|
The grass dance come from the thunder beings who gave it to the Omaha who in turn gave/sold it to the Lakota people.
The Hidatsa bought it from them .A few years ago they still sung songs that the Lakota forgot.Only you had to really know what they were singing,since their language is different from the Lakota.Good songs which tell the story of the people!I heard them sung by a man who was 1/2 hidatsa.
There is a story that say that when the last "Omaha society "leader died,he said that the if someone had a dream about changing the rituals of the dance,he could do it.Well the guy who said he had one and tried to change it ,was struck dead by a lightning!!!!
They offered tobacco to the thunder beings and since then ....
As for the Grass dance as it is done now,i heard 20 years ago in Fort Peck that the dancer was mimicking the buffalo bug,the cricket[who told the people were the buffalo were in the old days]
Anybody else heard that?
|