Wolf Mask
After berry picking and salmon season came the long gray, rainy winter, divided in half by the winter ceremonies. This winter was especially exciting because she heard that the wolf-people would come to capture the older boys and take them to the forest for training. The boys are captured about every other year and this winter there were eleven boys who were old enough for the ceremony. Some even showed beards growing on their chins.
Sometime during the evenings of story telling, the people would hear the cries of wolves outside the long house. At first the storyteller instructed the people to ignore the wolves, saying that everyone was safe as long as they stayed inside. He ordered more wood placed on the fire and soon after the errie yelps subsided into the distance.
Each night in succession the wolf cries grew louder until the people heard running outside, pounding on the walls of the long house and knocking at the doorposts. Warriors gathered on each side of the low door with spears and clubs, to use against the wolves in case they broke in. Sure enough, after fierce pounding and howling, the wolf-people broke in to pass by the warriors, who somehow failed to stop the intruders. Into the lodge danced six or more wolves, rocking back and forth and up and down to the beat of a drum and lifting their heads to howl.
“We know that you come for our boys,” shouted the chief’s spokesman.
“We freely offer them to you, if you promise leave their mothers, sisters and younger brothers unharmed.”
The older boys, wearing costumes of cedar branches tied to their heads and wrapped around their bodies like a tunic, were made to stand in groups of three or four before each wolf, who wagged his head back and forth and pranced around them, before forcing the group to go with them outside, not to be seen again until the last day of the winter storytelling.
During this time the initiates are taken out to a secret camp known as Rain Forest Deep up a northern valley to learn special songs and stories, watch wrestling matches, take part in a sweathouse ceremony, and be given other instructions in the way of the wolf. The younger children and the rest of the family are told to keep singing in hopes that the wolf-people might bring the boys back. Each Duwam'ha boy must undergo the wolf capture before he is considered a man. Some boys go to Rain Forest Deep more than once, but the reason is never revealed. Some newly initiated boys of high rank must deny themselves food and go on a spirit quest later in the summer to seek an encounter with the Great Spirit.
In the spring a similar ceremony was reserved for the older girls, who were taken away and sequestered by the Crain-people. When the spring flowers bloomed and the weather grew warm, the whole village had a feast of roasted new roots and the first elk or deer of the season. When everyone finished with the half-day long meal, dancers in crain costumes called from the woods -- their calls and whistles growing louder like the wolves -- until they arrived to the feast house. All of the older girls coming of age were given shredded cedar bark skirts and hats decorated with feathers and flowers that covered their hair while everyone sang the welcome song.
Holding hands, the girls followed elder women dressed in special bird regalia and led by a procession of costumed dancers and flute players, up to the hills above Sky Ladder Waterfall to special huts for dancing and instruction in ways of the sky world, while the families and younger children continued to sing and feast. After the ceremony, the young girls are considered women and are eligible for marriage if their mothers agree. Most did not marry for several years later.
Continued
Sometime during the evenings of story telling, the people would hear the cries of wolves outside the long house. At first the storyteller instructed the people to ignore the wolves, saying that everyone was safe as long as they stayed inside. He ordered more wood placed on the fire and soon after the errie yelps subsided into the distance.
Each night in succession the wolf cries grew louder until the people heard running outside, pounding on the walls of the long house and knocking at the doorposts. Warriors gathered on each side of the low door with spears and clubs, to use against the wolves in case they broke in. Sure enough, after fierce pounding and howling, the wolf-people broke in to pass by the warriors, who somehow failed to stop the intruders. Into the lodge danced six or more wolves, rocking back and forth and up and down to the beat of a drum and lifting their heads to howl.
“We know that you come for our boys,” shouted the chief’s spokesman.
“We freely offer them to you, if you promise leave their mothers, sisters and younger brothers unharmed.”
The older boys, wearing costumes of cedar branches tied to their heads and wrapped around their bodies like a tunic, were made to stand in groups of three or four before each wolf, who wagged his head back and forth and pranced around them, before forcing the group to go with them outside, not to be seen again until the last day of the winter storytelling.
During this time the initiates are taken out to a secret camp known as Rain Forest Deep up a northern valley to learn special songs and stories, watch wrestling matches, take part in a sweathouse ceremony, and be given other instructions in the way of the wolf. The younger children and the rest of the family are told to keep singing in hopes that the wolf-people might bring the boys back. Each Duwam'ha boy must undergo the wolf capture before he is considered a man. Some boys go to Rain Forest Deep more than once, but the reason is never revealed. Some newly initiated boys of high rank must deny themselves food and go on a spirit quest later in the summer to seek an encounter with the Great Spirit.
In the spring a similar ceremony was reserved for the older girls, who were taken away and sequestered by the Crain-people. When the spring flowers bloomed and the weather grew warm, the whole village had a feast of roasted new roots and the first elk or deer of the season. When everyone finished with the half-day long meal, dancers in crain costumes called from the woods -- their calls and whistles growing louder like the wolves -- until they arrived to the feast house. All of the older girls coming of age were given shredded cedar bark skirts and hats decorated with feathers and flowers that covered their hair while everyone sang the welcome song.
Holding hands, the girls followed elder women dressed in special bird regalia and led by a procession of costumed dancers and flute players, up to the hills above Sky Ladder Waterfall to special huts for dancing and instruction in ways of the sky world, while the families and younger children continued to sing and feast. After the ceremony, the young girls are considered women and are eligible for marriage if their mothers agree. Most did not marry for several years later.
Continued
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