essay
The Feast of the Dead or Ghost Dance at Six Nations Reserve, Canada
Symposium on local diversity in Iroquois culture • Washington, D.c. • Published In 1951 • Pages: 139-165
By: Fenton, William N. (William Nelson), Kurath, Gertrude P..
AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
This article presents a detailed study of the ceremonial observance of the Feast of the Dead at Onondaga longhouse, Six Nations Reserve, Ontario in 1945 and at Sour Springs (Cayuga)longhouse, also at Six Nations in 1949. Fenton and Kurath describe all aspects of this ceremony with special emphasis on songs, music, dancing, the improtance of the women's role in the ceremony, and the distribution of gifts at the end of the performance. There are also data on Iroquois beliefs about the dead, illustrated by two folk tales concerning the relations between the living and the dead. The article concludes with a few comments on the functional relationship of the Feast of the Dead with other aspects of Iroquois culture.
- SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
- Cult of the dead
- cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
- Iroquois
- HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
- 1996
- RegionThe area the document pertains to
- North America
- Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
- Eastern Woodlands
- Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
- essay
- Evaluation
- Creator TypesThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
- Ethnologist
- Musicologist
- Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
- 5: Excellent Primary Data
- AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
- John Beierle ; 1961
- Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
- ca. 1948
- Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
- 1949; 1945
- Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
- Cayuga (Upper) and Onondaga ; Six Nations Reserve, Grand River, Ontario, Canada
- NotesAdditional notes
- William N. Fenton and Gertrude P. Kurath
- LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
- Iroquois Indians