Kachinas of Powamu Ceremony
Hopi
Photograph by James Mooney
Copyright 1893

Kachinas are masked dancers representing
ancestral spirits who return to the Hopi from the
subterranean world in January or February each
year and depart in July. Powamu, the Bean-Planting,
is the first great ceremony of the cycle during which
the children are initiated into the Powamu and
Kachina Societies. Powamu celebrates the return of
the spirits and a fertile harvest.

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