Hora-hamįnąka (Riding the Fish) Walking Day (1848 - bef. 1906)

Born 1848 in Wisconsin, United States

Died before 1906 in Winnebago, Thurston, Nebraska, United States [uncertain]

Hora-hamįnąka (Riding the Fish) Walking Day was a Native American and member of the Ho-Chunk tribe.

Biography

Birth

The 1900 census records that she was born in 1848, in Wisconsin, the same year that it had become a state.

Marriage

The 1900 census shows that she was married to a younger man, born in 1852, named "Walking Day," probably of the Bear Clan.

Name

She had the Hocąk name, Ho-ra-hau-me-nuk-kaw, which is for Hora-hamįnąka, "Riding the Fish(es)," probably a Fish Clan name, although raptorial birds can be thought of as "riding" fish when they swoop down and seize them by their backs. This is from ho, "fish"; -ra, a kind of definite article suffix which is also used to form the plural (so that hora can mean "the fish", or "the fishes", or just "fishes"); hamįnąk, "to ride" (< ha- a superessive applicative: "a grammatical element of the verb unknown in English ... mostly translated as 'on something' or 'over something'" (Helmbrecht-Lehmann); and mįną́k, "to sit"); and -ka, a definite article suffix used in personal names. The name is best expressed hyphenated, since normally aha resolves by sandhi to ā, which would yield the form Horāmįnąka.

Death

She does not appear in the 1906 census, which shows her husband Walking Day living alone.

Sources

• 1900 Federal Census for Winnebago, Thurston, Nebraska; Page: 18; Enumeration District: 0187; FHL microfilm: 1240941. United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Twelfth Census of the United States, 1900. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1900. T623, 1854 rolls.
• 1906 Indian census; Roll: M595_663; Line: 12; Agency: Winnebago. Indian Census Rolls, 1885-1940; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M595, 692 rolls); Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Record Group 75; National Archives, Washington, D.C.
• Learner’s Dictionary, Hocąk–English/English–Hocąk, edd. Johannes Helmbrecht and Christian Lehmann. Arbeitspapiere des Seminars für Sprachwissenschaft der Universität Erfurt Seminar für Sprachwissenschaft, no. 21. 2d ed. (Erfurt: the Editors, May, 2006).

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