Indians of North America -- Colorado; Mesa Verde National Park (Colo.)
The cradle board makes the care of the child very simple. The mother may
carry it on her back as she goes about her work. She may hang it on a
tree or on a roof pole or lean it up against the house. When the child
is on its cradle board it is in no danger of rolling off the roof or
over a cliff. Occasionally it is taken off the cradle and the juniper
bark pad that serves as a diaper is changed. When the child reaches the
age where it must learn to walk, it will be released from the cradle and
will be placed in the constant care of an older sister or some other
little girl of its clan.
For the first six or seven years, children lead carefree lives. They
have no responsibilities and nothing is expected of them except that
they survive and be happy. If they do wrong they are seldom punished
physically but are talked to at great length. And quite often they are
frightened into good behavior by tales of witches and what they do to
bad children.
All of the children are up at dawn and the day’s play begins. The very
young ones must stay within the cave where they climb over the houses
and play on the roofs and in the courts. After they are a little older
they play on the canyon slope below the cave and finally they are big
enough to play along the cliffs beside the town. All through the day the
echoes of their voices and laughter fill the canyon.
At the age of six or seven, this life of constant play ends and they
begin to learn, by imitating their parents, all they must know to fit
into the life of the community. A little girl follows her mother
wherever she goes and imitates her in every activity. When the mother
makes pottery her small daughter makes crude, miniature pieces: when the
mother bakes corn cakes her little shadow bakes tiny cakes of mud and,
after a time, is allowed to use the precious corn meal itself. When the
mother goes to the spring the little girl trots at her heels and soon
she is carrying small jars of water on her head. She spends long hours
at the grinding bin and equally long hours caring for younger brothers
and sisters. As she grows older, she accepts more and more
responsibility and finally, when marriage comes, she is an accomplished
housewife.
In the same manner the small boy goes through a long period of training.
At sunrise he tumbles out of his blankets to listen and watch
attentively as his father says his morning prayer and tosses an offering
of corn meal or corn pollen to the gods of dawn. He follows his father
to the fields and as soon as he is old enough, accompanies him on
hunting trips. When his father makes bows, arrows, flint knives, bone
awls and the many other tools, the boy imitates him, in miniature, and
gradually learns all the necessary crafts.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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