Kuksu, was a religion in Northern California practiced by members within several

Indigenous peoples of California The indigenous peoples of California (known as Native Californians) are the indigenous inhabitants who have lived or currently live in the geographic area within the current boundaries of California before and after the arrival of Europeans. ...

before and during contact with the arriving European settlers. The religious belief system was held by several tribes in

Central California Central California is generally thought of as the middle third of the state, north of Southern California, which includes Los Angeles, and south of Northern California, which includes San Francisco. It includes the northern portion of the S ...

and Northern California, from the Sacramento Valley west to the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contin ...

. The practice of Kuksu religion included elaborate narrative ceremonial dances and specific regalia. The men of the tribe practiced

rituals A ritual is a sequence of activities involving gestures, words, actions, or objects, performed according to a set sequence. Rituals may be prescribed by the traditions of a community, including a religious community. Rituals are characterized, b ...

to ensure good health, bountiful harvests, hunts, fertility, and good weather. Ceremonies included an annual mourning ceremony,

rites of passage A rite of passage is a ceremony or ritual of the passage which occurs when an individual leaves one group to enter another. It involves a significant change of status in society. In cultural anthropology the term is the Anglicisation of ''rite ...

, and intervention with the spirit world. A male secret society met in underground dance rooms and danced in disguises at the public dances.Kroeber, Alfred L. ''The Religion of the Indians of California'', 1907. Among the Patwin and

Maidu The Maidu are a Native Americans in the United States, Native American people of northern California. They reside in the central Sierra Nevada (U.S.), Sierra Nevada, in the watershed area of the Feather River, Feather and American River, American ...

, Hesi developed as a subdivision of Kuksu distinguished by its female participation. Kuksu has been identified archaeologically by the discovery of underground dance rooms and wooden dance drums.

Northern Kuksu religion

Patwin

The Patwin culture of Northern California had comparatively strong and noticeable Kuksu systems and rituals. Maidu dancer

Maidu

The

culture of Northern California had comparatively strong and noticeable Kuksu systems and rituals.

Pomo

Kuksu was personified as a spirit being by the

Pomo people The Pomo are an Indigenous people of California. Historical Pomo territory in Northern California was large, bordered by the Pacific Coast to the west, extending inland to Clear Lake, and mainly between Cleone and Duncans Point. One small gr ...

. Their

mythology Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narra ...

and dance ceremonies were witnessed, including the spirit of Kuksu or Guksu, between 1892 and 1904. The Pomo used the name ''Kuksu'' or ''Guksu'', depending on the dialect, as the name for a red-beaked supernatural being, that lived in a sweathouse at the southern end of the world. Healing was his province and specialty. The person who played the Kuksu/Guksu in Pomo dance ceremonies was often considered the

medicine man A medicine man or medicine woman is a traditional healer and spiritual leader who serves a community of Indigenous people of the Americas. Individual cultures have their own names, in their respective languages, for spiritual healers and cerem ...

, and dressed as him when attending the sick. A ceremony dance was named after him. He also appeared in costume at most ceremonies briefly in order to take away the villager's illnesses. All males were expected to join a ceremonial society; some of their dances were private or secret from women and children. Scholars differ in their opinions of the societies' power in the tribe: "There was no secret society of importance as there was among the Maidu and presumedly among the neighboring

Wintun The Wintun are members of several related Native American peoples of Northern California, including the Wintu (northern), Nomlaki (central), and Patwin (southern).Pritzker, 152Clear Lake Pomo said: "The heart of religious activities lay in a secret society called ''kuhma'', akin to that of the Patwin and Maidu and composed chiefly of men, which managed the ritual of the ancient kuksu religion.

Southern Kuksu religion

The ethnohistorian

Alfred L. Kroeber Alfred Louis Kroeber (June 11, 1876 – October 5, 1960) was an American cultural anthropologist. He received his PhD under Franz Boas at Columbia University in 1901, the first doctorate in anthropology awarded by Columbia. He was also the first ...

observed that Kuksu existed, but had less "specialized cosmogony," in the "southern Kuksu-dancing groups" of the Ohlone/Costanoan, Salinan,

Miwok The Miwok (also spelled Miwuk, Mi-Wuk, or Me-Wuk) are members of four linguistically related Native American groups indigenous to what is now Northern California, who traditionally spoke one of the Miwok languages in the Utian family. The word ...

and Esselen and northernmost

Yokuts The Yokuts (previously known as MariposasPowell, 1891:90–91.) are an ethnic group of Native Americans native to central California. Before European contact, the Yokuts consisted of up to 60 tribes speaking several related languages. ''Yokuts ...

, in comparison to the groups in the Northern California and northern Sacramento Valley.Kroeber (1925) 445: "It is true the Costanoan and Salinan stocks, who participate in the Kuksu cult and live in the same transverse belt of California as the Miwok, seem also to lean in their mythology toward the Yokuts more than to the Sacramento Valley tribes. A less specialized type of cosmogony is therefore indicated for the southern Kuksu-dancing groups. [1. If, as seems probable, the southerly Kuksu tribes (the Miwok, Costanoans, Esselen, and northernmost Yokuts) had no real society in connection with their Kuksu ceremonies, the distinctness of their mythology appears less surprising.]"

Notes

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References

* Samuel Barrett, Barret, Samuel A. "Ceremonies of the Pomo Indians", Published by University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnicity, July 6, 1917, Vol. 12, No 10., pages 397-441. Thi Stephen Powers. * Kroeber, Alfred L. ''The Kuksu Cult''. Paraphrased. Maidu Cultur

* Kroeber, Alfred L. 1907. ''The Religion of the Indians of California'', ''University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology'' 4:#6. Berkeley, sections titled "Shamanism", "Public Ceremonies", "Ceremonial Structures and Paraphernalia", and "Mythology and Beliefs"; available a
Sacred Texts Online
* Kroeber, Alfred L. 1925. ''Handbook of the Indians of California''. Washington, D.C: ''Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin'' No. 78; (Miwok chapter is available a
Yosemite Online Library
- discusses Kuksu) * Edward Winslow Gifford, Gifford, Edward W. 1926. ''Clear Lake Pomo Society'',''University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology'' 18:2 p. 353-363 "Secret Society Members" (Describes E.M. Loeb's 1925 investigation of the Clear Lake Pomo's practice of the Guksu icreligion.)