Comments on Hanta Yo

Note COMMENTS ON HANTA YO The publicity given to Hanta Yo, the book written by Ruth Beebe Hill, implies that the Sioux story has never been told from “the inside.” This is not true. There have been many writers, Indians and non-Indians, who have written from “the inside.” She interprets the title Hanta Yo to mean “Clear the way! In a sacred manner I come!” It means no such thing. It was never used in a ceremony. It really means, “Get out of the way!” (addressed to one person) or “Beat it!” “Scram!” My Indian “sister” says it’s “like slang.” This misinformation, plus a Santee informant and interpreter, Chunksa Yuha (sic.), for a Lakota story is a poor beginning. Santee and Lakota can understand each other but they lived different cultures, often having differ­ ent words for the same thing, and have dialectical differences all the way through. It is difficult to understand how such misinformation could come from a sincere student after thirty years of research. Mrs. Hill says, “Nobody else ever told the story from the inside, using the ancient Sioux language to develop the Indians’ point of view.” This is all nonsense, as is the writing of the story in Sioux and translating it back into “early nineteenth century English,” if she ever really did this. She got the idea from Mari Sandoz, who wrote her Crazy Horse in a sort of Sioux phraseology. Mari was brought up with the Indian “kids” and knew many real old-timers. She did not have to write her story first in Lakota because she knew Indians well enough to give a real Indian flavor without doing so. Nevertheless, Crazy Horse, fine account that it is, is difficult reading for people unaccustomed to Sioux phraseology. If the archaic Sioux language Mrs. Hill talks about was any different from the language spoken today it has been long gone, with no chance whatever of finding anyone who knows anything about it. Mrs. Hill stated that there are 300 words in English that have no equivalent in the Sioux language. This is an overstatement. They can express the same thoughts with full understanding of their content. She says there is no word for blue. There is not only a word for blue but many ways of expressing the various shades of blue. She implies that there is a word for green, but this is the color for which there is no word in itself. Green is yellow-blue. She says she used Father Buechel’s Lakota Grammar. If she had also used his dictionary she w'ould have found some of the words she says do not exist. She claims there were no war bonnets before the Tetons (Titonwan) moved out onto the prairie. They were reported by the earliest 144 Western American Literature explorers in the 1600’s. There were also chiefs, although they did not have the power and authority ascribed to them by some writers. She implies that hunters shot between the buffalo’s ribs, which they did not. They shot behind the ribs so the arrow would not lose its penetration by striking one. Nor was a person purified in the smoke of an ordinary lodge fire but with special incense, usually burned away from the actual fireplace. Nor was there any ceremony for making a winkta although winkta sometimes held ceremonial positions. A man became winkta through a dream. Mrs. Hill makes the same mistake a number of writers have made in stating that the belly quills of the porcupine are the finest and most prized. No Indian quill worker ever told her this. Such quills certainly would be prized for there aren’t any quills on the belly. She says she got hers from road kills but they must have been so badly smashed she couldn’t tell the back from the belly. The book is full of misunderstanding. For one thing, a man would never call his future wife “sister.” Some of the text is disgusting and revolt­ ing, completely untrue in these instances. There are many errors and mis­ conceptions and the author’s understanding of Sioux religion is almost nil. One could go...