Page:American Anthropologist NS vol. 1.djvu/223

 NOTES AND NEWS The Butterfly and the Spider among the Blackfeet — Not

very long ago, in Forest and Stream^ I called attention to the belief held by the Blackfeet Indians that dreams are brought to us in sleep by the butterfly (dp u'nni). As my informant said :

" You know that it is the butterfly who brings us our dreams — who brings the news to us when we are asleep. Have you never heard a man say, when he sees a butterfly fluttering over the prairie, * There is a little fellow flying about that is going to bring the news to some one tonight ' ? Or have you not heard a person say after night, as the fire burns low and the people begin to make up their beds about the lodge, 4 Well, let us go to bed and see what news the butterfly will bring' ?"

I called attention also to the sign for the butterfly — a design roughly in the shape of a maltese cross, one arm horizontal and the other vertical,

+ which is painted on most of the more elaborately orna- mented Piegan lodges, just below the smoke-hole and between the wings at the back of the lodge. This sign painted on a lodge indicates that the style and method of painting the lodge were taught the lodge owner in a Fig. 3-Biackfoot d reanh More recent inquiry leads me to suspect that

butterfly symbol.

the influence of the butterfly is not confined to dreams but covers sleep as well.

It is still a custom for the Blackfeet woman to embroider the sign of the butterfly in beads or quills on a small piece of buckskin, and to tie this in her baby's hair when she wishes it to go to sleep. At the same time she sings to the child a lullaby, in which the butterfly is asked to come flying about and to put the baby to sleep.

The word dp a'nm appears to have some relation to dpd warn, which means "talking around," or "talking in different places," "to go about telling news." A wd'ni, "he says" ; dp d wa wd &d, "he walks about." The prefix ap seems to denote presence or existence in different places.

I have not been able to learn why or how the butterfly brings dreams or sleep. It is stated merely that it is soft and pretty and moves gently and that if you look at it for a long time you will go to sleep.

How widespread the faith in the butterfly as the American sleep-

194

�� �