This is a natayaa song. Totsantsi(i) is a song form meaning ‘cleansing’. It is based on the root tosa”- ‘white’, which has the song form totsa, plus -ntsi, the song form of the diminutive-affectionate and nominalizing suffix -ttsi. Either of the two versions of this song is sung repeatedly, especially as the opening ceremony of the pinenut festival traditionally held in the fall when pinenuts were harvested. Pinenuts were one of the most important staple food sources for the Western Shoshoni people....

This is a natayaa song. Yoo is the song form of the root yuu(n) ‘gentle, peaceful, still’. Ainkappata is a medicinal plant....

This is a nataya’a song. Totowaantsi is a song word related to topo’ih(ka) ‘stand, be upright (pl)’. But, totowaantsi has the song form with the nominalizing diminutive and affectionate suffix -ntsi (normal -ttsi) on it, which makes it a noun meaning ‘stand, grove’. Puisenna ‘green aspen’ here means aspen that is leafing, as in the springtime...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Tewekkwintoote is the song form of tewekkwintuih ‘swirl, churn’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Watsempi(n) is the song form of waseppi(n) ~ waseppeh ‘mountain sheep’, and nointsai is the song form of noitsai ‘sticky, stickily’. The ordinary word for ‘(on the) side (of)’ is teppanna. Here, a song word tepanayu(n) has been formed with the verbalizing suffix -yu....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This song is about the coming of spring, when the first blades of green grass start to come up. That’s what it’s about.”...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “You know, a long time ago before children had toys like they do now, the children used to play with anything that they could find. So anyway, this song is about when children were playing, they would sit there with red fire ants and the pissants and mix them together. Then, they would watch them fight. That’s what this song is about.”

The normal word for black ant is a’ni(n). Here, the song form annitan is used to rhyme and keep rhythm with hunnitan (~ hu’nitan) ‘red ant’. Similarly,...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This song is about a buck deer standing on the side of a hill early in the morning. And the hunter killed it with a bow and arrow.” Aan kuantsi is the song form of aan kuha ‘buck, stag’ (< aan ‘horn’, kuha ~ kuhma ‘male’)....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This song is about a big buck deer. When a deer gets that big, some people call it a stag.” Maapi(nna) is the song form of maape(nna) ‘climb’. And tepa is the song form of teppanna ‘(on the) side (of)’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This song is about the beginning of fall. You know, the Indian calender is different from the white man’s calender. When the sun reaches its highest point in the summer and starts to go back towards south, and the nights start to be colder, to the Indians, that is the beginning of fall. That’s what this song is about.”

The normal word for ‘fall’ is yepani, instead of the song word yepatu used here. The normal word for ‘but’ is pinnah, instead of pintsi. And pipuntu is not an...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’, with several somewhat different versions. Earl Crum says, “You know, a long time ago when I was a little boy in Battle Mountain, the old people used to sing this song. It sounds like a medicine song. It’s a song about a buck antelope grazing on green grass.” The third version is not recorded on the CD.

Kwahatenna kuha, literally meaning ‘antelope male’, is a descriptive phrase for buck antelope. Wantsi is the normal word for ‘buck antelope’. Nani is the song form of nanah ‘just, only’, used here to be in...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This song is about a hunter walking at a distance like a shadow.” The second version is not recorded on the CD.

Watsempin tsukumpe is the song form of waseppeh tsukuppe ‘hunter’, which is derived from waseppeh ‘killed (pl)’ and tsukuppe ‘old man’. Another common word for hunter is tekaite(n)....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “You know a long time ago, the early Indians used to go through a ritual by going through different motions with their hands and with the words they said. And every time you hear in a song where they say hainna or haiya wainna, they are blessing the song.”

Pintsi is the song form of pitsi ‘suck, suckle’. Nonowa is not a normal word but is probably related to the auxiliary verb nooh ‘move about’, itself from the main verb noo” ‘carry’. Ainkam pehyen literally means ‘red duck’ but...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This song is about a big buffalo that a hunter is tracking. And as he goes tracking the buffalo, the buffalo saw him and sneaked away.” Yewampontsi is the song word for ‘track’ and ‘take aim’. The ordinary words for ‘track’ are nampuih or nayaa, and wapuih is the normal word for ‘take aim’. Pui’awatsi is the song word for ‘spy (on)’; the ordinary word is watsippuih.

Although buffalo were prevalent in massive herds on the Great Plains, they were also not uncommon in small herds on the Snake...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Huintsaantsi is the song word for ‘sage hen’; the ordinary word is huittsaa(n). Pomia(kwaai) is the song form of pomi’a(kwai) ‘migrate (around) [of birds]’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This is a song about the warrior … Early in the morning before daylight, the singer looked up into the sky and saw the formation of stars, Orion, and sang about it.” Yooti” is the plural form of the verb ‘arise, get up; fly off’. Here it is directed to the singer’s listeners, whom she encourages to rise above their problems and the things that hold them down. This offers them a blessing of hope for better things to come. And on a more practical level, it means for...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This is a song about a young man coming down from above, riding on a horse.” The song can be interpreted both in the physical sense of a young man riding down from higher ground, but also in a more spiritual sense of a youth riding down from the heavens above. Paa(n) is the song form of pa’a(n) ‘over, above, on (top of)’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Pinenuts were one of the most important staple foods for the Western Shoshoni. Several families would gather together in the fall to collect and prepare them and celebrate the harvest....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “A long time ago, the Indians used to go out and harvest this plant, piatetsii ‘wild rice’. But the plant doesn’t grow anymore. The cattle, the sheep, and the horses ate them all up, and the plant just couldn’t reproduce itself. It has become extinct. Some people identify it as tall rye grass, which is good to eat too. But that is not as numerous as piatetsii used to be.”...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. It is about the ominous and frightful flash floods that can happen any time in the desert West. Winkum is the song form of wikkah(ku) ‘break away, break loose, give way’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. In this song the singer could use hapite(n) ‘lying’ instead of katete(n) ‘sitting’. Toyahapite(n) means ‘mountain range’, literally, ‘mountain lying’, while toyakatete(n) means a single large ‘mountain sitting’ alone. Nopii is the song form for noopite ‘arrive’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “This song is called ‘The Rock Walker’. It is about a person walking on a hill, and he is rolling the rocks down. And as the rock goes rolling down, he listens to it as it goes away from him.”

The noun-forming suffix -tta on nemitta ‘walker, wanderer’ (< nemi ‘walk around, wander, roam’) is not a normal agentive noun suffix in Western Shoshoni, although it is probably historically related to the regular agentive suffix -ttü in Panamint (Tümpisa) Shoshoni (see Dayley 1989, 237). Tuun before nuwa is a...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Earl Crum says, “You know, early in the morning when the sun comes up, and a little after, the singer would sing this song. And when he would get through singing this song, having danced all night, the people would go home.” Taai is the poetic word used in this song for normal tai(n) ~ tamme(n) ‘our (incl)’. Some singers use tewaai instead of taai....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. The song makes reference to a saying that parents used to say to misbehaving children: Ukka kai en tenankanku, Itsappe en kwasi pinnookkwanto’i. ‘If you don’t behave, Coyote will carry you off on his tail.’ Another warning to misbehaving children was that Tso’apittseh, a mythological monster who ate people, would come from the mountains and carry them off. Both of these sayings are much like when English speaking parents say, “If you don’t behave, the boogeyman will get you.” Shoshonis say Pia Isa ‘Wolf’ and Itsappe ‘Coyote’ are nanapapinneweh ‘brothers’. In this...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Kammentsi is the affectionate endearing song form of ordinary kamme ~ kammu ‘jackrabbit’. Jackrabbits were an important food source and also prized for their fur to make rabbit-skin blankets. Paa is the song form of pa’a(n) ‘on (top of)’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Pimma(a) tuantsi is related to Comanche pimmorua ‘calf’. Pimma(a) is not an ordinary word in Shoshoni. Kwakkwapiikinna is the distributive song form of kwapi” ‘lie (down)’ plural...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. The song has two totally different interpretations. The first makes reference to skipping stones, especially small flat cobblestones patsittempi, around in the water. The second interpretation is given on the following two pages. In both interpretations aiwan is the song form of aiwa’ih ‘like this’. In the first version, toi is the song form of tawiih ‘throw’. Patemmam pii is a song word from pakateten ‘body of water, pool’ plus the song form pii of the postposition pai ‘around (in an undefined area)’. Wooyompa means ‘splash’ and is a song word but...

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Tootompi is the distributive plural song form of tooppeh ‘cloud’, wiya is the song form of wia ‘(mountain) pass’, and paha(n) is the song form in this song of pa’a(n) ‘on’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Wenkato(mpi) is the song form of wekkatookka ‘spread out’, pakenna is the song form of pakenappeh ‘fog’, and kenna is the song form of the instrumental verb -kenah ‘cover’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Patsiwankatte(n) is one song form of pasiwakkatete(n) ‘sand dune’, also used in this song. Mantuu is the song form used in this song of mantu(n) ‘towards’; manteh is the song form used here of mante(n), another ordinary form of ‘to’, ‘towards’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Yuwannan is a song form of yu’aih ‘be warm’. Totompeentsi is a distributive song word based on tooppeh ‘cloud’ plus peesi ‘fine fur’. Kotsimpoo ‘dust trail’ is a compound song form based on the ordinary words kusippeh ‘dust, ashes’ and po’i” ‘trail, path, road’. Kwakkwapi is a distributive song form of kwapi” ‘lie (down) (pl)’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. It is about rubbing oneself with wet, shiny, bluish chalky clay as a purification process. Namapataatsiyuwainna is a verb built with the reflexive prefix na-, plus the instrumental prefix ma- ‘with the hand’, and the verb root pataatsi (ordinary form: patatsiki) ‘shine’, followed by the suffixes -yu progressive, -kwain ‘all over’ and -nna general tense and aspect....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. It is about walking through the yampa ‘wild carrot’ fields in the summer time. Payampa are crispy, juicy wild carrots as they first come out in the early summer. Wild carrots were an important and cherished food source....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Himmapi is the song form of hima” ‘carry, take (pl)’, and kantsu is the song form of katsu(n) ‘end, tip, edge’. Okwaiteentsi is the song form of okwaiten ‘flood, flowing’ with the addition of the song form -ntsi of the diminutive-affectionate suffix -ttsi. Pampunuuhanniite is the song form of pampunuaniite(n) ‘swirling water, whirlpool’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Pakena(a) is a song form of ordinary pakenappeh ‘fog’, tootompi is a plural distributive form of tooppeh ‘cloud’, and natempi is a possessive form of tempi ‘rock’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Piya is the song form of pia ‘big’, tokwaimmi is the song form of tento’immi’a ‘go climbing’, waanka is the song form of waakka(n) ‘at the juniper’, toontsin is the song form of tootsa ‘Indian balsam’, waai(ki) is the song form of wai(kkin) ‘come down (hither)’, and huumpin is the song form of huuppi(n) ‘stick, wood(s), tree, log’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Huuntukkantu is the song form of huuttukkan tuu ‘through and under the sticks’, tei is the song form of tea ‘again, also’, and haai is the song form of hinna ‘something (obj)’. Puipaawoo is the song word for puiwoo, which are small green native trout living in streams of northern Nevada and southern Idaho, like Reese’s River and the Owyhee River....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. It is about someone pitching large grass seeds in a big grinding stone and reaching in and tasting them every once in a while. Potoompin is the song form of potto(n) ‘grinding stone’, yuwaa is the song form of yewe” ‘swallow’, tuankam is the song form of temmaih ‘taste’, patewantsii is the song form of patuntsi ‘a type of large grass seed’, yaanka is the song form of yaakka(n) ‘hold’, and yunka is the song form of yunah ‘take’....

This is a nekka hupia or nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Saai pakantsunkii is the song form of sai pakantsukkih (< sai ‘tule’, pakantsukkih ‘blackbird’), which refers to both red-winged blackbirds and yellow-headed blackbirds, both of which live in the tules. Hunupii is the song form of hunupi(n)....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Weyempin is the song form of weyempih. As in several songs before, totsa is the song form of tosa” ‘white’. Tokkim is the song form of tokai ~ tokwai ‘right, correct, perfect’, mukuwa is the song form of mukua ‘soul’. Paampintsi is the song form of pampittsi ‘little head’ but is metaphorically referring to the fact that the buffalo berries are just perfectly ripe little berries....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Tuumpantsuku is the song form of tuuppantsuku ‘mink’ from tuu” ‘dark’ plus pantsuku ‘water mammal (= mink/otter)’, literally ‘old man of the water’. Pantsahapi is the song form of pahapi ‘swim’, and kwipipi is the song form of kwippikke(n) ‘shake, shiver’. Paapu is the song form of papun(pihten) ‘clear’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Kwakkwapi is the plural distributive form of kwapi” ‘lie (pl)’. Wahniki(n) is the song form of wettantani ~ wettaini ‘winnow’, and pee is the song form of pemma ‘themselves’....

This is a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. Paipaateeyonneh is the song form of pantei ‘killdeer’, which literally means ‘friend of the water’. Paipaateeyonneh is based on paa (pai obj) ‘water’, pa’a ‘on, over’, and teeyonneh, the song form of tei ‘friend’....

This is an aipuntu song. It is about the constellation Orion as a warrior holding a bow and taking aim. Weyuu is the song form of weyaah ‘hold, carry’, and waantsi ‘wander’ is a song word, not in ordinary usage....

This is an aipuntu song. It is about enjoying nature and the scenery, taking it for what it is, sometimes puzzling but always exciting and mysterious. Wiintoya is the song form of kwiittoya ‘smoky mountain’, and waaka is the song form of waakka(n) ‘at the juniper’. Tukkananka is the song form of tukkanankwa ~ tukkananku ‘from below, underneath; from the south’....

This is an aipuntu song. It is about enjoying eating delicious, tender young plants prepared by one’s mother. Mononoo is the song form of monooh(kan) ‘hold/keep/carry in the mouth’. Patakwiintsi is the song form of patekwittsi ‘tender young plants’, which the Shoshoni used to eat, particularly in the spring and early summer (e.g., kenka ‘wild onions’). Pii’nee is the song form of piinnee ‘mothers’....

This is an aipuntu song. It is about taking delight in fashioning a boat from wood and then putting it in water and watching it float along, especially in meandering mountain streams.

Tetsimmuuka is the song form of ordinary tetsimmuka ‘sharp point(ed)’, and huumpi is the song form of huuppi(n) ‘wood, stick, log, tree’....

This song is a puha hupia ‘power song’ or nanisuntehai hupia ‘prayer song’. It is also sometimes sung as a nua hupia ‘round dance song’. The song is about a puha wa’ippe ‘power woman’ or puhakante ‘medicine person’ or ‘person with power’, and it is also an ode to womanhood. Waimpentsi is the song form of wa’ippe ‘woman’....

This song is a puha hupia ‘power song’ or nanisuntehai hupia ‘prayer song’, in two different versions. Earl Crum says, “This song is about a Canadian goose.” Tuun nekenta(n) literally means ‘dark goose’ but specifically means ‘Canadian goose’. However, baby Canadian geese are not dark, rather light gray with white wings....

This song is a puha hupia ‘power song’ or nanisuntehai hupia ‘prayer song’....

This song is a nanisuntehai hupia ‘prayer song’ or puha hupia ‘power song’. Eagle feathers were used by traditional Shoshoni healers, called puhakante(n), to purify and cure in healing and other ceremonies. See Earl Crum’s discussion of puhakante(n) and the use of eagle feathers in Crum and Dayley 1997 (77–78, 85–86). As he states there: Tease ama kwi’naa’an kwasi ma utii wemmapuisi’iyu … ‘Also, they (puhakante) would purify patients with the tail feather of an eagle …’

Beverly Crum’s late mother, Anna Premo, was raised by her aunt Tuuppampi ‘Black Hair’, who was a puhakante(n). When asked about...

This is wehe’neki hupia ‘rasping song’, or what is called in English a bear dance song. Satee means ‘dog’ but in its diminutive affectionate form sateettsi, it may be used generically and affectionately for ‘pet’. The animal wasn’t necessarily someone’s actual pet, but was probably so named because it hung around in or near the fields of wild carrots where people used to gather food. In this song the singer is expressing the Shoshoni view that human beings share their space and environment with sokopittan nanewenee ‘the creatures of the earth’ (or literally: ‘earth’s relatives’). Taai is the song form...

This is a modern or contemporay nanisuntehai hupia ‘prayer song’ or puha hupia ‘power song’, but with a very traditional rhythm. It and songs like it are sung in Native American Church services. The Native American Church religious movement began among the Comanche and Kiowa in southeastern Oklahoma in the 1890s and then spread to most other North American Indian tribes by the early part of the twentieth century. The church was formally incorporated in 1918 by members from a number of different tribes. The movement first came to the Duck Valley Reservation in 1916 but didn’t become popular until...

This is a contemporary song. It is one of the songs sung during the opening ceremony at pow-wows....