Post by Okwes on Jan 13, 2008 17:59:37 GMT -5
Fish Clan Origins - Winnebago
by Richard L. Dieterle
Little is publicly known about the Fish Clan (Ho Hik'ik'áradjera) or what
its social functions were. The Fish Clan and the Snake Clan were to be the
first line of defense should their village be attacked. [1] Some of the
personal names of Fish clansmen survive [2]:
Ho-apcudjewîga - Red fish Scale Woman (R)
Hotcûktcûkwîga - She who has Plenty of Great Fish (F)
Nahuskáka - White Sturgeon (F)
Watcoginiwîga - Goes Ahead of Them (common to all clans) (R)
Goes Ahead of Them (common to all clans) (R) It is said that, like their
friends the Snake Clan, the Fish Clan was a late addition to the tribe. This
claim is almost certainly not the case, but is rather a symbolic statement,
as the youngest is usually portrayed as the strongest. It may have broken
off from the Snake Clan as one of its subclans, as there is no trace of a
Fish Clan among the closely related Chiwere tribes (the Oto, Ioway, and
Missouria). The Çegiha Siouan tribe, the Quapah, however, were said to have
had a Fish Clan. [3]
The Fish Clan could well claim a special status, inasmuch as the name of the
nation, Hotcâgara, means both "Great Voice," and "Great Fish.," since the
first compound, ho, can mean either "voice," or "fish." It was an early
tradition that the "great fish" in question was the whale, according to
Wak'âhaga ("Snake Skin") [portrait] of the Snake Clan. He thought that the
Hotcâgara had migrated from the Pacific southwest where whales are common,
but the true reason must lie elsewhere. [4] It may mean that among the fish
of the sea, the Hotcâgara are whales; thus they have a big voice in the
affairs of state.
Version 1
by John Fisher (Fish Clan)
"Four brothers and four sisters came on earth and each belong to different
divisions of the family [clan]. They came out of the water. They became
people." [5]
Version 2 (?)
by Alexander Longtail, Buffalo Clan
There is another waikâ that strongly suggests itself as the origin story for
the Fish Clan. This is The Man who went to the Upper and Lower Worlds, which
is told in brief here.
The Chief of Fishes once came to earth to live as a man. He had two sons,
who eventually came to live apart from one another. The younger brother, who
lived in a lodge like the Hotcâgara build, killed a bear and was about to
eat it when something seem to hiss at him. He could not find the source, so
he went to the upper and lower worlds asking who might have done it, but no
one said that they had. He traveled over the surface of the earth and asked
some people if they had done it, but they rudely ignored him, so he shot an
arrow at them. When he returned home, his elder brother arrived to warn him
of an impending attack. Instead of fleeing, they fought, but were out
manned. Finally, they did flee to their father's place, and he in turn took
them to an island. There he rested satisfied, and in time returned to the
waters in his natural form as a fish. [6]
Commentary.:
In the first story we find that the original clan was divided into four
parts as was the case with so many other clans, suggesting that each of the
Hotcâk clans was comprised of four subclans.
In the second story, who were the two brothers left behind? They were human,
but descended from the Chief of the Fishes, which makes them piscoid. One
was, by implication, a Hotcâk or proto-Hotcâk. It would seem, then, that
they might be the progenitors of the Fish and Snake Clans.
However, the story makes no reference to the Creation Council at which the
progenitors of the Hotcâk clans first met at Red Banks to form the nation.
On the other hand, only one version of one story, the Thunderbird Clan
Origin Myth, mentions the Fish Clan as being at the Creation Council; all
the other clan origin stories fail to mention them. [7] However, inasmuch as
we are also missing the Snake Clan origin story, we do not know whether the
two brothers, the sons of the Chief of the Fishes, did not eventually come
to Red Banks and the Creation Council.
Notes:
[1] David Lee Smith, Folklore of the Winnebago Tribe (Norman: University of
Oklahoma Press, 1997) 9.
[2] The list was composed from the following sources:
(F) Thomas Foster, Foster's Indian Record and Historical Data (Washington,
D. C.: 1876-1877) vol. 1, #1: p. 4, coll. 3-4.
(R) Paul Radin, The Winnebago Tribe (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press,
1990 [1923]) 202.
[3] J. Owen Dorsey, "The Social Organization of the Siouan Tribes," 336-338.
[4] Personal communication from B. W. Brisbois to Rueben G. Thwaites (1882),
Wisconsin Historical Collections, 10 (1885): 500; Lawson, "The Winnebago
Tribe," 83.
[5] John Fisher (Fish Clan), "Fish Family/Clan," in Paul Radin,
[unpublished] Winnebago Notes, Winnebago I, #7a, Freeman number 3881
(Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1908) 101.
[6] Philip Longtail, "The Man who Visited the Upper and Lower Worlds," 4800,
Dorsey Papers: Winnebago 3.3.2, (National Anthropological Archives,
Smithsonian Institution, 1893).
[7] Radin, The Winnebago Tribe, 166. Informant: a member of the Thunderbird
Clan.
hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.FishClanOrigins.html
by Richard L. Dieterle
Little is publicly known about the Fish Clan (Ho Hik'ik'áradjera) or what
its social functions were. The Fish Clan and the Snake Clan were to be the
first line of defense should their village be attacked. [1] Some of the
personal names of Fish clansmen survive [2]:
Ho-apcudjewîga - Red fish Scale Woman (R)
Hotcûktcûkwîga - She who has Plenty of Great Fish (F)
Nahuskáka - White Sturgeon (F)
Watcoginiwîga - Goes Ahead of Them (common to all clans) (R)
Goes Ahead of Them (common to all clans) (R) It is said that, like their
friends the Snake Clan, the Fish Clan was a late addition to the tribe. This
claim is almost certainly not the case, but is rather a symbolic statement,
as the youngest is usually portrayed as the strongest. It may have broken
off from the Snake Clan as one of its subclans, as there is no trace of a
Fish Clan among the closely related Chiwere tribes (the Oto, Ioway, and
Missouria). The Çegiha Siouan tribe, the Quapah, however, were said to have
had a Fish Clan. [3]
The Fish Clan could well claim a special status, inasmuch as the name of the
nation, Hotcâgara, means both "Great Voice," and "Great Fish.," since the
first compound, ho, can mean either "voice," or "fish." It was an early
tradition that the "great fish" in question was the whale, according to
Wak'âhaga ("Snake Skin") [portrait] of the Snake Clan. He thought that the
Hotcâgara had migrated from the Pacific southwest where whales are common,
but the true reason must lie elsewhere. [4] It may mean that among the fish
of the sea, the Hotcâgara are whales; thus they have a big voice in the
affairs of state.
Version 1
by John Fisher (Fish Clan)
"Four brothers and four sisters came on earth and each belong to different
divisions of the family [clan]. They came out of the water. They became
people." [5]
Version 2 (?)
by Alexander Longtail, Buffalo Clan
There is another waikâ that strongly suggests itself as the origin story for
the Fish Clan. This is The Man who went to the Upper and Lower Worlds, which
is told in brief here.
The Chief of Fishes once came to earth to live as a man. He had two sons,
who eventually came to live apart from one another. The younger brother, who
lived in a lodge like the Hotcâgara build, killed a bear and was about to
eat it when something seem to hiss at him. He could not find the source, so
he went to the upper and lower worlds asking who might have done it, but no
one said that they had. He traveled over the surface of the earth and asked
some people if they had done it, but they rudely ignored him, so he shot an
arrow at them. When he returned home, his elder brother arrived to warn him
of an impending attack. Instead of fleeing, they fought, but were out
manned. Finally, they did flee to their father's place, and he in turn took
them to an island. There he rested satisfied, and in time returned to the
waters in his natural form as a fish. [6]
Commentary.:
In the first story we find that the original clan was divided into four
parts as was the case with so many other clans, suggesting that each of the
Hotcâk clans was comprised of four subclans.
In the second story, who were the two brothers left behind? They were human,
but descended from the Chief of the Fishes, which makes them piscoid. One
was, by implication, a Hotcâk or proto-Hotcâk. It would seem, then, that
they might be the progenitors of the Fish and Snake Clans.
However, the story makes no reference to the Creation Council at which the
progenitors of the Hotcâk clans first met at Red Banks to form the nation.
On the other hand, only one version of one story, the Thunderbird Clan
Origin Myth, mentions the Fish Clan as being at the Creation Council; all
the other clan origin stories fail to mention them. [7] However, inasmuch as
we are also missing the Snake Clan origin story, we do not know whether the
two brothers, the sons of the Chief of the Fishes, did not eventually come
to Red Banks and the Creation Council.
Notes:
[1] David Lee Smith, Folklore of the Winnebago Tribe (Norman: University of
Oklahoma Press, 1997) 9.
[2] The list was composed from the following sources:
(F) Thomas Foster, Foster's Indian Record and Historical Data (Washington,
D. C.: 1876-1877) vol. 1, #1: p. 4, coll. 3-4.
(R) Paul Radin, The Winnebago Tribe (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press,
1990 [1923]) 202.
[3] J. Owen Dorsey, "The Social Organization of the Siouan Tribes," 336-338.
[4] Personal communication from B. W. Brisbois to Rueben G. Thwaites (1882),
Wisconsin Historical Collections, 10 (1885): 500; Lawson, "The Winnebago
Tribe," 83.
[5] John Fisher (Fish Clan), "Fish Family/Clan," in Paul Radin,
[unpublished] Winnebago Notes, Winnebago I, #7a, Freeman number 3881
(Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1908) 101.
[6] Philip Longtail, "The Man who Visited the Upper and Lower Worlds," 4800,
Dorsey Papers: Winnebago 3.3.2, (National Anthropological Archives,
Smithsonian Institution, 1893).
[7] Radin, The Winnebago Tribe, 166. Informant: a member of the Thunderbird
Clan.
hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.FishClanOrigins.html