Hoita

Hoita, the Speckled Eagle, is the Mandan master of the animals and one of the principal figures of the Okipa. A powerful being born among the Mandan, he shut the animals of the earth inside Dog Den Butte and made them perform a dance there. Lone Man, transforming himself to investigate, learned the dance, and after a contest Hoita released the animals; the two were reconciled and together established the Okipa so that the buffalo and game would return to the people. Within the ceremony Hoita is the patron of the masked dancers who impersonate the animals, and it is the Speckled Eagle who designates the man chosen to play the Foolish One.

Domains

• master of the animals
• ceremony and ritual

Powers

• to gather and command the animals of the earth
• to preside over the masked animal dancers of the Okipa

Epithets

• Hoita

Relations

• rival: Lone Man
• creator of: The Foolish One

Sources

• Alfred W. Bowers, Mandan Social and Ceremonial Organization, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1950.
• Leslie V. Tischauser, "Okipa", in David J. Wishart (ed.), Encyclopedia of the Great Plains, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004.