Red Horn (legend)

The legend of Red Horn (also known as 'He Who Wears Human Heads as Earrings' [National Geographic December 1993 'Going Head-to-Head with Indian Prehistory'] ) is found in the oral traditions of the Pawnee (?), Ioway, ["6. Wâkx!istowi, the Man with the Human Head Earrings," Alanson Skinner, "Traditions of the Iowa Indians," The Journal of American Folklore, vol. 38, #150 (Oct.-Dec., 1925): 427-506 [457-458] .] and Winnebago people (the last of these was recorded by anthropologist Paul Radin 1908-1912). [Paul Radin, Winnebago Hero Cycles: A Study in Aboriginal Literature (Baltimore: Waverly Press, 1948) 115-136.] The Red Horn Cycle depicts his adventure with Turtle, Storms-As-He-Walks (a thunderbird) and others who contest a race of giants, the "Wągerucge" or "Man-Eaters", who have been killing human beings whom Red Horn has pledged to help. Red Horn eventually took a red haired giant woman as a wife. Archaeologists have speculated that Red Horn is one of the major mythic figures in Mississipian art, with numerous representations on Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (SECC) artifacts, [ cite book | editors = F. Kent Reilly and James Garber | title = Ancient Objects and Sacred Realms | publisher = University of Texas Press | date = 2004 | pages = pp. 29-34 | isbn - 978-0-292-71347-5] although the evidence for this is still in dispute. [Contrary arguments at [http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.GottschallDebate.html| Gottschall — Debate and Discussion.] ] The mythic cycle of Red Horn and his sons has certain analogies with the Hero Twins mythic cycle of Mesoamerica. [Robert L. Hall, The Cultural Background of Mississippian Symbolism, in Patricia Galloway, ed., The Southeastern Ceremonial Complex: Artifacts and Analysis. The Cottonlandia Conference (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press) 239-278. cite book | last = Power | first = Susan | title = Early Art of the Southeastern Indians-Feathered Serpents and Winged Beings | publisher = University of Georgia Press | date = 2004 | pages = pp. 158| isbn - 0-08203-2501-5]

Red Horn's Adventures

Redhorn was known by many names, and some have speculated that he is Morning Star, although this identity has never been explicitly attested, and runs contrary to his identity as a fixed star in the Winnebago story "Intcohorucika". [Here is what this story says, "The one star that is shining most greatly of the trio, it is he. The greatly shining white one, and the blue one, and the red one; and įcohorúšika was the yellowish one. And the other ones, his older brothers, are also stars. They are the trio that are bunched together [the Belt Stars of Orion] . Paul Radin, "Intcohorúcika," Winnebago Notebooks (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society Library) #14, pp. 1-67 [65-67] . "Égi že tanihajega wiragošge wa’ųnąkše. Hitanike wiragošgežą horokanakąnąpra hanątc´ herenagi, žee e hereže. Horokanakąnąpra skanąga co, hánąga šujanąga zinisganąki ereže, įcohorúšika. Égi hijanénąka, hiniwahira, hišge wiragošge hireže. Hitanike stonąki e herereže."] He is also known as "He who is Struck with Deer Lungs," a possible reference to the Bi-Lobed Arrow Motif of the SECC. Robert Hall has argued that the Bi-Lobed Arrow Motif may be a graphic depiction of the calumet. [Robert L. Hall, The Cultural Background of Mississippian Symbolism, in Patricia Galloway, ed., The Southeastern Ceremonial Complex: Artifacts and Analysis. The Cottonlandia Conference (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press) 239-278. cite web | url = http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.RedhornCycle.html|title=The Red Horn Cycle| access date-09-13-08] He has also argued that the characters in the myth may be integrally tied to the calumet ceremony, and it's association with kinship and adoption. [Robert L. Hall, An Archaeology of the Soul: North American Indian Belief and Ritual (Urbana & Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1997) 151. cite web | url = http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3904/is_200004/ai_n8897879/pg_7?tag=artBody;col1|title=Of Masks and Myths| access date-09-13-08] In the episode associated with this name, Red Horn turns himself into an arrow to win a race. After winning the race Redhorn creates heads on his earlobes and makes his hair into a long red braid called a "he", "horn", in Winnebago. Thus he becomes known as "Redhorn" ("he-šucka") and as "He who has Human Heads as Earlobes" ("įco-horúšika"). In one episode an orphan girl who always wears a white beaverskin wrap is pressured by her grandmother to court Redhorn. Despite the girl's adamant refusal, the grandmother insists. She eventually relents and goes off to find Redhorn, who is surrounded by other girls. She teases him, and unexpectedly, he smiles at her. The other girls were jealous, they push and shove her and tell her "You don't know anything." Redhorn and his friends prepare to go on the warpath and are camped just outside the village. During this time the women bring the warriors moccasins and the she brings a pair to Red Horn, who accepts them. When the warriors return from battle, they play a prank and have the sentries proclaim that Red Horn and one of his friends are dead. The grandmother begins to cut the hair of the orphan girl, as if she were already Redhorn's wife. When he comes into view and it is apparent that he is not dead, the grandmother laments "I have wrecked my granddaughter's hair." The victors dance for four days, and many of the young men approach Redhorn to recommend their sisters to him. He takes no interest, and asks instead, "Where does the girl in the white beaverskin wrap live?" At night Redhorn shows up at the girl's lodge and lays down next to her. Her grandmother throws a blanket over them and they are married. [cite web|url=http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.Redhorn%26BrothersMarry.html|title=Redhorn and His Brothers Marry(§3 of the Redhorn Cycle)|author=Richard L. Dieterle|accessed=2008-10-7] In another episode, with their lives staked on the outcome, the Giants challenge Redhorn and his friends to play ball ("kisik" [lacrosse] and clearly not chunkey). [cite book | last = Pauketat | first = Timothy | title = Ancient Cahokia and the Mississippians| publisher = Cambridge University Press | date = 2004 | isbn - 0-521-52066-5] The best Giant player was a woman with long red hair just like Redhorn's. The little heads on Redhorn's ears caused her to laugh so much that it interfered with her game and the giants lost. [ cite book | editors = F. Kent Reilly and James Garber | title = Ancient Objects and Sacred Realms | publisher = University of Texas Press | date = 2004 | pages = pp. 29-34 | isbn - 978-0-292-71347-5] The Giants lost all the other contests as well. Then they challenged Redhorn and his friends to a wrestling match in which they threw all but Red Horn's friend Turtle. Since Redhorn and his fellow spirits lost two out of the three matches, they were all slain.

Red Horn's Sons

The two wives of Redhorn were pregnant at the time of his death. Redhorn's first wife, the girl in the white beaverskin wrap, gave birth to a son who had the same red hair and human heads hanging from his ears as his father. Redhorn's second wife, the Giantess, also gave birth to a red haired boy, but with living faces where his nipples should have been. The sons were spared by the Giants and grew up to be very large. One day the eldest son went out to fast in order to get a blessing from the Thunderbirds. He went to seek his visions at a place not far from a broad prairie where the Giants had a village. He knew that the head of his father, whose hair had by now turned white, hung from a lodge pole there. When he called out to the spirits with a death song, the kind sung by prisoners about to be executed, the Giants who heard it would immediately jump into the fire. When the old men of the village saw that so many of their people were jumping in the flames, they guessed at the cause, and ordered four warriors to guard the scalp pole. Two of the guards painted themselves red and the others painted themselves black. Red Horns two sons decided then to retrieve the heads of their father and his friends. They use their powers to make special red and black arrows to kill the guards, then grabbed the heads and ran with them. As the boys ran they shot the Giants with their arrows, each arrow killing many Giants. When they ran out of arrows, they used their bows as clubs, amost wiping out the Giants completely. A little girl with a boy that she packed on her back are spared so that the race of Giants do not become extinct, but they are thrown to the other side of the sea so than will no longer be a threat. The twos sons then burn the bodies of the Giants and grind up their bones and spread the powder around their own village. [cite web|url=http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.SonsOfRHFindTheirFather.html|title=The Sons of Redhorn Find Their Father (§5 of the Redhorn Cycle)|author=Richard L. Dieterle|accessed=2008-10-5] The two sons take the head of Redhorn and ask their mothers to sleep with it, but each replies, "How can I sleep with that, it is only a skull?" The boys take all three heads and lay them in a bed in the middle of the lodge. The next day Redhorn, Turtle, and "Storms as He Walks" are all found alive and sleeping in the bed. Where the sons had scattered the powdered bones of the Giants, all the people that the Giants had killed were also found alive and sleeping. When Red Horns wives saw this, they shouted, "Oh, our sons have brought our husbands back to life again!" The boys picked up their fathers and carried them around like children. [cite web|url=http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.SonsOfRHFindTheirFather.html|title=The Sons of Redhorn Find Their Father (§5 of the Redhorn Cycle)|author=Richard L. Dieterle|accessed=2008-10-5] In honor of this feat, Turtle and "Storms as He Walks" promise the boys special weapons. In another episode, the sons of Redhorn decide to go on the warpath. The older brother asks "Storms as He Walks" for the Thunderbird Warbundle. After some effort, it is produced, but the Thunderbirds demand that it have a case. A friend of the sons of Redhorn offers his own body as its case. The boys take the Thunderbird Warbundle and with their followers go on a raid to the other side of the sky. [cite web | url = http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.RedhornCycle.html|title=The Red Horn Cycle| access date-09-13-08] Many S.E.C.C. images seem to be of Red Horn, his companions, and his sons. Other images found in S.E.C.C. art show figures with Long Nosed God Maskettes on their ears and in place of their nipples. [ cite book | last = Pauketat | first = Timothy | title = Ancient Cahokia and the Mississippians| publisher = Cambridge University Press | date = 2004 | isbn - 0-521-52066-5] [John Paul Staeck, Archaeology, identity, and oral tradition: A reconsideration of Late Prehistoric and Early Historic Winnebago social structure and identity as seen through oral traditions, Ph. D. thesis, Rutgers (New Brunswick, 1994). cite web | url = http://www.fortunecity.com/marina/caribbean/244/oraltrad.html|title=Archaeology, Ethnicity, and Oral Tradition-Chapter 6| access date-09-13-08] [ cite book | last = Townsend | first = Richard F. | title = Hero, Hawk, and Open Hand| publisher = Yale University Press | date = 2004 | isbn - 0-300-10601-7]

ee also

*Ho-Chunk (Winnebago) Mythology
*Pawnee mythology

References

* [http://www.tcinternet.net/users/cbailey/RedHorn.html Red Horn]
* [http://www.mpm.edu/wirp/ICW-52.html Ho-chunk Culture]
* [http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.RedhornCycle.html Hotcak Encyclopedia]