Origins of the Amerindians

Variations in Indian languages

Games and entertainment

Social and political organization

American Indian Culture areas

Spirituality

Conclusion

Bibliography

C. GAMES AND ENTERTAINMENT

The Indians did not spend all their time working. Naturally careless of the future, they had many kinds of leisure activities ranging from games to dances. American Indians had games and amusements which were pretty similar to those of peoples elsewhere. An Indian’s leisure time was filled with a constant round of feasting, dancing, story-telling, athletic contests, and gambling games.

1. Sports

Competitions whether in foot racing, wrestling and archery were popular in all areas. Later, the Spaniards gave the Indians horses and horse racing became one of the favorite game especially among Plains Indians.

Young people and adults competed in athletic sports. The principal athletic game played in various regions of North America, though principally in the eastern region, was the ball play. Athletes were highly trained for intertribal contests and a special dance and secret ceremonial preceded the contest. In this game balls were caught, not with the hand, but with a stick somewhat resembling a tennis racket. It was eventually adopted by European settlers and is currently known in Canada under the name lacrosse and in Louisiana as racquette.

Next in tribal favor in the East was the game known under the name of chunkee or chunkey, a kind of bowling in which a stone disk replaced the ball. In this game, one player had to make the disk his competitor rolled along the ground fall within his stick curved at one end. Indians of the Midwest were particularly fond of this play that was sometimes kept up for hours despite the hard running it necessitated. A somewhat similar game was found in the Plains. It was played with a straight stick and a netted wheel whose holes were given names such as buffalo, calf etc. The aim was to dart the stick through one hole chosen at the beginning of the game.

Foot races being frequently a part of great ceremonial functions were very popular with certain tribes as the Crows and the Pueblo who held intervillage contests.

Ring-and-pole and hoop-and-pole games were frequently played throughout the continent. In that game, the players had to throw sticks through stone rings or into a rolling netted hoop. Snow snake was a game in which the aim was to flung a long stick (sometimes painted to look like a snake) as far as possible over the ice or frozen ground. It was, of course, popular among northern tribes as the ground had to be covered with ice.

Besides, various kinds of target shooting with bow and arrow or darts were also popular.

Among the games exclusively played by women were football and shinny. Shinny simply consisted in keeping the ball in the air as long as possible by bouncing it from the toes. In the Southwest, women rather played a kind of football that was thought to have magical powers in early times. It was a simplified version of the game we know today since the only aim was to kick a ball somewhat smaller than the current one around a long course without losing it.

2. Games of chance and gambling

Games of chance were appreciated by Indians of all tribes. Among these, the hand game was the commonest guessing game. The players were arranged in two opposing lines, one player holding in his hands two bone or wooden cylinders, one plain and the other marked. His opponents attempted to guess the whereabouts of the small objects shifted rapidly from hand to hand. One camp might compete against another. Backers lined up beside the players, shouting, singing and beating the rhythm to distract them. In the excitement, an Indian might lose part of his possessions or even everything he owned. This game was also often played during winter as a favorite tipi pastime involving both sexes to the accompaniment of songs fitted to the rapid movement of the hands.

Other numerous gambling games used markers resembling dice, marked sticks, plum seeds, carved bones and other small objects. One of them called the bowl game was common among northern tribes. Players took aim at a bowl, trying to toss marked peach or plum seeds in it.

3. Children games

In the same way we, in our childhood, learned skills from games, Indian children soon got to learn abilities in order to survive in an Indian community. There were whips, tops to spin, stilts, slings, dolls and other toys. Indian children played with them or imitated their elders in shooting, riding, hunting, planting and "playing house". They had dogs and small wild animals as pets.

Girls traditionally played with dolls wearing the traditional costumes of their tribes and with miniature figures while boys shot arrows from toy bows. They also often pretended to be hunters or warriors, wandering through the woods, creeping and practicing hunting. Those games taught them skills such as target practice and footraces needed by the hunters. In agricultural parts of the country, children played with implements imitating adult activities. Pueblo children learned about kachinas, their mystical ancestors, from their kachina dolls. Those dolls were given to the children when the tribes held kachina dances to celebrate visits from the spirits. They were supposed to inspire them to be like their forefathers.

In groups, a popular game was tag, a play in "which the one who was "it" often imitated a jaguar or similar animal. Minor amusements included cat's cradle, in which a symbolic string figure is constructed on the player's fingers, and the use of tops and swings. Around the fire in the evening, old and young played guessing games such as hunt-the-button. "They made cat's cradles with fiber string"¹.

4. Ceremonies, music and songs

The Indian was also fond of singing and had songs for every occasion including love, war, hunting, gaming, medicine as well as children's songs and lullabies. Therefore, singing accompanied every public ceremony as well as the important stages in an individual's life.

Tribal communities came together for festivals that frequently exceeded a week. The main purpose of those was usually religious but they usually included games, storytelling, amusing singing and dancing as well. By holding religious ceremonies, performing dances and honoring their spirits, or gods, the Indians hoped to gain their help and favor. Medicine men, or religious leaders, danced to seek aid for the sick. Hunters danced the deer dance or the buffalo dance to attract abundant game. Farming tribes held ceremonials to bring rain for the crop to grow. Certain tribes performed dances relating stories from their history or mythology, let alone other ceremonies held when children arrived at manhood or womanhood or to initiate them into the religious secret societies of the tribe. Although the purpose of a dance was serious, the Indians usually made it the occasion for fun and sociability. In many tribes, there were clowns or other fun makers among the musicians or dancers. In the evening or at the end of a festival, social dances were sometimes held. The squaw dance of the Navajos was one of them in which both men and women took part. Originally it came at the end of elaborate ceremonials to welcome the braves at the end of a war.

Religious songs passed down from generation to generation, as they were an important part of the ceremonies. Women sang songs not only to ease the burden of their own activities, such as spinning and grinding, but also to encourage the warriors as he left the camp. Every mother, of course, sang lullabies. On the northwest coast there were spirited song contests between tribes. Every tribe had its legends of the history of the tribe and certain songs were the exclusive property of clans and societies. Individuals in the clan, however, could sell their songs or even give them away. When the day’s work was done, the old people would tell these tales. There were also many stories involving animals and mythical beings which could assume human form and yet retain some of their own particular traits. Children were thrilled by these stories. The Indian stories and myths were passed by word of mouth from one generation to another. This is known as the oral tradition.

The Indian was essentially musical. Instrumental music served primarily as a rhythmic accompaniment for songs but story-telling and dance were also usually accompanied by a variety of instruments. These included drums, rattles (shaken in the hand or worn on the body), flute, or flageolet, bull-roarers, whistles and other more crude devices as notched sticks rasped on bones. The Indians made them of materials at hand and each had its special religious significance and ceremonial purposes, particularly the rattle, of which there were many varieties. Northwestern tribes used wooden boxes, and their rattles were made like masks from wood or native copper. The Pueblos and other farming tribes made gourd rattles. The Iroquois used a turtle shell and a pot or water drum. Both the tune and the rhythm seem strange to the White man’s ears.

¹Encyclopaedia Encarta - Native Americans http://encarta.msn.com/find/concise.asp?mod=1&ti=761570777&page=4#s22