hole from which the first beings emerged from the darkness of the underworld, according to Hopi mythology. The stamping is to call attention of the powers that be of what is going on.

In marked contrast to the sedate Antelopes the Snake society then rushes into the plaza, led by its chief, the members clad in barbaric splendor and carrying the paraphernalia to be used in the dance. After circling the plaza four times they form a line facing the Antelope Society, which now breaks into a low, humming song, swaying their bodies laterally in rythm with the music, while the Snake society steps to and fro, moving their feather snake whips back and forth in time with the rattles and song.

The Snake priests arrange themselves into groups of three, called respectively the carrier, the hugger and the gatherer. The snakes having been brought from their kiva, each carrier kneels down and reaching his arm into the bag of writhing snakes, he draws one out. He places the squirming creature in his mouth, holding the body near the middle and allowing the two ends to dangle freely. At Walpi the dancers express contempt for those of the other pueblos, who hold the two loose ends of the snake with the hands or grasp it near the neck with their mouths. The groups then begin making the ceremonial circuit of the plaza and the most exciting episode of the Snake Dance is under way.

Excitement Begins

The huggers, each with the left arm placed around the carrier's neck, distract the attention of the snakes by brushing their feather snake-whips before the heads of the serpents. The snakes are strong and occasionally one wriggles free and attempts to escape. It is now the duty of the gatherer to recapture the reptile lost by his group. As the plaza is filled with priests making the circuit, the excitement, which has become intense, is heightened as an occasional serpent dashes toward the crowd, pursued by his gatherer; or an occasional spectator, is struck in the face by the body of a live snake carried by one of the priests. During the entire dance the priests conduct themselves as though the spectators were not present and a spectator who happens to be in the path of a fast-charging carrier or gatherer is treated with scant courtesy.

After all the snakes have been carried the chief priests make a large ring of corn meal on the ground and across it is formed six radial lines representing the Six Directions. At a given signal all of the snakes are cast into the ring. A signal is given and the women cast corn meal into the seething mass; whereupon all the Snake Prists rush up to the ring, grasp as many snakes as they can hold in both hands and dash with(Turn to Page Fifteen)