Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A barbarous religious ceremony practised in honor of the sun by certain tribes of the North American Indians, as the Sioux and Blackfeet.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • "We should be role models in keeping the earth clean," says sun-dance chief Robert (Dude) Perry.

    Dirty Dancing 2008

  • To such elements many other things have been added, but the fact remains that our own formal dances, as well as the sun-dance of the Indian and the mad whirl of the Dervish, are modern products which have truly evolved.

    The Doctrine of Evolution Its Basis and Its Scope Henry Edward Crampton

  • The most important of their religious practices is the sun-dance (okan), an elaborate ceremonial performance which needs months of preparation and ends with a week or so of festivities, in which fasting, self-torture, and self-mutilation are joined with rejoicings and frolics of every description.

    The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 2: Assizes-Browne 1840-1916 1913

  • "Well, I've been a 'hoodoo' all my, life; and if I only lead some one into luck now -- good luck -- oh, wouldn't I learn a sun-dance, and dance it!"

    That Girl Montana Marah Ellis Ryan 1900

  • "In the sun-dance canyon," answered the Inspector.

    Corporal Cameron of the North West Mounted Police; a tale of the Macleod trail Ralph Connor 1898

  • But the red man no longer set up his tepee in these secluded groves; the wapiti and red deer had fled to the north never to return, the snarling wolf had stolen into regions more barren; the ceremonial of the ancient people no longer made weird the lonely nights; the medicine-man's incantations, the harvest - dance, the green-corn-dance, the sun-dance had gone.

    The Project Gutenberg Complete Works of Gilbert Parker Gilbert Parker 1897

  • But the red man no longer set up his tepee in these secluded groves; the wapiti and red deer had fled to the north never to return, the snarling wolf had stolen into regions more barren; the ceremonial of the ancient people no longer made weird the lonely nights; the medicine-man's incantations, the harvest-dance, the green-corn-dance, the sun-dance had gone.

    The World for Sale, Complete Gilbert Parker 1897

  • But the red man no longer set up his tepee in these secluded groves; the wapiti and red deer had fled to the north never to return, the snarling wolf had stolen into regions more barren; the ceremonial of the ancient people no longer made weird the lonely nights; the medicine-man's incantations, the harvest - dance, the green-corn-dance, the sun-dance had gone.

    The World for Sale, Volume 1. Gilbert Parker 1897

  • All day, from the closing of the ceremony of shooting at the sun-pole, the attention of the Indians was occupied in constructing this inclosure, where, within a day or two after its completion, they performed those barbarous rites and ceremonies of cruelty and self-torture that have placed the sun-dance of the Sioux on a level with the barbarisms of any of the far more famed devotees of Juggernaut.

    The Sun-Dance of the Sioux 1889

  • Nearly half way between the reservations the two forks of the Chadron (or Shadron) creek form a wide plain, which was chosen as the site of the great sun-dance.

    The Sun-Dance of the Sioux 1889

Comments

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  • (noun) - A custom was formerly in vogue of rising early on Easter-day to see the sun "dance," the superstitious believing the sun really did dance on that day. --James Halliwell's Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words, 1855

    March 16, 2018

  • 'barbarous'...who writes this stuff?

    March 17, 2018

  • But all is not lost, perhaps we can get Van Morrison to culturally appropriate it.

    March 17, 2018