The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1930-11-21

fundamental idea OF the
day as feast day may be traced back
to ancient times. Read the Book of
judges in the Old Testament and
there you will find this description of
a practice of the Canaanites, from
whom the Children of Israel derived
some of their customs:
"And they went out into the fields
and gathered their vineyards, and
trode the grass and held festival, and
went into the house of their god, and
did eat and drink"
This vintage or harvest festival ap-
peared later among the Hebrews as an
act of worship to Jehovah and was
called the Feast of Tabernacles. In
Deuteronomy, Moses gave specific di-
rections for its keeping,
Pagan Greece and Rome, too, had
their thanksgiving season in honor of
the harvest deities. At Athens, in No
vember, this feast, called Thesmoph-
oria, was celebrated by married wOm-
en- only, and two wealthy and distin-
guished members of the sex were
chosen to prepare the sacred meal,
which correspondent to the Thanksgiv-
ing dinner of today. The Romans on
October 4 worshiped Ceres, their god
dess of the harvest, with professions
in the fields, music, rustic sports, and
a feast at the end of the day, which
was called Cerelia.
In the modern world, England for
centuries observed an autumnal festi-
val called the Harvest Home, which
traces its beginning back to the Sax
general PROFESSIONS were held in Eng
land and were thought to have helped
a backward harvest in that year. The
Englishman has always followed the
custom Of setting aside days to COM
memorate public blessings. The dis
covery of the Gunpowder Plot was
thus observed and Guy Fawkes day
was established as day of public
thanksgiving to Almighty God" This
happened only a short time before the
Pilgrims left England for Holland, so
it is easy to see how they later car
ried to the New world the idea of
day for giving thanks.
Insofar as all the familiar pictures
of the first Thanksgiving day in Ply
mouth show. Indians taking part in the
Pilgrim feasting, we have come to as
sociate the red man with this holiday
particularly. Few of us realize, per-
haps, that the American Indian con-
tributed more to our Thanksgiving day
celebration than we realize. For the
many American families which will
gather around the loaded Thanksgiv-
ing day tables this year TO enjoy their
roast turkey will be observing a GUS
tom that prevailed before the Pilgrims
England.
The records of the Smithsonian in
stitution in Washington, records which
bridge the gap between the abo-
riginal civilization of thousands Of
years ago and ours today, show that
the Indians of the Southwest domes-
ticated turkeys and fattened them for
the choice morsels at their ceremonial
feasts. The practice of such feasts,
however, had been established long be-
fore by the cliff jewellers who raised
turkeys and when they wanted nice,
fat bird for one Of their ceremonial
feasts, all they had to do was to go
out to pen where they kept the fowls
and get one.
More than that, the Navajo Indians
have a November thanksgiving cere-
monial which goes back as far as tri-
bal tradition goes. A series of thanks
giving ceremonies begins about No
vembef and continues at intervals
during the entire month. The Naval IN
name for these occasions is the Yabi-
chi, which means a thanksgiving for
the corn harvest-a general thanks