San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1894-12-08
SIOUX SUPERSTITIONS.
Barbarity of Some of Their An
cient Religious Rites.
Ruins and Relics Which Bear Witness to
the Weird Ceremonies of By-Gone
Days-The Gods Whom the
Redmen Invoked.

To the Sioux of the past, religion
was truly mystery. From the simple
growth of the blade of grass to the
complex phenomena of the thunder
storm, all life, power and strength
were interpreted as the physical acts
of unknown gods. The Great Spirit,
writes Lieut.. William H. Wassell in
Harper's Magazine, is name given US
by the interpreter, for the Sioux had no
conception of a single spirit, however
great, capable of ruling the universe.
Lightning was the anger of a thunder
god, an awful bird, whose structure
varied from wings containing only six
quilts to wings with four joints each,
according to the imagination of the
medicine-man. The moving god, he
whose aid it was difficult to invoke,
was too subtle to be likened to any
known form, but he controlled the In
,tellect, passions and mental faculties,
distractions for which the Sioux has
not even a name. The Hayoka was
the contrary god, who sat naked, and
famed himself in the GOODNESS of Da-
kota blizzard, and huddled shivering
over a fire in the heat of summer,
who cried for joy and laughed in
his sorrow. Rocks and powders
things; hence they belonged to the
Oldest gods-smaller rocks were fetch
es. On the barren buttes of the Dako-
tas may be seen many crumbling pile
of stones erected in by-gOne days to
propitiate an unknown god. Many a
forgotten chief has gone to the highest
hill when his son was sick. and amidst
HASTINGS and lamentations reared
mound of little stones in the hope that
his loved ones life might be spared.
And still another relic of the savage
belief of the old Sioux is found on the
bodies of the warriors themselves.
Take almost any man who is thirty
years old or more, and he can show
you long scars on his back or breast,
and dozens of smaller sears on his
arms, all inflicted by himself in fulfill
ing his vows to the sun. The sun
dance was one of the great religious
and political events of the Sioux life.
Whole villages assembled and feasted,
while the worshipers tasted and ex-
hausted the strength they were to need
SO badly in the coming test of en-
durance. On the appointed day
none but virgins were allowed
to cut down and trim the tree that
was to be used, while only chiefs and
warriors of exceptional bravery were
allowed to carry it to its place in the
center of the village. Here, with mys-
FERROUS pipe-smokings and unintelligi-
BILE nominations, the pole is planted,
ropes of buffalo hide having been fas-
tened to its top, one rope for each wor-
shipper. The men, already half dead
from exhaustion, are then brought out
and laid on the ground around the pole,
always ready knives thrust through
the muscles of their chests or backs,
and in the holes thus made wooden
skewers thrust, to which are fastened
the loose ends of the ropes. Then
round and round dance the worshipers,
their eyes fixed on the blazing sun,
while the jerk, jerk, jerk of the bleed
Ing flesh beats a sickening time to the
hi-yas Of Dakota song. Friends and
relatives, men, women and children,
xaSh their arms and breasts to stimulate
the dancers and keep up their courage.
When the flesh is torn apart the dancer
Is released, his vow fulfilled, his BRAY
cry, his manhood unquestioned. These
and a thousand other monstrous Gus
toms were what the early missionary
had to combat.