Having now characterized the Huichol-Tarahumari type-rite for Mexico,
the Lipan-Mescalero for the transitional nomad Southwest, and the
Kiowa-Comanche as the historical prototype for the Plains, we may attempt
a comparison and contrasting of them.
In Mexico as a whole “curing” is perhaps the most salient characteristic,
while both curing and doctoring are conspicuous in Mescalero. In the
Plains, while doctoring is an important feature it is by no means
indispensable.[121] Peyotism in Mexico, therefore, has a tribal
character, while in Mescalero the ceremony is a _forum for rival
shamans_—a trait not altogether absent in early Plains rites—and in the
Plains peyotism has a societal nature. These facts have an important
bearing on the cultural manifestations of the physiological action of
peyote. In Mexico visions are turned to the uses of prophecy;[122] in
Mescalero they enable a shaman to detect rival witchcraft; while in
the Plains, visions are a source of individual power. These categories
should not be made too rigid, however, for clairvoyance, if not prophecy,
as well as witchcraft anxiety are known for early Plains peyotism,
and on the other hand, peyote medicine-power is a source of Mescalero
shamanistic rivalry. Yet as indications of relative emphasis these
statements might be allowed to stand.
The Mexican symbolisms point to an association with hunting, agriculture
and gathering activities, and the typical anxiety expressed in the
religion is the desire for rain. In Mescalero, peyote is the focal
point for the warfare of antagonistic powers, and expresses the mutual
suspicion of formerly small local groups; the intense and ever-present
anxiety is the fear of aggression and reprisal by witchcraft. In the
early Plains peyote ceremonies, associations with warfare were prominent
(influenced no doubt by a forerunner of peyotism there, the mescal bean
ceremonialism), though in later times this element had become so nearly
absent that Mooney could point quite properly to the “international”
character of the cult in his time.[123]
Areal contrasts in minor points are no less striking. Dancing was
conspicuous in Mexico, less important transitionally, and on the whole
lacking in the Plains. Painting of a symbolic nature was ritually
significant in Mexico; in the Plains individual styles were dictated
by peyote visions. Peyotism in Mexico is a seasonal matter, but in the
Plains the rite occurs the year around (in the south the trip for peyote
may have been associated more with the ritual salt pilgrimage, in the
north with the ritualized war journeys; parallels are also suggested in
the Maricopa ritualized mountain-sheep hunting and Navaho deer hunting).
In Mexico peyote was a tribal affair and women participated on equal
terms with the men in dancing, etc. In Mescalero, women were excluded
from meetings, as in the Plains also originally. The rite was held
principally outdoors in Mexico, and in a tipi transitionally and in the
Plains—a patio arrangement in Mexico, and an altar centering around
the “moon” in the Plains. Ritual racing and ball games[124] are part
of Mexican peyotism, but not elsewhere. Smoking is inconspicuous in
Mexico, but in the Plains it has been important enough to involve church
schisms.[125] Huichol peyote had no drum, though elsewhere in Mexico a
wooden drum was used, while in the Plains the water-drum (intrusive from
the Southwest) is universal. The rasp is Mexican, but the Plains rite has
the gourd rattle and eagle wing-bone whistle in addition to the drum. The
“staff” is a special problem in the Plains.
The Huichol and Tarahumari have a squirrel fetish in addition to the
fetish plant; the Plains have only the latter. Ceremonial drunkenness
with tesvino, etc., is an integral part of Mexican “curing”; in the
Plains peyote and alcohol are so far mutually exclusive that the familiar
propaganda calls the first a specific against the second. The alleged
aphrodisiac virtue of peyote is a Mexican belief; but curiously enough
in Mexico, where many “peyotes” were said by natives to be aphrodisiac,
Lumholtz pronounced _Lophophora williamsii_ definitely anaphrodisiac;
while in the Plains, where the natives most strenuously deny this virtue
for peyote, enemies of the cult most consistently claim that it produces
aphrodisiac orgies.[126]
In Mexico the shaman alone sings, though his assistants may “spell”
him; in the Plains all male participants drum and rattle. In Mescalero,
though the drum circles the tipi, the staff and gourd remain with the
leader. Finally, Mexican and Mescalero peyotism are almost wholly free
of Christian elements; so too were the early Plains rites diffusing from
the Kiowa-Comanche, though in the John Wilson rite, the Oto Church of
the First-born (and its successor, the Native American Church) and the
Winnebago Rave-Hensley variant, Christian symbolism and interpretations
are frequent.
Common elements are numerous: the ceremonial trip for peyote (more
elaborate in Mexico, to be sure), the meeting held at night, the fetish
peyote, the use of feathers and the abundance of symbolisms connected
with birds, the ritual circuit, ceremonial fire and incensing, water
ceremonies, the “Peyote Woman,” morning “baptism” or “curing” rites,
“talking” peyote, abstinence from salt, ritual breakfast, singing,
tobacco ceremonials, public confession of sins, Morning Star symbolisms,
and (for northern Mexico) the crescent moon[127] altar. The fear of
being blinded by the peyote-fuzz is Mescalero, Lipan and Plains, and the
water-drum is shared by both non-peyote Southwestern groups and those of
the Plains who have the peyote rite. The use of parched corn in sugar
water, boneless, sweetened meat and fruit for the “peyote breakfast” may
be regarded as universal for peyotism, wherever found.