For ALL who have the LS Native American Tarot!

[Mi-Shell]

Fox Medicine part 1

There are 2 foxes on these cards: one runs with our Fool, Older Brother Coyote and the dancing Fox on the 7 of Swords.
While everyone knows everything about Coyote the trickster and "anti-hero" of Native America here is some info about Wa guish the Fox:


LEGENDS AND TRADITI0NS ABOUT THE FOX:
The Persistence and Gentleness of the Fox
Just as the badger was seen to represent what could be called a diminutive expression of the bear principle, the fox resembled the larger wolf. The fox was considered to be persistent, yet was gentler and less aggressive than the wolf. This is undoubtedly the reason the Wolf Society was predominantly a War Society, while the Kit Fox Society (Takala) was one of the Akicita or policing societies whose duties centered less on warfare and more on camp life and hunting activities.
According to Standing Bear:
The fox had knowledge of underground things hidden from human eyes, and this he shared with the dreamer, telling him of roots and herbs that were healing and curing; then he shared his powers of swiftness and cleverness as well as gentleness.
In this gentleness, there was strength and courage, as indicated by one of the songs of the Fox Society: "1 am a Fox. I am supposed to die. If there is anything difficult, if there is anything dangerous, that is mine to do.

A Miwok tale credits the silver fox and coyote with the creation of the universe. In the time of mists, in the time before time began, there was nothing but water and a single fox. Feeling lonely, the fox began to sing:

'I want to meet someone.' Coyote appeared. The two walked together, and fox suggested that they create the world. Coyote asked, 'How?'

'We shall sing it into being,' fox said, and she thought of a lump of clay. It materialized in her hands. She threw it to the ground, and coyote and fox sang the mountains, the valleys, rivers and lakes. They danced until the earth grew around them, and that is how the world began.

Further east, fox was linked with warriors. Typical policing societies of the Plains included the Kit Fox Society of the Lakota, the Dog soldiers of the Cheyenne, and the Fox Society of the Crow. The members of the latter group strove amongst themselves to strike the first blow against the enemy. The leaders carried a staff which, when they dismounted, they planted and refused to move from that spot, even when other members of the tribe retreated.

Fox shares many characteristics with ferret, in its ability to move unseen and its cunning. Other common attributes include: camouflage, swiftness, shapeshifting, invisibility - all important abilities for the warrior.

The Inuit recognized the 'magic' of foxes and feared them. After a kill, the fox was hamstrung so that the spirit could not re-animate the body, for if it were to walk again it might take revenge on the hunter.

The kit fox was revered all across the Plains. It remains an important animal to this day. In 1800, the Kit Fox Society was one of the great warrior societies of Oglala Sioux. They were also used as internal 'police' or marshals of the camp. Therefore, they were guardians of the tribe.

The members of the Kit Fox Society painted their bodies, faces and arms yellow. If the leader was to be handling sacred things, such as during the Sun Dance, his hands would be painted red. A yellow fox skin suspended from the right hand was a badge of membership. An eagle feather attached to the fur was the mark of a leader. Red bird plumes and a war club indicated readiness for battle.

The warriors, or foxes, were stake-holders whose duty it was to defend the helpless unto death in case the village was attacked. It was after the death of four of these warrior-foxes, all stake-holders and sons of the chief, that their grieving father sought a vision. He was told of two children who needed him. He sought and found these two abandoned children, a boy and a girl, and raised them as his own. Before his death, he held a feast and told his people that if one's heart was good towards another, they should become as one family. Thus, one of the seven important rites, the Hunka (adoption) ceremony of the Lakota, was born from the sacrifice made by Kit Fox warriors.
A person did not ask to join the Kit Fox Society, but was nominated and then invited to join. The ceremony was complex. Once a member, it was believed that the man could not lie. If later the warrior was wounded, it was thought that he must have done something wrong or broken his vows. Otherwise, he would have remained invincible. .
And the women of the Oglala also have a Kit Fox Society. For man or woman, kit fox imparts the laudable qualities of constancy, courage and integrity. These women are stern defenders of their families. As an animal, kit fox is a good parent; therefore, women who are endowed with kit fox medicine are conscientious mothers.

Medicine and Powers:
Cunning, dexterity, speed, agility, invisibility subtlety, wisdom, trickery and guile; (depending on tribe and species): protection, family, maternal instinct, camouflage, healing, invisible presence.

The Hopi used fox furs for healing and in shamans' robes. The healing action took place by the holy man placing the fur on the affected part and drawing the sickness away.

Many Native American tribes wore a fox skin or held ceremonies to invoke its power. It was believed that, worn on the head, the skin imparted fox's inteIligence to the individual. Meanwhile the tail of the fox often graced the medicine man's spirit poles (the Plains' equivalent to northwestern totem poles, or the Celtic wand or wizard's staff).
Fox teaches subtlety and imparts the ability to run like the wind.
These are warrior traits. Fox is decisive and sure-footed in the physical world. It is swiftness of thought in the intellectual.

 

[Debra]

This is more a Tarot question: when you look at the cards: which one of the symbols is more the HP and which one is more the Empress.
A HP with a baby in her arms - and sooo young .....?
And on the other side the wise old crone / Medicine Woman teaching her
?granddaughter?- apprentice-? the mysteries of Life !!
All the while the Powerful Bear Spirit = Strength, Goodness and knowledge of self, as well as healing with herbs stands in attendance and lending POWER!

If I ever would use this as a reading deck, I would reverse them....
What do you think??

I'm with you, Mi-Shell....the young mother is so focused on her baby, I don't know how she'd have any energy left for teaching or guarding the spiritual wisdom of the people. I think this is one reason why High Priestesses are often thought of as virginal (if not outright virgins)--a topic discussed in another thread somewhere--because sex is frankly distracting, and babies are, too! At any rate, it seems like a odd choice, and the fecundity of a traditional Empress is totally lacking from the image of the old woman.

Thanks for your postings in this thread....every one is informative and much appreciated.

 

[Mi-Shell]

Thank You, Debra for your input!
I am soooo glad, you said something because I was wondering if I have a BIIIIG Peakock feather stuck up my A.. and am dancing around here all by myself!

I read the thread you mentioned with much intrest and it broadened my view of the High Priestess!

 

[Debra]

Oh no, Mi-Shell. I personally was away from the computer for a few days but I'm definitely watching this thread with great interest and I think others are as well.

About twenty years ago I moved from the east coast to New Mexico. I had one Seminole friend in high school who made me aware of what was going on with the Native American movement. But in New Mexico, wow, it's complicated--the native cultures are in a strange relationship with one another and the Spanish & Mexican cultures and the cowboy cultures and the "easterners" and there's a lot of good will but also suspicion and "where are the boundaries" issues as well--very complex, and there I learned to just be quiet and listen! I find what you are tell us very interesting but I don't say much here because I do feel I know so little--I think I've seen a badger ONCE in my life! But I do have some ideas about the High Priestess and the Empress. So -- even if we're quiet, we're listening!

 

[Mi-Shell]

3 cards with Masks:

The deck has 3 cards with rather hideously masked beings on it.
The first one is the Hierophant:
-But garb and body paint rather a warrior than a Spiritual leader or shaman, who has 2 of these masked beings crouching in attendance.
The BWB gives 3 accurate sentences to explain what a "Medicine Man" is and it seems obvious that the character in the middle is the one talked about. But for Native American eyes what you actually see is quite different:
A First Nations Person would recognize a warrior with body paint appearing before 2 Medicine Spirits. and that we have s scissor tailed flycatcher in the sky above - a bird of Forked advice = telling 2 lies or 2 different truth or a lie and a truth may lead the First Nations Person to believe that this warrior is getting conflicting advice......
Pipe, drum, buffalo skull and gourd rattle in a shallow gras free area may point to a ceremony or ritual of some sort.
Baaaaaaaaad is the skull turned to on its side!!!
So all this very likely will let a First Nations Person of Lakota descent think of one thing: Witchcraft!!!!!! 9 and I do NOT mean WICCA) but BAD medicine is under way!!!
what are we to make of this????
Knowing all this maybe in the future I will choose to see and interpret this card as follows:
2 Spirits of much Wisdom of the old ways and ritual have uncovered the errant (sinister) ways of a warrior and are now persuading him to walk a road of peace -especially since ominous dark clouds are in the sky ....

More messy Masks tomorrow....

 

[Mi-Shell]

more messy Masks....

The Next Masked conundrum is the 2 of wands:
The BWB say : Mask it imprisons the dead and specters,exprcising the destructive power. It imposes the will of those who wear it, is an initiation instrument, hides the visible and reveals the invisible.
That is a good description for a mask --- a whitemans / culture mask that is! A carnival/ Mardi Gras, Mummer’s dance mask and many others
BUT NOT THE RITUAL MASKS OF ANY NATIVE AMERICAN TRIBE!!!!!!!

Here white culture assumes mask is mask...... with a 20th century spin instead the 17tenth to 19tenth century church spin, that all masks are EVIL DEVIL WORSHIP.......

We have mainly 3 Native cultural realms using masks: the Iroquois and Woodland cultures, the North West Coast tribes and the Hopi and Pueblo People.
Everywhere the mask is a living entity and revered as the personification of a guiding Spirit that has the prosperity and well-being of the People at heart and teaches important lessons!
Remember my ramblings about Tupulogaukuk the Raven, Stealing the light from the chief in the Upper world and bringing it to Earth??? (post 1)
See a pic of HIS Mask= HIS personification....
And then there is Rapsisuite, the female healing Bear .....

 

[Mi-Shell]

More masks: used for healing!!!!

And Now it is time to talk about the Iroquois False Face Society: Here an Expert who knows and types better than me:

Curing, the restoration of well-being for the community and health for the individual, is a vital part of native religious practice. The best known of several curing societies among the IROQUOIS of the lower Great Lakes is the False Face Society. The False Faces has special powers over the winds, ill luck and illness affecting the joints and shoulders, as well as toothaches, earaches, swelling and nosebleeds. Public and private ceremonies are held at certain times of the year to drive out disease; amid dancing and chanting the sick are cured by having ashes rubbed onto their heads or having hands laid on them. In return, the False Faces demands tobacco and hot corn mush.
False Face masks represent portraits of mythological beings whose help is requested; the performers themselves are initiated into the society, originally secret, upon seeing Faces in dreams or being cured by them. Members are men, but the leader or keeper of the False Faces is always a woman. Masks, which were given curative powers by offerings of tobacco, are carved from specially selected living trees, then painted and adorned with fibres of hair. The distorted or exaggerated features, although human, are often terrifying or even comic. The society was witnessed by Europeans in the late 17th century, and has continued into this century. Masks are still carved in traditional styles, but often for sale rather than for ritual use.

False Face Society
The False Face Society is the best known of many medicinal societies among the Iroquois. The society is best known for its dramatic wooden masks, the "false faces." The masks are used in healing rituals which invoke spirits and a dream world. Those cured by the society become members. Also, echoing the significance of dreams to the Iroquois, anyone who dreams that they should be a member of the society may join.
In modern times, the masks have been a contentious subject among the Iroquois. Many Iroquois have produced and sold the masks to Western tourists and collectors. The Iroquois leadership responded to the commercialization of this tradition and released a statement against the sale of these sacred masks. They also called for the return of the masks from collectors and museums. Iroquois traditionalists object to labeling the "False Faces" as masks since they are not objects but the living representation of spirits.

Masks
The masks are considered to be "living" and are "fed" with tobacco. The design of the masks is somewhat variable, but most share certain features. The masks have long, black or white horse hair. Before the introduction of horses by the Europeans, corn husks and buffalo hair were used. The eyes are deep-set and accented by metal. The noses are bent and crooked. The other facial features are variable. The masks are painted red and black. Basswood is usually used for the masks although other types of wood are often used. When making a mask, an Iroquois walks through the woods until he is moved by a spirit to carve a mask from the tree. The spirit inspires the unique elements of the mask's design and the resulting product represents the spirit itself. The masks are carved directly on the tree and only removed when completed. Masks are painted red if they were begun in the morning or black if they were begun in the afternoon. Red masks are thought to be more powerful. Masks with both colors represent spirits with "divided bodies."

Origin myth
Iroquois tradition records the legendary beginning of the False Face tradition. According to the accounts, the "Spirit Medicine Man", a man blessed with healing powers in response to his love of living things, encountered a stranger and faced him in a competition to see who could move a mountain. The stranger managed to make the mountain quake. Spirit Medicine Man declared the stranger had skill but not enough faith to move the mountain. He proceeded to move the mountain suddenly, striking the stranger in the face with it and leaving him disfigured. The Spirit Medicine Man healed the stranger and taught him the ways of medicine. The stranger became a great healer known as "Old Broken Nose". The False Face rituals honor Old Broken Nose and the masks represent his smashed face. In various versions of the story, the Spirit Medicine Man is a creator god while Old Broken Nose is known by other names such as "False Face" and the "Great Face".

Ritual
The False Face Society performs a ritual to promote health using the masks. The ceremony usually contains a telling of the False Face myth, an innovation to the spirits using tobacco, the main False Face ritual, and a feast at the end. During the main part of the ritual, the False Face members go through every house in the entire town searching for disease and illness. The False Face members also use turtle shell rattles, a reference to Iroquois cosmology which see our world resting on the back of a giant turtle. The arrival of the False Faces is heralded by another medicine society that uses corn husk masks. If a sick person is found, a healing ritual is performed using tobacco and singing. The tobacco is burned, and the ashes are blown over the sick person. The community then gathers at the longhouse where the False Faces enter and move towards the central fire. Here individuals may request healing. The ritual continues with dancing and ends with a ceremonial ash blowing and a feast. The ritual is performed during the spring, fall, midwinter, and smaller versions of the ceremony are performed whenever a sick individual requires it.

 

[Mi-Shell]

Katchinas

The next masks we have are crouching rather sinister in front of the Tower, involved in some kind of ritual with feathers.
The BWB Calls them >>Kachinas (the specter)->quote< and That is the atrocity in itself! The beings portrayed have nothing in common with the VERY sacred Katchinas of the Hopi People and are a cultural blunder at best,....
See, Katchinas themselves are sooo sacred that they are not to be depicted or photographed.
But Katchina dolls are ok !! And you can buy an “authentic” one at E -bay....!?
So here is wisdom about Katchinas:
Katchina means "spirit." The word applies to both the ancestral spirits that arrive and depart as well as to the men dancers who wear masks and impersonate the spirits. All of these have spirits that are personified as katchinas: Men, animals, plants, stones, mountains, storms, the
sky and the underground. All come into the modern world carrying legends of the Hopi past.
There are a number of legends concerning the ol1igin of the Katchina. The main legend states that they chief kat china was a BADGER (!!!!!) who came from the underworld.
The kat chinas themselves are not gods. But, they do act as intermediaries between mortals and the Hopi gods. Prayers are made to them for more sun, rain, and children in belief that they will relay these appeals 0 the god's attention.

Masked dancers represent the katchinas. These dancers perform in an area called the plaza. The dance consists of pounding of feet in a rhythmic nature, as well as chanting and sprinkling sacred meal on the ground. Their arms are filled with green cornstalks, that symbolize the crops that the tribe is so thankful for. Some dancers carry musical instruments made from hollowed out gourds that are painted yellow and green. Notched sticks are laid across these
gourds and the shoulder blades of deer serve as bows for these fiddle-like instruments. The dance is repeated at intervals throughout the day.
There is a large underground room called the kiva. During the dance, a procession of men and woman emerge from this room. These are the Hopi priests and priestesses. One of them carries an ancient water bowl. From this bowl the dancer (using an eagle feather) will fling drops of water, symbolizing rain. Another dancer has a ceremonial pipe and blows smoke from it to symbolize clouds. The women place meal in each dancer's hand, to symbolize gratitude for a good harvest.
The dancers also hand out gifts to the children such as gourd rattles, bows and arrows (for boys) and katchina dolls (for girls). They also pass out baskets, bowls and wash pans filled with foods symbolic of the harvest such as corn, peaches, melon and other first fruits. All the young Hopi women who have married during the year are barred from observing any ceremonial dances until the Niman Katchina. This is because everyone is required to be at this ceremony. The newly married Hopi women all wear pure white wedding blankets made by the grooms from native cotton and wool. This blanket is worn at all ceremonies after the wedding and when Q Hopi woman dies, it then serves as her burial shroud. The katchinas don't actually depart until the second morning of the festival. A brief ceremony takes place at sunrise that involves throwing meal, pouring water and other symbolic acts. The priest stands at the top of the ladder that leads down into the kiva (the underground ceremonial room, remember?) and offers a prayer. All the masked katchina dancers leave the village going west. Thus, they disappear just as the sun appears over the horizon.
Katchina also applies to the dolls that are carved out of cottonwood and painted, dressed and feathered to look like the Katchina Dancers. Hopi children play with these dolls. They can be seen presented on special altars also around the time of the festival.
Many of the ceremonies featuring katchinas are done in a language so ancient that many of the participants do not understand it today.
The most distinguishing feature of the Katchina Dancer is their ceremonial helmet (mask). The face of this mask may represent a bird, beast, or man (or a combination). Many color variations are used also. The masks usually have symbols that represent clouds, rain or rainbows because the Niman Katchina Festival takes place at the time of year when rain is apt to be scarce. The male katchinas often carry an object associated with the spirits they represent such as a bow and arrow, yucca whip, pine branch or feathers. The women katchinas also called katchinamana, are represented by the men. The men wear wigs with the hair styled in flat swirls over the ears known as squash blossoms. This hairstyle represents virginity.
Before the last katchina dance, the masks are repainted and refinished with a ruff of feathers, fur or spruce at the neck. According to the Hopi Indians, spruce has a magnetic attraction for rain. The remainder of the costume consists of white ceremonial kirtle (kilt) and sash, with a turtle-shell rattle under the knee, moccasins and jewellery. A fox skin hangs from the rear of the belt or sash.


I will choose to see this card as follows:
2 Spirit Beings with “more than ordinary knowledge” = horns on mask<<
are witnessing the fall of 2 humans from the tower.
More on horns and their meanings for First Nations People another day.....

 

[Debra]

These two posts on masks are fascinating. You are so right about how modern this is--from what I know of kachinas, your description is right on, right on. Real kachinas--not the dolls--are huge. I think (not sure) the biggest is Shalako. (I've never seen one, I've just heard tell!)

 

[Mi-Shell]

A card and its legend from the North of the Cherokee Medicine wheel

This post is about the King of Chalices, Youngdeer!


Earlier Cherokee respected the deer so much that the hunters would be as much like the deer as possible, even using the movements of the deer to be quiet and aware of every sound. One of the greatest hunters was Youngdeer, who even learned to run like the deer and catch smells in the wind. Some used to say that he looked so much like a deer when he adorned himself with a deerskin that once he was mistaken for a deer and almost shot with a bow and arrow.
As an Elder by the Medicine name of name of Young deer recently toldTeaching Tent at Gathering of Nations Pow Wow, NM)
"Our People, the Cherokee were great hunters, not just for their skill, but because they knew the Medicine and spirit of the deer. They would always give thanks to the deer for all that the deer would mean in feeding the families of the human ones, as well as the use of the deerskin to keep warm in the winter. Prayer and gifting was always done after the taking of the deer because the hunter was also the protector of all the animals and the winged-ones. We knew our place in the Universal Circle of Life."

NORTH: PATH OF QUIET
The direction of the North according to the Cherokee embodies the mental aspect of inner consciousness and wisdom turned outward.
North symbolizes the wisdom that teaches us to become masters of our trade, like Youngdeer, and to develop understanding of nature. There is much to learn from nature that provides us much advantage today.