The Medicine-Men of the Apache. (1892 N 09 / 1887-1888 (pages 443-604))

Regnard, a traveler in Lapland, makes the statement that when the shamans of that country began to lose their teeth they retired from practice. There is nothing of this kind to be noted among the Apache or other tribes of North America with which I am in any degree familiar. On the contrary, some of the most influential of those whom I have known have been old and decrepit men, with thin, gray hair and teeth gone or loose in their heads. In a description given by Corbusier of a great "medicine" ceremony of the Apache-Yuma at Camp Verde, it is stated that the principal officer was a "toothless, gray-haired man."32

Among many savage or barbarous peoples of the world albinos have been reserved for the priestly office. There are many well marked examples of albinism among the Pueblos of New Mexico and Arizona, especially among the Zuñi and Tusayan; but in no case did I learn that the individuals thus distinguished were accredited with power not ascribable to them under ordinary circumstances. Among the Cheyenne I saw one family, all of whose members had the crown lock white. They were not medicine-men, neither were any of the members of the single albino family among the Navajo in 1881.

It is a well known fact that among the Romans epilepsy was looked upon as a disease sent direct from the gods, and that it was designated the "sacred disease" – morbus sacer. Mahomet is believed to have been an epileptic. The nations of the East regard epileptics and the insane as inspired from on high.

Our native tribes do not exactly believe that the mildly insane are gifted with medical or spiritual powers; but they regard them with a feeling of superstitious awe, akin to reverence. I have personally known several cases of this kind, though not within late years, and am not able to say whether or not the education of the younger generation in our schools has as yet exercised an influence in eradicating this sentiment.

Strange to say, I was unable to find any observance of lucky or unlucky days among the Apache. The Romans in the period of their greatest enlightenment had their days, both "fasti" and "nefasti." Neither was I able to determine the selection of auspicious days for marriage; indeed, it was stated that the medicine-men had nothing to do with marriage. Among the Zapotecs the wedding day was fixed by the priests.33 In this the Apache again stands above the Roman who would not marry in the month dedicated to the goddess Maia (May), because human sacrifice used to be offered in that month. This superstition survived in Europe until a comparatively recent period. According to Picart the Hebrew rabbis designated the days upon which weddings should take place.

Herbert Spencer34 says that the medicine-men of the Arawaks claimed the "jus primæ noctis." There is no such privilege claimed or conceded among the North American tribes, to my knowledge, and the Arawaks would seem to be alone among the natives of the whole continent in this respect.

In the town of Cumaná, in Amaracapanna, apparently close to Carthagena, in the present republic of Colombia, South America, the medicine-men, according to Girolamo Benzoni, exercised the "jus primæ noctis."35

To recover stolen or lost property, especially ponies, is one of the principal tasks imposed upon the medicine-men. They rely greatly upon the aid of pieces of crystal in effecting this. I made a friend of an Apache medicine-man by presenting him with a large crystal of denticulated spar, much larger than the one of whose mystical properties he had just been boasting to me. I can not say how this property of the crystal is manifested. Na-a-cha, the medicine-man alluded to, could give no explanation, except that by looking into it he could see everything he wanted to see.

The name of an American Indian is a sacred thing, not to be divulged by the owner himself without due consideration. One may ask a warrior of any tribe to give his name and the question will be met with either a point-blank refusal or the more diplomatic evasion that he can not understand what is wanted of him. The moment a friend approaches, the warrior first interrogated will whisper what is wanted, and the friend can tell the name, receiving a reciprocation of the courtesy from the other. The giving of names to children is a solemn matter, and one in which the medicine-men should always be consulted. Among the Plains tribes the children were formerly named at the moment of piercing their ears, which should occur at the first sun dance after their birth, or rather as near their first year as possible. The wailing of the children at the sun dance as their ears were slit will always be to me a most distressing memory.

The warriors of the Plains tribes used to assume agnomens or battle names, and I have known some of them who had enjoyed as many as four or five; but the Apache name once conferred seems to remain through life, except in the case of the medicine-men, who, I have always suspected, change their names upon assuming their profession, much as a professor of learning in China is said to do.

The names of mothers-in-law are never mentioned and it would be highly improper to ask for them by name; neither are the names of the dead, at least not for a long period of time. But it often happens that the child will bear the name of its grandfather or some other relative who was a distinguished warrior.

All charms, idols, talismans, medicine hats, and other sacred regalia should be made, or at least blessed, by the medicine-men. They assume charge of all ceremonial feasts and dances – such as the nubile dance, which occurs when any maiden attains marriageable age, and war dances preceding battle. Nearly all preparations for the warpath are under their control, and when on the trail of the enemy their power is almost supreme. Not a night passes but that the medicine-men get into the "ta-a-chi," or sweat bath, if such a thing be possible, and there remain for some minutes, singing and making "medicine" for the good of the party. After dark they sit around the fire and sing and talk with the spirits and predict the results of the campaign. I have alluded quite fully to these points in a previous work.

When a man is taken sick the medicine-men are in the zenith of their glory. One or two will assume charge of the case, and the clansmen and friends of the patient are called upon to supply the fire and help out in the chorus. On such occasions the Apache use no music except a drum or a rawhide. The drum is nearly always improvised from an iron camp kettle, partially filled with water and covered with a piece of cloth, well soaped and drawn as tight as possible. The drumstick does not terminate in a ball, as with us, but is curved into a circle, and the stroke is not perpendicular to the surface, but is often given from one side to the other. The American Indian's theory of disease is the theory of the Chaldean, the Assyrian, the Hebrew, the Greek, the Roman – all bodily disorders and ailments are attributed to the maleficence of spirits who must be expelled or placated. Where there is only one person sick, the exercises consist of singing and drumming exclusively, but dancing is added in all cases when an epidemic is raging in the tribe. The medicine-men lead off in the singing, to which the assistants reply with a refrain which at times has appeared to me to be antiphonal. Then the chorus is swelled by the voices of the women and larger children and rises and falls with monotonous cadence. Prayers are recited, several of which have been repeated to me and transcribed; but very frequently the words are ejaculatory and confined to such expressions as "ugashe" (go away), and again there is to be noted the same mumbling of incoherent phrases which has been the stock in trade of medicine-men in all ages and places. This use of gibberish was admitted by the medicine-men, who claimed that the words employed and known only to themselves (each individual seemed to have his own vocabulary) were mysteriously effective in dispelling sickness of any kind. Gibberish was believed to be more potential in magic than was language which the practitioner or his dupes could comprehend. In Saxon Leechdoms, compiled by Cockayne, will be seen a text of gibberish to be recited by those wishing to stanch the flow of blood. (See p. 464.)

In the following citations it will be observed that Adair and Catlin were grievously in error in their respective statements. Adair denies that Indians on the warpath or elsewhere depend upon their "augurs" for instruction and guidance.36 Gomara is authority for the statement that the natives of Hispaniola never made war without consulting their medicine-men – "no sin respuesta de los ídolos ó sin la de los sacerdotes, que adevinan."37

The medicine-men of Chicora (our present South Carolina) sprinkled the warriors with the juice of a certain herb as they were about to engage in battle.38

In Chicora "Mascaban los Sacerdotes una Ierva, i con el çumo de ella rociaban los Soldados, quando querian dar batalla, que era bendecirlos."39

"Among the Abipones [of Paraguay] the medicine-man teaches them the place, time, and manner proper for attacking wild beasts or the enemy."40

"The North American Indians are nowhere idolaters."41

Idols were always carried to war by the natives of Hispaniola: "Atanse á la frente ídolos chiquitos cuando quieren pelear."42

"Among the primitive Germans * * * the maintenance of discipline in the field as in the council was left in great measure to the priests; they took the auguries and gave the signal for onset."43

"In New Caledonia * * * the priests go to battle, but sit in the distance, fasting and praying for victory."44

Our hunting songs and war songs may be a survival of the incantations of Celtic or Teutonic medicine-men.

The adoption or retention of obsolete phraseology as a hieratic language which has been noted among many nations of the highest comparative development is a manifestation of the same mental process.

Gibberish was so invariable an accompaniment of the sacred antics of the medicine-men of Mexico that Fray Diego Duran warns his readers that if they see any Indian dancing and singing, "ó diciendo algunas palabras que no son inteligibles, pues es de saber que aquellos representaban Dioses."45

Henry Youle Hind says:

The Dakotahs have a common and a sacred language. The conjurer, the war prophet, and the dreamer employ a language in which words are borrowed from other Indian tongues and dialects; they make much use of descriptive expressions, and use words apart from the ordinary signification. The Ojibways abbreviate their sentences and employ many elliptical forms of expression, so much so that half-breeds, quite familiar with the colloquial language, fail to comprehend a medicine-man when in the full flow of excited oratory.46

"Blood may be stanched by the words sicycuma, cucuma, ucuma, cuma, uma, ma, a."47 There are numbers of these gibberish formulæ given, but one is sufficient.

"The third part of the magic48 of the Chaldeans belonged entirely to that description of charlatanism which consists in the use of gestures, postures, and mysterious speeches, as byplay, and which formed an accompaniment to the proceedings of the thaumaturgist well calculated to mislead."49

Sahagun50 calls attention to the fact that the Aztec hymns were in language known only to the initiated.

It must be conceded that the monotonous intonation of the medicine-men is not without good results, especially in such ailments as can be benefited by the sleep which such singing induces. On the same principle that petulant babies are lulled to slumber by the crooning of their nurses, the sick will frequently be composed to a sound and beneficial slumber, from which they awake refreshed and ameliorated. I can recall, among many other cases, those of Chaundezi ("Long Ear," or "Mule") and Chemihuevi-Sal, both chiefs of the Apache, who recovered under the treatment of their own medicine-men after our surgeons had abandoned the case. This recovery could be attributed only to the sedative effects of the chanting.

Music of a gentle, monotonous kind has been prescribed in the medical treatment of Romans, Greeks, and even of comparatively modern Europeans. John Mason Goode, in his translation of Lucretius' De Natura Rerum, mentions among others Galen, Theophrastus, and Aulus Gellius. An anonymous writer in the Press of Philadelphia, Pa., under date of December 23, 1888, takes the ground that its use should be resumed.

The noise made by medicine-men around the couch of the sick is no better, no worse, than the clangor of bells in Europe. Bells, we are told, were rung on every possible occasion. Brand is full of quaint information on this head. According to him they were rung in Spain when women were in labor,51 at weddings,52 to dispel thunder, drive away bad spirits, and frustrate the deviltry of witches;53 throughout Europe on the arrival of emperors, kings, the higher nobility, bishops, etc.,54 to ease pain of the dead,55 were solemnly baptized, receiving names,56 and became the objects of superstition, various powers being ascribed to them.57

Adair, who was gifted with an excellent imagination, alludes to the possession of an "ark" by the medicine-men of the Creeks and other tribes of the Mississippi country, among whom he lived for so many years as a trader. The Apache have no such things; but I did see a sacred bundle or package, which I was allowed to feel, but not to open, and which I learned contained some of the lightning-riven twigs upon which they place such dependence. This was carried by a young medicine-man, scarcely out of his teens, during Gen. Crook's expedition into the Sierra Madre, Mexico, in 1883, in pursuit of the hostile Chiricahua Apache. Maj. Frank North also told me that the Pawnee had a sacred package which contained, among other objects of veneration, the skin of an albino buffalo calf.

There are allusions by several authorities to the necessity of confession by the patient before the efforts of the medicine-men can prove efficacious.58

This confession, granting that it really existed, could well be compared to the warpath secret, which imposed upon all the warriors engaged the duty of making a clean breast of all delinquencies and secured them immunity from punishment for the same, even if they had been offenses against some of the other warriors present.

The Sioux and others had a custom of "striking the post" in their dances, especially the sun dance, and there was then an obligation upon the striker to tell the truth. I was told that the medicine-men were wont to strike with a club the stalagmites in the sacred caves of the Apache, but what else they did I was not able to ascertain.

Under the title of "hoddentin" will be found the statement made by one of the Apache as to the means employed to secure the presence of a medicine-man at the bedside of the sick. I give it for what it is worth, merely stating that Kohl, in his Kitchi-Gami, if I remember correctly, refers to something of the same kind where the medicine-man is represented as being obliged to respond to every summons made unless he can catch the messenger within a given distance and kick him.

There is very little discrepancy of statement as to what would happen to a medicine-man in case of failure to cure; but many conflicting stories have been in circulation as to the number of patients he would be allowed to kill before incurring risk of punishment. My own conclusions are that there is no truth whatever in the numbers alleged, either three or seven, but that a medicine-man would be in danger, under certain circumstances, if he let only one patient die on his hands. These circumstances would be the verdict of the spirit doctors that he was culpably negligent or ignorant. He could evade death at the hands of the patient's kinsfolk only by flight or by demonstrating that a witch had been at the bottom of the mischief.59

Medicine-men, called "wizards" by Falkner, sometimes were killed by the Patagonians, when unsuccessful in their treatment, and were also obliged to wear women's clothing. They were selected in youth for supposed qualifications, especially if epileptic.60

In Hispaniola we are told that when a man died his friends resorted to necromancy to learn whether he had died through the neglect of the attending medicine-man to observe the prescribed fasts. If they found the medicine-man guilty, they killed him and broke all his bones. In spite of this the medicine-man often returned to life and had to be killed again, and mutilated by castration and otherwise.61

Herrera repeats the story about a patient who died and whose relatives felt dissatisfied with the medicine-man:

Para saber si la muerte fue por su culpa, tomaban el çumo de cierta Ierva, i cortaban las vñas del muerto, i los cabellos de encima de la frente, i los hacian polvos, i mezclados con el çumo, se lo daban à beber al muerto por la boca, i las narices, i luego le preguntaban muchas veces, si el Medico guardò dieta, hasta que hablando el demonio, respondia tan claro, como si fuera vivo, i decia, que el Medico no hiço dieta, i luego le bolvian à la sepultura.

Then the relatives attacked the medicine-man: "I le daban tantos palos, que le quebraban los braços, i las piernas, i à otros sacaban los ojos, i los cortaban sus miembros genitales."62

Alexander the Great expressed his sorrow at the death of his friend Hephæstion by crucifying the poor physicians who had attended the deceased.63

The medicine-men of the Natchez were put to death when they failed to cure.64

The Apache attach as much importance to the necessity of "laying the manes" of their dead as the Romans did. They have not localized the site of the future world as the Mohave have, but believe that the dead remain for a few days or nights in the neighborhood of the place where they departed from this life, and that they try to communicate with their living friends through the voice of the owl. If a relative hears this sound by night, or, as often happens, he imagines that he has seen the ghost itself, he hurries to the nearest medicine-man, relates his story, and carries out to the smallest detail the prescription of feast, singing, dancing, and other means of keeping the spirit in good humor on the journey which it will now undertake to the "house of spirits," the "chidin-bi-kungua." Nearly all medicine-men claim the power of going there at will, and not a few who are not medicine-men claim the same faculty.

The medicine-men of the Apache are paid by each patient or by his friends at the time they are consulted. There is no such thing as a maintenance fund, no system of tithes, nor any other burden for their support, although I can recall having seen while among the Zuñi one of the medicine-men who was making cane holders for the tobacco to be smoked at a coming festival, and whose fields were attended and his herds guarded by the other members of the tribe.

Among the Eskimo "the priest receives fees beforehand."65

"Tous ces sorciers ne réfusaient leurs secours à personne, pourvu qu'on les payait."66

"Among other customs was that of those who came to be cured, giving their bow and arrows, shoes, and beads to the Indians who accompanied Vaca and his companions."67 (But we must remember that Vaca and his comrades traveled across the continent as medicine-men.)

"Las sementeras que hacen los Assenais son tambien de comunidad y comienzan la primera en la casa de su Chemisi que es su sacerdote principal y el que cuida de la Casa del Fuego."68 The Asinai extended as far east as the present city of Natchitoches (Nacogdoches).

Spencer quotes Bernan and Hilhouse to the effect that the poor among the Arawaks of South America (Guiana) have no names because they can not pay the medicine-men.69

As a general rule, the medicine-men do not attend to their own families, neither do they assist in cases of childbirth unless specially needed. To both these rules there are exceptions innumerable. While I was at San Carlos Agency, Surgeon Davis was sent for to help in a case of uterine inertia, and I myself have been asked in the pueblo of Nambé, New Mexico, to give advice in a case of puerperal fever.

The medicine-men are accused of administering poisons to their enemies. Among the Navajo I was told that they would put finely pounded glass in food.

MEDICINE-WOMEN

There are medicine-women as well as medicine-men among the Apache, with two of whom I was personally acquainted. One named "Captain Jack" was well advanced in years and physically quite feeble, but bright in intellect and said to be well versed in the lore of her people. She was fond of instructing her grandchildren, whom she supported, in the prayers and invocations to the gods worshiped by her fathers, and I have several times listened carefully and unobserved to these recitations and determined that the prayers were the same as those which had already been given to myself as those of the tribe. The other was named Tze-go-juni, a Chiricahua, and a woman with a most romantic history. She had passed five years in captivity among the Mexicans in Sonora and had learned to speak Spanish with facility. A mountain lion had severely mangled her in the shoulder and knee, and once she had been struck by lightning; so that whether by reason of superior attainments or by an appeal to the superstitious reverence of her comrades, she wielded considerable influence. These medicine-women devote their attention principally to obstetrics, and have many peculiar stories to relate concerning pre-natal influences and matters of that sort. Tze-go-juni wore at her neck the stone amulet, shaped like a spear, which is figured in the illustrations of this paper. The material was the silex from the top of a mountain, taken from a ledge at the foot of a tree which had been struck by lightning. The fact that siliceous rock will emit sparks when struck by another hard body appeals to the reasoning powers of the savage as a proof that the fire must have been originally deposited therein by the bolt of lightning. A tiny piece of this arrow or lance was broken off and ground into the finest powder, and then administered in water to women during time of gestation. I have found the same kind of arrows in use among the women of Laguna and other pueblos. This matter will receive more extended treatment in my coming monograph on "Stone Worship."

Mendieta is authority for the statement that the Mexicans had both medicine-men and medicine-women. The former attended to the sick men and the latter to the sick women. "Á las mujeres siempre las curaban otras mujeres, y á los hombres otros hombres."70 Some of the medicine-women seem to have made an illicit use of the knowledge they had acquired, in which case both the medicine-woman and the woman concerned were put to death. "La mujer preñada que tomaba con que abortar y echar la criatura, ella y la física que le habia dado con que la lanzase, ambas morian."71

Gomara asserts that they were to be found among the Indians of Chicora (South Carolina).72 He calls them "viejas" (old women).

"Los Medicos eran Mugeres viejas, i no havia otras."73 In Nicaragua, "Las Viejas curaban los Enfermos."74

There were medicine-women in Goazacoalco: "Tienen Medicos para curar las enfermedades, i los mas eran Mugeres, grandes Herbolarias, que hacian todas las curas con Iervas."75

Bernal Diaz, in 1568, speaks of having, on a certain occasion, at the summit of a high mountain, found "an Indian woman, very fat, and having with her a dog of that species, which they breed in order to eat, and which do not bark. This Indian was a witch; she was in the act of sacrificing the dog, which is a signal of hostility."76

"The office of medicine-man though generally usurped by males does not appertain to them exclusively, and at the time of our visit the one most extensively known was a black (or meztizo) woman, who had acquired the most unbounded influence by shrewdness, joined to a hideous personal appearance, and a certain mystery with which she was invested."77 Creeks have medicine-women as well as medicine-men. The Eskimo have medicine-men and medicine-women.78 The medicine-men and women of the Dakota "can cause ghosts to appear on occasion."79

Speaking of the Chippewa, Spencer says: "Women may practice soothsaying, but the higher religious functions are performed only by men."80

The medicine-men of the Apache do not assume to live upon food different from that used by the laity. There are such things as sacred feasts among the tribes of North America – as, for example, the feast of stewed puppy at the sun dance of the Sioux – but in these all people share.