Page:American Anthropologist NS vol. 1.djvu/786

 powell] SOCIOLOGY, OR THE SCIENCE OF INSTITUTIONS 71$

worship is controlled by the phratral unit, that is, by the brother- hood. This place of worship is also the place where the council of the brotherhood is held. Sometimes the council of the tribe is held now at one, now at another, of the kivas. The kiva is the general place for divination where the signs are consulted for the purpose of determining whether enterprises will be suc- cessful or not. All of the operations of the people and all of the things in which they are most deeply interested are controlled by these ceremonies held in the kiva. Especially is the weather controlled, for it is here where they pray for rain, or pray for the abatement of storm. It is where the ceremonies are performed which determine the nature of the crops. It is here where health or sickness is found. When the individual is once under the power of a disease the shaman may go to his relief and gather about his sick-bed the members of the phratry who sing, dance, and perform other ceremonies for his recovery. It is in the kiva where trials for witchcraft are held.

In all barbaric societies and in many savage societies there is a place for the tribe to assemble. When architecture is de- veloped this is called the temple, but very often it is a mere plaza under the shelter of trees, where special seats are furnished for the brotherhoods. Here men are promoted or invested with horns, feathers, or stripes, — the investiture is always a time of merrymaking, with a feast and with dancing ; and here men are deposed.

Tribal life is chiefly public life. There is little domestic seclusion ; often the house is a communal house for the entire clan or gens. Nearly all hunting is public hunting, nearly all fishing is public fishing, nearly all gathering of seeds is public gathering of seeds, nearly all gathering of roots is public gather- ing of roots ; all agriculture is public agriculture, and all herds are public herds. The kiva is the gathering place of the brother- hoods, and here they meet not only for religious ceremony but to pass the time in conversation or in jest. Here the shamanistic

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