Outlines of Zuñi Creation Myths: Thirteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1891-1892, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1896, pages 321-448Cushing, Frank Hamilton
History
Outlines of Zuñi Creation Myths: Thirteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1891-1892, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1896, pages 321-448
Cushing, Frank Hamilton
Zuni mythology
At last, after much wrangling and council, the people agreed to this.
And they set apart the time, eight days (as now days are numbered)
wherein to make their preparations, which was well; for therefrom
resulted to them great gain, yea, and the winning of these stranger
villagers, and by wise and peaceful acts rather than by war and the
impetuosity of right hands. In the borders of the plain in the midst
of cedars (fuel furnishers of the food-maturing fire, these!) and
under the shade of Hemlocks (Tree-goddesses of the food-growing water,
these!) they encamped. And at the foot of the Hemlocks, facing the
sunlight, they builded them of cedar boughs a great bower: like to it,
only lesser, are those whence we watch and foster the ripening of our
corn; for from their bower thus fashioned, our fathers and mothers, the
priests and priest-matrons of old, watched and labored for the first
birth of corn, and in this wondrous wise, as young parents watch for
the birth of their children, though not knowing of what kind or favor
they will be, nevertheless expectantly of heart; and as we now watch
the fulfilment of our harvests.
So, the seed-priests and master-keepers of the possessions, and their
fathers (those of the house of houses) fasted and intently contemplated
their sacred substances to divine the means thereof. And it seemed good
to them to cut wands of the spaces, painting them significantly and
pluming them in various ways with the feathers of the cloud and summer
sun-loving birds (Ólowik‘ya Wówe Pékwi Áshiwani), thinking thereby
to waft the breath of their prayers and incantations (taught of the
Surpassing Ones all in the new time of the world) and to show forth
their meanings even so far as unto the ancient sitting spaces of those
who first taught them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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