by Faun Rice
dancers, who trained young boys in arcane ritual and older boys and girls in
curing, or participated in the renewal of the universe.
On one level, these were fairly unremarkable examples of a broad type of
spirit-impersonation ritual widely practiced in Australia, Melanesia, and parts
of South America as well: involving elaborate disguises, the use of bull-roar-
ers to create terrifying unearthly noises, and the pretense that those excluded
(young boys and many women) actually believe they are witnessing spirits. But
in these dramas, the spirits almost never give orders. Mainly they just terrify
people (or else people pretend to be terrified; it’s never entirely clear who’s really
fooling whom), and then reveal to a certain elect the ritual knowledge that lets
initiates themselves play spirits in their turn. The elders who impersonate the
spirits in some contexts might, in others, beat and admonish the initiates, and
order them around; but these initiates are children and the elders’ behavior is
just a harsher or more exaggerated version of how parents normally treat small
children. What we see in central California is in certain ways quite different.
The most important spirit was known as Kuksu, or “Big Head,” the god who
had revealed al the arts and sciences to humans long ago. Yet at least equal in
importance were the clowns. Clowns were a fixture of many Californian rituals.
They behaved like gluttons, lechers, and buffoons; they accompanied almost all
rituals, no matter how solemn or important, with burlesque mimicry and slapstick
routines, making fun of the officiants, musicians, and even gods. Al this is much
NOTES ON THE POLITICS OF DIVINE KINGSHIP
383
discussed in the literature. But if one picks careful y through accounts of the ac-
tual ceremonies, one surprising feature emerges that has largely escaped previous
comment. Clowns were also the only figures in those rituals, or, for that matter,
in Californian life more general y, who had the power to issue direct orders to
anyone else. Or at least, they were the only ones who could issue orders directly
backed up by threat of punishment—since clowns also had the power to levy fines
or other penalties for misbehavior. This might mean enforcing the various rules
and regulations of the ceremony, though it might also mean whimsical y making
them up, and sometimes “misbehavior” might mean just laughing at their jokes,
since unlike in ordinary life, during rituals, laughing at a clown’s jokes was strictly
forbidden. During Pomo Kuksu rituals, if anyone cracked up at the clown’s antics,
the clown—who we are told also acted as “sergeant at arms” for the ritual—was al-
lowed to (playful y) attack the culprit and then levy a fine (Barrett 1917: 417, 422;
cf. 1919: 457 n. 24).2 Of the Wappo coyote dance, another Kuksu ritual, we read:
While the dance was open to women, it was only the men who made up as
clowns. The latter danced naked, with stripes on their bodies, and colored clay
on their faces. They made funny faces. . . . If a man (or woman) laughed, he was
thrown up in the air. Then he had to pay a fine, give a feast, or do anything which
the clowns demanded. (Loeb 1932: 111)
In other words, clown orders could be completely arbitrary and, in principle, at
least unlimited. Among the Wintun hesi ritual, S. A. Barrett observed that moki
clowns, described elsewhere (Loeb 1933: 171) as “policemen” of the ceremony,
are privileged to levy a fine on one who does anything contrary to custom, and
especially upon those who show displeasure at their ridicule or refuse to do their
bidding. When, therefore, they ask someone to sing, he must accede or pay a fine.
It is said that nearly all individual singing is due to the commands of the clowns.
(Barrett 1919: 458)3
2. So among the Northern Maidu the director of ceremonies issues “commands”
(Dixon 1905: 253); in Loeb’s description of the Pomo ritual, the clown or ghost-
clown has the role of fining dancers who make mistakes (1932: 50) or who laugh at
their jokes (ibid., 5, 27, 110–12); on fines for laughing, see also Kroeber (1925: 264,
450); Loeb (1933: 224); and Steward (1931: 199–200).
3. Here the clown’s behavior seems to echo the behavior of shamanic spirits, who, at
least among the Shasta, will demand the shaman sing and threaten punishment if
384
ON KINGS
Clowns were the only performers who could break all the rules. Often they car-
ried out tasks literally backward, or upside down. But they also made up rules,
and enforced existing ones. Sometimes clowns did both at the same time, like
the Yuki clowns, who would tell initiates to do the exact opposite of what they
were supposed to, then impose fines on anyone foolish enough to take them
at their word (Kroeber 1925: 187).4 It was as if the clowns were the personal
embodiment of the principle that only those not bound by rules can create
rules. Clown commands were supposed to be whimsical—hence, arbitrary—but
clown commands were the only genuine commands anyone gave or received
in most Californian societies, since only they were enforced by the threat of
sanction. What’s more, while clowns were not, like the costumed masquerad-
ers, identified with specific gods, they appear to have represented the divine
principle in general. Rather than humans impersonating gods, they were gods
impersonating humans, the absurdity of their behavior a way of conveying to
us how ridiculous we appear in divine eyes (Park 1990: 270; cf. Makarius 1970;
Hieb 1972; Handelman 1981).5
For present purposes, though, what’s important is that the divine and ar-
bitrary power clowns wield is strictly confined to rituals. Some Californian
communities did have their own village clowns; but those clowns had no right
to give orders under regular circumstances. In fact, neither did anyone else:
the main authorities among the Pomo, Wintun, Maidu, and their neighbors,
whether chiefs, shamans, or heads of initiation societies, did not have the power
to command others. What’s more, the clowns were most often drawn from a
class of hobos and beggars, who were the last people who could be seen as hold-
ing authority of any kind, coercive or otherwise (Brightman 1999).
Pueblo clowns similarly embodied gods, acted as “police” during ritu-
als, and had the power to whip and punish children. Clowns become more of
an autonomous force here, as there are warrior societies that combine police
they don’t (Dixon 1907: 473–76). The name Moki is used both for the master of
ceremonies and for the clowns. In other instances the roles are combined.
4. “They direct each other to step in the wrong place, which is their way of indicating
where they are to stand. Should one really go where he is told, he has to pay” (ibid.).
5. “The key to understanding these ludic displays—their obscenity, their disrespect for
property, and their seemingly irrational disregard for self—is a simple one: we are
meant to view them not as perverse humans but as gods impersonating humans,
showing us what clods we are in the gods’ eyes” (Park 1990: 270).
NOTES ON THE POLITICS OF DIVINE KINGSHIP
functions and clowning.6 But perhaps the most impressive expression of police
powers in the hands of buffoons is to be found among the Kwakiutl, during the
Midwinter Ceremonials. During this ritual season, the normal social structure
was suspended, people even took on different names, and society came to be
organized around rights to dance certain roles in the great ritual dramas: Can-
nibal dancers, Thunderbirds, Grizzly Bears, Killer Whales, Seals, Ghosts, and,
critically, Fools (Boas 1897: 498–99; Curtis 1915: 156–58). The system seems
in many ways a transformation of a graded set of initiation societies, with ad-
ditional military functions added on: many of the dancers are specifical y said to
be warriors, and this alternative social structure also pops into action, replacing
the normal one, whenever society goes to war (Boas 1899: 101–2; cf. Codere
1950: 119).7
The highest order during the ritual season is represented by the Hamatsa or
Man-Eater, a human seized by a terrible cannibalistic spirit who must gradually
be cured over the course of the ceremonies. But it’s the clowns—the Fool Danc-
ers or nutlmatl, often aided and accompanied by the Grizzly Bears, armed with
great bear claws—who functioned as “the tribal police during the winter period
of aggregation and ceremonial” (MacLeod 1933: 339). According to Boas,
[The] “fool dancers” are also messengers and helpers of the Hamatsa who help to
enforce the laws referring to the ceremonial. Their method of attack is by throw-
ing stones at people, hitting them with sticks, or in serious cases stabbing and
killing them with lances and war axes. (1897: 468)
6. “Pueblo clowns served as police during ceremonies to ensure that people attend
performances and that they obeyed the taboos during ritual periods. Clowns might
be given considerable power over others at these times. . . . Among the Pueblo
Indians clowns are also disciplinarians for children, and are used as bogeymen.
Wearing masks and impersonating supernatural beings, they threatened to whip
children and frighten them in other ways” (Norbeck 1961: 209, cited in Crumrine
1969: 15, who provides a similar analysis of Mayo clowns). Similarly, Else Clews
Parsons writes “the clowning society is dangerous and fear-inspiring. The clowns are
licensed to do as they choose; they are punitive and have express police or warrior
functions” (1939: 131). On police functions of Southwestern clowns in general,
cf. Parsons and Biels (1939: 499, 504); Whitman (1947: 15).
7. It is probably significant that in the Southern Kwakiutl winter dancing societies
documented by Drucker (1940), Fool Dancers were largely absent, though “warrior”
dancers appear to have taken their place.
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ON KINGS
The Fools are said to menace or attack anyone who stumbled while dancing
(Morland-Simpson 1888: 82; Boas 1890: 67), laughed, or coughed during a
performance (Boas 1897: 506),8 mistakenly called someone by his or her sum-
mer name (ibid.: 517), or even took too long eating (ibid.: 551). Even if Boas’
informants were obviously sometimes exaggerating for theatrical effect (“if any-
one makes a mistake in dancing he is killed by the Nutlmatl” [ibid.]), Kwakiutl
clowns were clearly far more dangerous characters than their Californian cous-
ins. Most in Boas’ time were experienced warriors. They are also even more gro-
tesque. Fool Dancers wore tattered clothing, blackened their faces, or donned
masks with exceedingly long noses. Their noses were always running and they
became excited if anyone touched or even mentioned them. They flung mucus
at one another. They carried out tasks backward and became furious if anyone
tried to correct them. They were constantly pretending to throw rocks at crowds.
Some would feign stabbing themselves, using bladders of fake blood to feign in-
jury. But some of their destructiveness was not simulated. “They are armed with
clubs and stones, which they use on anything that arouses their repugnance for
beauty and order,” wrote Edward Curtis (1915: 216); “they dislike to see clean
and beautiful clothing,” one of Boas’ informants added. “They tear and soil it.
They break canoes, houses, kettles, and boxes; in short, act the mad man in every
conceivable way” (Boas 1897: 469). Sometimes a crew of Fools in a berserker
rage would soil everything in sight, filling houses with filth and ordure, even
pulling houses apart9 (Boas 1890: 66–8; 1897: 468–73, 506, 516, 564, 566–69;
1921: 1160; 1930: 146–50; Curtis 1915: 215–16, 231–32).
So once again those who are not bound by any sort of order—indeed, who
express revulsion toward the very idea of order—are also those in charge of
enforcing it.
Northwest Coast society was in no sense egalitarian. Perhaps a third of the
population held aristocratic titles, and in pre-Conquest times roughly a fifth
were slaves (Donald 1997).10 Still, there was nothing like a state, no apparatus
of rule. Free adults did not issue commands to one another, let alone commands
8. For other examples of punishment for laughing: Boas (1897: 525–26, 642).
9. Since they were obliged to compensate the owners later for any property damage,
the office was actually rather expensive. For Goldman, the Fool Dancers are “lesser
forms of war dancers. The nutlmatl represent the madness, the wildness, and the
obscene side of war and destruction” (1975: 118–19).
10. One role of the Fools prior to conquest had been to sacrifice and carve up a slave for
the Man-Eater (Boas 1897: 339).
NOTES ON THE POLITICS OF DIVINE KINGSHIP
387
backed up by threats of force.11 Ordinarily there was nothing like a “tribal po-
lice.” Yet between November and February, when a whole series of “secret so-
ciety” initiations spilled over into a “Winter Ceremonial” season of dances and
potlatches, the authority of the Fools seems to have spilled over as well.
Unlike the Californian clowns, they could not give arbitrary orders in their
own right; they were strictly deputies of the Man-Eater, who alone could issue
commands.12 We are already beginning to see a process of division of sover-
eignty. The right of command in the Northwest Coast belonged properly to
“supernatural power” (divinity in the undifferentiated sense);13 when that di-
vinity manifested itself in human form, it was as the crazed Hamatsa, lust-
ing for human flesh. But the Hamatsa mainly just made inarticulate noises; it
was incapable of ordering anyone to do anything other than fetching food. The
Man-Eater in this context is almost like a stranger-king manqué, a pure force
of vital energy bursting into the world of the living, needing to be tamed; with
the exception that, once domesticated, his sovereignty is destroyed and he is
rendered once again an ordinary mortal. The Fools, in turn, seem to be stripped
of any autonomous power of command, and so simply act as enforcers.
The Kwakiutl (like the Pueblo) are also already halfway to the situation de-
scribed by Lowie for so many Plains societies, where throughout the summer
months—a time when otherwise scattered bands gathered to
gether first for
the great bison hunts, then for the Sun Dance rituals—certain clans or warrior
societies would be assigned temporary police powers, allowing them to keep
discipline in the hunt, impose arbitrary resolutions to disputes, and enforce
their judgments by the destruction of property, beatings, and even in extreme
11. In fact, they did not even really have chiefs.
Although titleholders are usually referred to as “chiefs” these men and women
were not political office-holders as such. Indeed, we might say that political
office-holding as we understand it did not exist on the Northwest Coast. Title-
holders led or were important in their kinship or residential group. In many
winter villages, the heads of the component villages were ranked, but though
this gave the “village chief ” considerable prestige and some ritual authority,
it bestowed little or no power or authority to command in what is usually
thought of as the political arena. (Donald 1997: 26)
12. “When a Hamatsa wishes to obtain food he may send anyone hunting or fishing,
and his orders must be obeyed” (Boas 1890: 64).
13. So in Boas’ later account, speeches at the Winter Ceremonial make frequent
invocations of following “orders given by the supernatural power” (1930: 97, 124,
126–27, 166, 172), the latter apparently referring to the divine generically.
388
ON KINGS
cases killing of recalcitrants, even though, during the rest of the year, disputes
were resolved through mediation and the last summer’s police no longer had
any more power than anybody else (Lowie 1927: 103–04; 1948b: 18–19; cf.
1909: 79, 82, 89, 96–98; 1948a: 40, 162, 325–26, 350; MacLeod 1937; Provinse
1937: 344–53; Llewellyn, Hoebel, and Adamson 1941). At all times, ultimate
authority in such societies still rested with councils of elders. But in the ritual
season, “police” or “soldiers” could act with a fair degree of discretion and impu-
nity—even though there was always a system of rotation to ensure no individual
or group held such powers two years running. There were some traces here of
the association of police power with clowns and contraries—in writing of his
own original fieldwork on the Assiniboine, for instance, Lowie observed that