Dreams have played a central and determinative role in the formation of the religious and spiritual worlds of most Native American groups. As early as 1623, dreams were recorded among the Hurons by the French Catholic Recollect brother Gabriel Sagard. These accounts were then expanded by the writings of the Jesuit priest Jean de Br?beuf, who lived with the Hurons around Georgian Bay (1634-36). According to these writings, young Huron and Iroquois men would fast for extended periods, either in a partitioned rear section of their longhouse or in a specially made shelter. These fasts could last as long as thirty days and were undertaken so that the young men would have a vision or powerful dream that would enhance their abilities in hunting, warfare, or healing. The records of Br?beuf also include dramatic accounts of dreams and visions that came spontaneously to women and played a role in determining those women’s participation in various ceremonial rites.
If the dreamer was successful, he would obtain a vision of a dream spirit who would give him a specific ability or power and show him how to solicit that power through special songs and ritual activities. Among most native groups, the dream spirit would then become a lifelong protector and helper whose aid and abilities could be solicited through prayer and tobacco offerings. In dreams, the dreaming soul?that aspect of self that travels in visions away from the body?could contact the dream spirit and receive instructions. Dreams were considered by many native groups to be the most valid means for communicating with the spiritual powers and the primary basis of religious knowledge. Advanced dreamers who became religious specialists would interpret dreams in order to diagnose illness, foretell the death or return to health of the sick, predict the outcome of expeditions in hunting and warfare, as well as which objects could be substituted for those things appearing in dreams which were difficult or impossible to procure for carrying out dream induced rituals.
Many ceremonies were attributed to dream origins. Foundational dreams would be transmitted through kinship groups, who held an exclusive knowledge of the dream and of the correct ritual for its enactment. The dream was usually owned by the head of the family and passed on through special ceremonial rites. However, additional dreams, especially by those who were recognized religious leaders, could modify and change the ceremonial patterns. A unique aspect of the Iroquois dreaming traditions was the dream-guessing feast, when dreamers would join together and go from longhouse to longhouse in entranced states induced by their dream spirits. Handling red-hot coals and dancing and singing, each dreamer would ask that his or her “dream desire,” narrated in the form of a riddle, be guessed by other members of the longhouse. When the riddle had been correctly solved, gifts would be given to the dreamer to satisfy the dream desire. A failure to receive the correct gifts could indicate the coming death of the dreamer.
Southeastern sources clearly show the centrality of dreaming in the religious worlds of most native groups in that region. Dreams were actively sought, both in regular sleep and in special fasting, and the songs and powers given through them became an intrinsic feature of the social and religious life of the dreamer. Dreams revealed the existence of a spirit world that had continuity with and similarity to the world of the living and that could be visited through dreams. Among the Choctaws, Creeks, and Cherokees, certain dreamers could travel to a village of the dead and there converse with their former relatives. Dreaming thus gave an experiential confirmation of the existence of other worlds, including that of the dead. Among the Cherokees, dream interpreters would seek out the “seat of pain” for those who were ill by asking them extensive questions about their dreams ranging back over months and sometimes over a period of years. Dream typologies were developed by means of which particular types of animals, actions, or various other dream images were given specific meanings and used diagnostically to predict future events or indicate cures that would bring the dreamer back into harmony with the dream spirits. The creation of the Cherokee syllabary by Sequoyah allowed many of the Cherokee spiritual leaders to record in the indigenous language a variety of formulaic prayers and ritual songs?most of which originated in dreams that had been passed on through oral tradition until they were written down by native practitioners in the old Cherokee language.
The most well known dreaming practices are those of the native peoples of the Great Plains. With her research, conducted in the 1920s, Ruth Benedict set the stage for interpreting Plains dreaming as the primary means by which a particular group reinforced its “culture pattern.” Dreams were seen as stereotypical in reproducing similar content that supported the religious worldview of the dreamer. However, alternative research later done by many native ethnographers showed clearly that dreaming was not stereotypical, that every dream had many unique and divergent qualities, and that no two dreams were ever identical. The distinction between dreams and visions was not considered significant; the primary criteria for evaluating the sacred power of a dream or vision depended upon the degree to which the subject could reproduce a visible, positive result as a consequence of his or her following either a dream had while sleeping or a waking vision attained while fasting or praying. Only those dreams or visions that resulted in a direct manifestation of power were considered sacred.
On the Plains, dreams were acquired in two basic ways: either they came spontaneously or they were sought ritually. A majority of the dreams and visions collected in the ethnography were spontaneous; acquired without conscious effort, they nevertheless made a lasting and lifelong impression on the dreamer. Spontaneous dreams were common for women under specific circumstances, such as during times of mourning for the recent dead, when Plains women would often slash their legs and arms and wander away from camp crying to the sacred powers. Domestic quarrels and conflicts among close kin groups could also result in a woman’s wandering away from camp and then having a remarkable visionary experience. Women who were captured by enemy warriors and later escaped to wander over the plains for many days without food, seeking their home tribe, often had visions. Dreams also came unsought during periods of illness. Such was the case with the famous dream of the Oglala Sioux holy man Black Elk, which occurred to him in 1872 at the age of nine.
The more structured vision quest or dream fast was usually undertaken by Plains men, and sometimes women, during adolescence, but it was sometimes repeated among certain groups throughout life. Young men went to experienced elders, usually relatives, to receive instructions for carrying out a proper dream fast. They would undergo various purification rites and then go to a nearby hill, on the top of which they would either make a circle within which they remained or dig a pit in which they stayed throughout the fast. Dressed in a minimum of clothing, with long hair unbraided, carrying only a pipe and a robe, they would pray continually to the holy powers to grant them a powerful dream. After as many as ten days of fasting, a successful dreamer might come down from the hill and relate his dream to elders in a sweat lodge. Or he might wait a specific number of days before approaching a leader of a dream society, whose members held rituals related to a particular dream spirit, like the buffalo or bear, and ask to join the dream society based on his successful vision.
Successful dreams were enacted, and the power of the dream had to be demonstrated for the dream to be accepted as an authentic gift from the dream spirits. Successful dreamers were expected to demonstrate remarkable or powerful abilities as a sign of a power-granting dream. Dreamers used a variety of objects to hold the power given to them in the dream, and would paint themselves and their horses according to dream experiences. The dream objects were kept within sacred bundles, which were unwrapped only under ritual circumstances, during which the dream was often narrated. In using the dream objects, dream songs were sung; these songs epitomized the heart of the dream recreation. Dream images were painted on tipis, robes, and other gear to empower those objects. Women would use dream images as a source for designs in crafts as well as in quill and bead work and other types of clothing ornamentation. The designs of the famous Ghost Dance shirts used during the religious revival that began in the 1890s were all said to have originated in visionary dreams. In Plains culture, dreams were central and a primary means for innovation and change in religious and social practices.
Dreams played a powerful social role among Northwest Coast peoples as well as among many Inuit groups. Franz Boas (1925) collected an entire volume of Kwakiutl dreams, showing the rich and complex dream symbolism that completely pervaded the Kwakiutl spiritual world. Sometimes a dream spirit would embed a dream crystal?a valuable source of power?in the body of the dreamer. The possession of such a crystal was a sign of a dreamer’s initiation into advanced dreaming practices. Many flying dreams have been recorded; they signify the dreamer’s ability to explore hidden dimensions of the religious cosmology. Dreams among Northwest Coast peoples as well as subarctic peoples indicate a strong belief in reincarnation. Many dreamers have claimed to know about their past lives through dream experiences, and there are records of women who dreamed of giving birth to someone who had recently died in the community. Certain dream spirits might send negative or frightening dreams, such as Stimsila among the Bella Coolas. On the other hand, certain dream spirits were regarded as protectors and accompanied the dreamer throughout life, revealing in dreams future events, matters pertaining to secret societies, and other critical life experiences.
Among the Pueblos, Navajos, and Apaches of the American Southwest, dreams were of much less significance. The highly structured ritual life of the Pueblo people and the complex healing rites of the Navajos did not normally allow for innovation through dreams. Traditional knowledge was transmitted through learning the rites and songs of the ceremonies and not through dreaming practices. Dorothy Eggan (1949) collected Hopi dreams and noted how they function in a personal way for the dreamer. But, she found, they are not usually connected to religious sanctions, nor are they considered necessary for becoming a participant in communal rites. However, Hopis evaluate dreams as either good or bad and take appropriate actions to counteract the effects of negative dreams. Among the Zunis, dreams are also evaluated, and only bad dreams are shared. For the Navajos, dreams may determine what type of diagnostician the dreamer may become, and they play a role in determining the causes of illness.
Lee Irwin
Mohawk-Delaware Ancestry
College of Charleston
