Shamanism in North America - Hardcover

Hunt, Norman

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1552976785 ISBN 13: 9781552976784

Publisher: Firefly Books, 2003

Synopsis

Shamanism has ancient roots. It stems from the beliefs of ancient hunting cultures but was adapted to fit the needs of agricultural communities where the role of the shaman integrated with that of the priest.

Native Americans believed that it was their responsibility to maintain harmony in the natural world on which they depended by performing a variety of rituals. Hunters blessed the animals they sought in the hope of their acquiescence, farmers blessed their fields and seedlings to ensure a bountiful harvest. Shamans were credited with exceptional powers to act on behalf of the community. They claimed to be capable of separating their spirits from their bodies and interceding with those spirits that controlled the many forces of nature.

This book records the author's research into the traditions and practices of shamans across North America. Illustrations include remarkable photographs of masks, effigies, and implements used by shamans that are in the National Museum of the American Indian, Field Museum of Natural History, Canadian Museum of Civilization, and Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology.

About this title

About the Author:

Norman Bancroft Hunt, Ph.D. is the widely acclaimed author of books on Native North Americans including Warriors: Warfare and the Native American Indian, The Indians of the Great Plains, and People of the Totem: Indians of the Pacific Northwest. He has many friends among the tribes he has visited across North America in the course of research.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

Introduction

When Europeans first arrived in North America they were amazed by the piety and devotion of the Native people they encountered. Captain Bonneville, who travelled among the Plains tribes of the northwest during the early years of the fur trade, noted that they were 'more like a nation of saints than a horde of savages'. Equally surprising to the Europeans was the fact that while many of the Native beliefs and practices were founded in traditions that appeared quite unlike those of their own organised religions, they shared certain familiar concepts. Tribally recognised ideas about the creation of the world and stories of a great flood were important in indigenous beliefs and were themes to which the Europeans could relate.

Despite these similarities the Europeans nevertheless thought of Native Americans as pagans: people who had only a superstitious outlook and no concept of a higher God. This was partly because Native beliefs were expressed in highly individualistic ways and seemed to lack the formal structures of European religion. Although some tribes -- particularly those of the Southeast and Southwest -- had priests whose primary function was to conduct rituals for the tribal good, most of them had no apparent system for separating a religious fraternity or priesthood from ordinary people, or for separating people from the animals and spirit beings with whom they shared their world.

Native Americans thought that human beings, animals, spirits, even trees and grasses, as well as the forces of nature, were equal, and that each had its own character, disposition, and form. Because of this different elements were recognised for their individual power and ability: Bear was noted for his strength; Eagle for his swiftness and ability to travel between earth and sky; Rock for its permanence. But none was better, or worse, than any other, and not even the Creator Gods were omnipotent.

People, however, had one special responsibility. In the distant past recalled in the legends and stories, some people had acted without due regard for the welfare of the rest of creation. The deities therefore decided to make the people responsible for the rituals that would keep the world in harmony and balance. Only people were capable of destroying this balance and only they might restore it. In this way they would always be reminded that they were part of a complex interactive universe which could only be maintained through proper respect for all its different parts.

The manner of showing respect varied from tribe to tribe and from individual to individual depending on their different needs and circumstances. Generally, for a hunter, it was essential to bless the animals he sought and to ask their acquiescence, otherwise they would withdraw and his family would starve. Farmers blessed their fields and seedlings, for failure to do so would result in the deities withholding the rain the crops needed. Failure to follow these customs by anyone was thought to affect the entire community, thus making personal devotions and attitudes matters of public concern.

The degree of power anyone possessed -- that is, the ability of an individual to influence events -- varied greatly from one person to another. Some people, often as a result of a traumatic experience, were thought capable of achieving a separation of their spirit from their body and to converse directly with other spirits that controlled the various forces of nature in an attempt to solicit their intervention on behalf of the community. These people were the shamans.

The word shaman is a convenient term that has been adopted in anthropological literature in the context of any religious belief that encompasses direct contact with spirit forces. It is derived from 'saman', from a Tungusic language of Siberia, and translates as 'the wise one'. Shamanism itself, however, is a very widespread belief system with an ancient history and continues into the present day. Despite its broad distribution and numerous adherents it is remarkable for its consistency over vast areas and prolonged periods. Similar themes and ideas occur in many parts of the world and modern shamans, although separated both by distance and in time from their ancient counterparts, have been known to recognise and interpret details of shamanic costume and paraphernalia depicted in cave paintings of the Paleolithic period.

From this it would appear that shamanism originated with the very first hunting-gathering cultures. By performing rituals the shamans attempted to engender a form of spiritual affinity with the animals being hunted, and this notion gave the hunters confidence they would be successful. Yet it is also apparent that even as early as the Paleolithic the shamans were thinking in broader and more abstract terms, since some of the animals depicted are not game animals and others are clearly spirit beings with both human and animal attributes. Shamanism is thus the oldest form of ritual activity, and is the earliest indication we have of human communities developing a sense of non-material existence and an awareness of their place in a broader environment that was not concerned only with the practical realities of everyday survival.

Shamanism in North America also has an ancient origin. Some scholars believe that it can be traced back to early migrations from Asia to the Americas as much as 50,000 years ago; but it is also clear that many distinctive traits have developed since then as a response to widely divergent environmental conditions in different parts of the North American continent. Yet despite these developments there are a number of common elements. These include the fact that shamanism is primarily exercised through the intervention of a small number of highly gifted and sensitive men and women; that it is animistic -- that is, founded on a belief that everything possesses a soul or life force; that contact with spirit powers is established through controlled trance; and that shamans attain knowledge and raised consciousness through a series of spiritual journeys, or tests, of increasing difficulty and danger.

Central to the practice of North American shamanism is a concept known as medicine. This comes from the term used by the first French colonists to describe the activities of the shamans. The French used it because they witnessed shamanic healing rituals and observed the shamans using herbal remedies to effect cures. Many of the French pioneers lived in or travelled through areas where there were no European doctors or surgeons and they benefited from and had direct experience of the shamans' skills in treating their various wounds and ailments. Yet despite their reliance on the shamans and the obvious fact that shamanic healing could be effective, the deeply held spiritual beliefs of the shamans were nevertheless seen by the Europeans as no more than pagan ritual.

The ethnic arrogance of the French and other Europeans led them to denigrate the activities of the shamans and to generally deny that there could be any factual base for the shamans' claims that they were able to exercise control or influence in the spirit world. Shamanic activities were consequently often dismissed as witchcraft. We should, nevertheless, remember that at the time of the early contacts European pharmacology and medicine were doctrinaire and narrow. The Pharmacopceia Londinensis of 1618, for example, lists mummy dust, human and pigeon excrement, and stag's penis as important European medicines. European priests, too, were likely to respond to shamans' speeches by hurling back exorcisms, and to claim that such verbal attacks proved most efficacious.

Adoption of the term medicine has given rise to a widely held but nonetheless inaccurate understanding of the shamans' principals role as healers or physicians. Native Americans consider shamanic healing as applicable in life-threatening situations, but they interpret the term medicine in a broader sense. Perhaps the closest to the Native meaning is mysterious power, if this

About this edition

• Publisher: Firefly Books
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1552976785
• ISBN 13: 9781552976784
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 232