kachina
Americannoun
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any of various ancestral spirits deified by the Hopi Indians and impersonated in religious rituals by masked dancers.
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a Hopi religious ritual at which such masked dancers perform.
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a masked dancer impersonating such a spirit at a Hopi religious ritual.
noun
Etymology
Origin of kachina
1885–90; < Hopi ḳacína < Keresan (Santa Ana) k̉â˙cina (or a cognate word)
Vocabulary lists containing kachina
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“I only owned seven head before reducing that number myself to three because of drought,” said Makwesa Chimerica, a carver of kachina figures who lives in the village of Hotevilla.
From New York Times ● Oct. 2, 2021
Goldwater also was an avid collector of kachina dolls, wood carvings of Hopi spirits.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 22, 2018
He decided to weave the kachina dolls into a game, not only because they had a “ready-made aesthetic” he liked, but because it seemed like “a cool talking point to use this indigenous art.”
From The Verge ● Sep. 1, 2018
Hopi artists created decorative kachina dolls that they used to help children learn important traditions and customs.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2012
When these girls see a Hair Eater Kachina coming up on the house top they run from her, remembering the old trouble when that kind of a kachina had done such an awful thing.
From The Unwritten Literature of the Hopi by Hattie Greene Lockett
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
