In Kwakiutl ceremonies sometimes a mask representing Dzonoqwa appears, the wild woman of the woods, the cannibal woman who eats children.
The supernatural being who are called Dzonoqwa can be both of male and female sex. However, generally they are represented as female. They dwell inland, in wooden or mountainous areas, where are their dwellings, far in the woods, often across a river.
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Masked Kwakiutl dancer representing Dzonokwa, the Cannibal Wild Woman of the Woods (photo E. S. Curtis, 1915) |
The Dzonoqwa have black bodies, with black hair, and hairy eyebrows, faces and hands. Generally, they have eyes wide open, but set so deep in the head that they cannot see well, while the mouth shows the typical protruding position which these beings utilize when emitting their characteristic guttural sound. When speaking they pronounce the words in such a way that every syllable of ordinary speech is repeated with an initial “h”, an aspirated sound, substituting it to the consonant beginning of the syllable or before the initial vowel of a word. They thus adopt the prominent lips posture which is found in the masks representing them.
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Dzonokwa Mask representing the Wild Woman of the Woods (Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada) |
Their voice is so loud that it makes the roof boards shake. They are giants, and their size is twice that of an ordinary man, and have great strength, so that they can tear down large trees with their bare hands. The Dzonokwa are regarded as being able to travel underground. Some tales report that a Dzonokwa cannot be killed until her life is hot, which she keeps hidden in a knot-hole.
Wooden statue representing Dzonokwa, near a Kwakiutl village (photo E. S. Curtis, 1915).
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Oftentimes the Dzonokwa tries to carry away children from human villages, putting them into a basket and taking them in her house in the woods. Sometimes, she entices away children from their house assuming the voice of their grandmother. For this reason, the figure of Dzonokwa was employed as a bugbear to frighten children into obedience to their parents’ orders, menacing them that otherwise the Dzonokwa will come and carry them away. She was described as a cannibal ogress, who takes away the children to roast and devour them, and when she kidnaps them she glues their eyes with a gum, red as blood, which she is chewing. However, with all her strength and untamed nature, she is represented in the tales as rather stupid, so much so that the stolen children are often able to trick and kill her, in order to come back home bringing with them the things found in the ogress’s dwelling. On the other hand, sometimes the encounter with this being can be profitable, because the Dzonokwa is the owner of wealth and supernatural powers which she can give to her visitor (Boas 1935: p.144-146). In a legend, after having killed the Dzonokwa, a group of men find her house full of food and furs. The chief takes possession of a mask, which brings the name of “Nightmare-Bringer-Nest-Mask”, with the accompanying costume of cedar bark, which shall be ever since a prestige title claimed by his family (Boas-Hunt, 1902).
Furthermore, the Dzonokwa is regarded as having healing powers and to be able to bring back to life the dead. The bath in the skull of a deceased Dzonokwa can give an extraordinary physical strength (Lévi-Strauss,1979).
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Animals