The Indians of the Painted Desert Region: Hopis, Navahoes, Wallapais, HavasupaisJames, George Wharton
Religion
The Indians of the Painted Desert Region: Hopis, Navahoes, Wallapais, Havasupais
James, George Wharton
Indians of North America -- Southwest, New
Sichumavi--"the mound of flowers"--was founded about the year 1750
by Walpians of the Badger Clan, who for some reason or other grew
discontented and wished a town of their own. Here they were joined by
Tanoans of the Asa Clan from the Rio Grande, who for a time had lived
in the seclusion of the Tsegi, as the Navahoes term the Canyon de
Chelly in New Mexico.
Exactly when Shipauluvi was founded is not known, though its name--"the
place of peaches"--clearly denotes that it must have been after the
Spanish invasion, for it was the conquerors who brought with them
peaches. Nor were peaches the only good things the Hopis and other
American aborigines owed to the hated foreigners. They introduced
horses, cows, sheep (which latter have afforded them a large measure of
sustenance and given to them and the Navahoes the material with which
to make their useful rugs and blankets), and goats, besides a number of
vegetables.
Here, then, about the middle of the eighteenth century the Hopi mesa
towns were settled as we now find them, and doubtless with populations
as near as can be to their present numbers.
Hano we have already visited. Let us now, hastily but carefully, glance
at each of the other villages as they appear at the present time.
Passing on to Sichumavi from Hano we find it similar in all its main
features to Hano, except that none of its houses are as high. In the
centre of the town is a large plaza where, in wet weather, a large body
of rain-water collects. This is used for "laundry" purposes, as drink
for the burros and goats, and a bathing pond for all the children of
the pueblo. It is one of the funniest sights imaginable to see the
youngsters playing and frolicking in the water by the hour,--I should
have said liquid mud, for the filth that accumulates in this plaza
reservoir is simply indescribable. Children of both sexes, their brown,
swarthy bodies utterly indifferent to the piercing darts of the sun,
lie down in this liquid filth, roll over, splash one another, run to
and fro, and enjoy themselves hugely, even in the presence of the
white visitor, until a glimpse of the dreaded camera sends them off
splashing, yelling, gesticulating, and some of them crying, to the
nearest shelter.
That supereminence of Hopi character is conservatism is shown as one
walks from Sichumavi to Walpi. Here is a literal exemplification
demonstrating how the present generations "tread in the footsteps" of
their forefathers. The trail over which the bare and moccasined feet of
these people have passed and repassed for years is worn down deep into
the solid sandstone. The springy and yielding foot, unprotected except
by its own epidermis or the dressed skin of the goat, sheep, or deer,
has cut its way into the unyielding rock, thus symbolizing the power of
an unyielding purpose and demonstrating the force of an unchangeable
conservatism.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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