(44) It is significant that the Dakota
word for horse (suk-tan'-ka or sun-ka'-wa-kan) is composed of the word for
dog (sun'-ka), with an affix indicating greatness, sacredness, or mystery,
so that the horse is literally "great mysterious dog," or "ancient sacred
dog," and that several terms for harness and other appurtenances
correspond with those used for the gear of the dog when used as a draft
animal.(45) This terminology corroborates the direct evidence that the dog
was domesticated by the Siouan aborigines long before the advent of the
horse.
Among the Siouan tribes, as among other Indians, amusements absorbed a
considerable part of the time and energy of the old and young of both
sexes. Among the young, the gambols, races, and other sports were chiefly
or wholly diversional, and commonly mimicked the avocations of the adults.
The girls played at the building and care of houses and were absorbed in
dolls, while the boys played at archery, foot racing, and mimic hunting,
which soon grew into the actual chase of small birds and animals. Some of
the sports of the elders were unorganized diversions, leaping, racing,
wrestling, and other spontaneous expressions of exuberance. Certain
diversions were controlled by more persistent motive, as when the idle
warrior occupied his leisure in meaningless ornamentation of his garment
or tipi, or spent hours of leisure in esthetic modification of his weapon
or ceremonial badge, and to this purposeless activity, which engendered
design with its own progress, the incipient graphic art of the tribes was
largely due.
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