outlines of zuni Creation Myths 6

outlines of zuni Creation Myths 6

The composite round and square pueblo ruin is not, however, confined to

this transitional type or to its comparatively restricted area wherever

occurring, but is found here and there as far northward, for instance,

as the neighborhood of older cliff ruins. But in such cases it seems

to have been developed, as heretofore hinted, in the comparatively

recent rebuilding of old rounded towns by square-house builders. Quite

in correspondence with all this is the history of the development,

from the round form into the square, of the kivas of the later Zuñi

towns; that is, like the towns themselves, the round kivas of the

earlier round towns became, first in part and then nearly squared in

the composite round and square towns, and finally altogether squared in

the square towns. This was brought about by a twofold cause. When the

cliff dwellers became inhabitants of the plains, not only their towns,

but also the kivas were enlarged. To such an extent, indeed, were the

latter enlarged that it became difficult to roof them over in the old

fashion of completing the upper courses of the walls with cross-laid

logs, and of roofing the narrowed apex of this coping with combined

rafter and stick structures; hence in many cases, although the round

kiva was rigidly adhered to, it was not unfrequently inclosed within a

square wall in order that, as had come to be the case in the ordinary

living rooms, rafters parallel to one another and of equal length might

be thrown across the top, thus making a flat roof essentially like the

flat terrace roofs of the ordinary house structure.

 

It is not improbable that the first suggestion of inclosing the round

kiva in a square-walled structure and of covering the latter with

a flat roof arose quite naturally long before the cliff dwellers

descended into the plains. It has been seen that frequently, in the

larger and longest occupied cliff-towns, the straight-walled houses

grew outward wholly around the kivas; and when this occurred the round

kiva was thus not only surrounded by a square inclosure--formed by the

walls of the nearest houses,--but also it became necessary to cover

this inclosing space with a flat roof, in order to render continuous

the house terrace in which it was constructed. Still, the practice

never became general or intentional in the earlier cliff-towns;

probably, indeed, it became so in the now ruined round towns only

by slow degrees. Yet it needed after this (in a measure) makeshift

beginning only such influence of continued intercourse between the

square-house building people and these round-town building people to

lead finally to the practical abandonment by the latter of the inner

round structure surviving from their old-fashioned kivas, and to make

them, like the modern Zuñi kiva, square rather than round.

 

An evidence that this was virtually the history of the change from the

round kiva building to the square kiva building, and that this change

was wrought thus gradually as though by long-continued intercourse,

is found in the fact that to this day all the ceremonials performed

in the great square kivas of Zuñi would be more appropriate in round

structures. For example, processions of the performers in the midwinter

night ceremonials in these kivas, on descending the ladders, proceed

to their places around the sides of the kivas in circles, as though

following a circular wall. The ceremonials of concerted invocation in

the cult societies when they meet in these kivas are also performed in

circles, and the singers for dances or other dramaturgic performances,

although arranged in one end or in the corner of the kiva, continue to

form themselves in perfect circles; the drum in the middle, the singers

sitting around and facing it as though gathered within a smaller

circular room inclosed in the square room. Thus it may be inferred,

first, from the fact that in the structural details of the scuttles

or hatchways by which these modern kivas are entered the cross-logged

structure of the inner roof of the earliest cliff kivas survive, and

from the additional fact above stated that the ceremonials of these

kivas are circular in form, that the square kiva is a lineal descendant

of the round one; and second, that even after the round kiva was

inclosed in the square room, so to say, in order that its roof might be

made as were the roofs of the women's houses, or continuous therewith,

it long retained the round kiva within, and hence the ceremonials

necessarily performed circularly within this round inner structure

became so associated with the outer structure as well, that after the

abandonment entirely, through the influences I have above suggested, of

these round inner structures, they continued thus to be performed.

 

As further evidence of the continuity of this development from the

earliest to the latest forms, certain painted marks on the walls of

the cliff kivas tell not only of their derivation in turn from a yet

earlier form, but also and again of the derivation from them of the

latest forms. In the ancient ruins of the scattered round houses,

which, it is presumed, mark the sites of buildings belonging to the

earlier cliff ancestry folk on the northern desert borders, there are

discovered the remains of certain unusually large huts, the walls of

which appear to have been strengthened at four equidistant points

by firmly planted upright logs. It is probable that, alike in this

distribution and in the number of these logs, they corresponded almost

strictly to the poles of, first, the medicine tent, and, second, the

medicine earth lodge. When, in a later period of their development,

these builders of the round huts in the north came to be, as has

heretofore been described, dwellers in the kivas of the caves, their

larger, presumably ceremonial structures, while reared without the

strengthening posts referred to, nevertheless contained, as appropriate

parts, the marks of them on the walls corresponding thereto. At any

rate, in the still later kivas of the cliffs three parallel marks,

extending from the tops of the walls to the floors, are found painted

on the four sides of the kivas. Finally, in the modern square kiva of

Zuñi there are still placed, ceremonially, once every fourth year, on

the four sides of the lintels or hatchways, three parallel marks, and

these marks are called by the Zuñi in their rituals the holders-up of

the doorways and roofs. Many additional points in connection not only

with the structural details of, but also in the ceremonials performed

within, these modern kivas, may be found, survivals all pointing, as do

those above mentioned, to the unbroken development of the kiva, from

the earth medicine lodge to the finished square structure of the modern

Zuñi and Tusayan Indians.

 

It likewise has been seen that through very natural causes a strict

division between the dwellings of the women and children and of

the adult male population of the cliff villages grew up. From the

relatively great numbers of the kivas found in the courts of the round

towns, it may be inferred that this division was still kept up after

the cliff dwellers became inhabitants of the plains and builders of

such round towns; for when first the Spaniards encountered the Zuñi

dwellers in the Seven Cities of Cibola they found that, at least

ceremonially, this division of the men's quarters from those of the

women was still persisted in, but there is evidence that even thus

early it was not so strictly held to on other occasions. Then, as now,

the men became permanent guests, at least, in the houses of their

wives, and it is probable that the cause which broke down this previous

strict division of the sexes was the union of the western or rancheria

building branch of the Zuñi ancestry with the cliff and round-town

building branch.

 

In nothing is the dual origin of the Zuñis so strongly suggested as

in the twofold nature of their burial customs at the time when first

they were encountered by the Spaniards; for according to some of the

early writers they cremated the dead with all of their belongings, yet

according to others they buried them in the courts, houses, or near

the walls of their villages. It has already been stated that the cliff

dwellers buried their dead in the houses and to the rear of their

cavern villages, and that, following them in this, the dwellers in the

round towns buried their dead also in the houses and to the rear--that

is, just outside of their villages. It remains to be stated that nearly

all of the Yuman tribes, and some even of the Piman tribes, of the

lower Colorado region disposed of their dead chiefly by cremation.

Investigation of the square-house remains which lie scattered over the

southwestern and central portions of Arizona would seem to indicate

that the western branch of the Zuñi ancestry continued this practice of

cremating the greater number of their dead. If this be true, the custom

on the one hand of cremating the dead, which was observed by Castañeda

at Mátsaki, one of the principal of the Seven Cities of Cibola, and the

practice of burying the dead observed by others of the earliest Spanish

explorers, are easily accounted for as being survivals of the differing

customs of the two peoples composing the Zuñi tribe at that time. As

has been mentioned in the first part of this introductory, both of

these very different customs continued ceremonially to be performed,

even after disposal of the dead solely by burial under the influence of

the Franciscan fathers came to be an established custom.

 

In the Kâ´kâ, or the mythic drama dance organization of the Zuñis,

there is equal evidence of dual origin, for while in the main the

_kâ´kâ_ of the Zuñis corresponds to the _katzina_ of the Rio Grande

Pueblo tribes and to the _kachina_ of the Tusayan Indians, yet it

possesses certain distinct and apparently extraneous features. The

most notable of these is found in that curious organization of

priest-clowns, the Kâ´yimäshi, the myth of the origin of which is

so fully given in the following outlines (see page 401). It will be

seen that in this myth these Kâ´yimäshi are described as having heads

covered with welts or knobs, that they are referred to not only as

"husbands of the sacred dance" or the "_kâ´kâ_" (from _kâ´kâ_ and

_yémäshi_, as in _óyemäshi_, husband or married to) and as the Old

Ones or _Á‘hläshiwe_.

 

Throughout the Rio Colorado region, and associated with all the

remaining ruins of the rancheria builders in central and even eastern

Arizona as well, are found certain concretions or other nodular and

usually very rough stones, which today, among some of the Yuman

tribes, are used as fetiches connected both with water worship and

household worship. Among the sacred objects said to have been brought

by the Zuñi ancestry from the places of creation are a number of such

fetich-stones, and in all the ruins of the later Zuñi towns such

fetich-stones are also found, especially before rude altars in the

plazas and around ancient, lonely shrines on the mesas and in the

mountains. These fetich-stones are today referred to as _á‘hläshiwe_,

or stone ancients, from _a_, a stone, _‘hlä´shi_, aged one, and _we_,

a plural suffix. The resemblance of this name to the _Á‘hläshiwe_ as

a name of the Kâ´yemäshi strongly suggests that the nodular shape

and knobbed mask-heads of these priest-clowns are but dramatic

personifications of these "stone ancients," and if one examine such

stones, especially when used in connection with the worship and

invocation of torrents, freshets, and swift-running streams (when, like

the masks in question, they are covered with clay), the resemblance

between the fetich-stones and the masks is so striking that one is

inclined to believe that both the characters and their names were

derived from this single source. From the fact that this peculiar

institution of the clown-priest organization, associated with or, as

the Zuñis say, literally married to the Cachina, or Kâ´kâ proper, was

at one time peculiarly Zuñi, as is averred by themselves and avowed

by all the other Pueblos, it would seem that it was distinctively an

institution of the western branch of their ancestry, since also, as the

myths declare, these Old Ones were born on the sacred mountains of the

Kâ´kâ, on the banks of the Colorado Chiquito in Arizona. Finally, this

is typical of many, if not all, features which distinguish the Zuñi

Kâ´kâ from the corresponding organizations of other Pueblo tribes.

 

 

OUTLINE OF ZUÑI MYTHO-SOCIOLOGIC ORGANIZATION.

 

A complete outline of the mytho-sociologic organization of the

Zuñi tribe can not in this connection be undertaken. A sufficient

characterization of this probably not unique combination of the

sociologic and mythologic institutions of a tribe should, however, be

given to make plain certain allusions in the following outlines which

it is feared would otherwise be incomprehensible.

 

The Zuñi of today number scarcely 1,700 and, as is well known, they

inhabit only a single large pueblo--single in more senses than one,

for it is not a village of separate houses, but a village of six

or seven separate parts in which the houses are mere apartments or

divisions, so to say. This pueblo, however, is divided, not always

clearly to the eye, but very clearly in the estimation of the people

themselves, into seven parts, corresponding, not perhaps in arrangement

topographically, but in sequence, to their subdivisions of the "worlds"

or world-quarters of this world. Thus, one division of the town is

supposed to be related to the north and to be centered in its kiva

or estufa, which may or may not be, however, in its center; another

division represents the west, another the south, another the east, yet

another the upper world and another the lower world, while a final

division represents the middle or mother and synthetic combination of

them all in this world.

 

By reference to the early Spanish history of the pueblo it may be seen

that when discovered, the Áshiwi or Zuñis were living in seven quite

widely separated towns, the celebrated Seven Cities of Cibola, and

that this theoretic subdivision of the only one of these towns now

remaining is in some measure a survival of the original subdivision

of the tribe into seven subtribes inhabiting as many separate towns.

It is evident that in both cases, however, the arrangement was, and

is, if we may call it such, a mythic organization; hence my use of the

term the mytho-sociologic organization of the tribe. At any rate, this

is the key to their sociology as well as to their mythic conceptions

of space and the universe. In common with all other Indian tribes of

North America thus far studied, the Zuñis are divided into clans, or

artificial kinship groups, with inheritance in the female line. Of

these clans there are, or until recently there were, nineteen, and

these in turn, with the exception of one, are grouped in threes to

correspond to the mythic subdivision I have above alluded to. These

clans are also, as are those of all other Indians, totemic; that is,

they bear the names and are supposed to have intimate relationship with

various animals, plants, and objects or elements. Named by their totems

they are as follows:

 

Kâ´lokta-kwe, Crane or Pelican people; Póyi-kwe (nearly extinct),

Grouse or Sagecock people; Tá‘hluptsi-kwe (nearly extinct), Yellow-wood

or Evergreen-oak people; Ain̄´shi-kwe, Bear people; Súski-kwe, Coyote

people; Aíyaho-kwe, Red-top plant or Spring-herb people; Ána-kwe,

Tobacco people; Tâ´a-kwe, Maize-plant people; Tónashi-kwe, Badger

people; Shóhoita-kwe, Deer people; Máawi-kwe (extinct), Antelope

people; Tóna-kwe, Turkey people; Yä´tok‘ya-kwe, Sun people; Ápoya-kwe

(extinct), Sky people; K‘yä´k‘yäli-kwe, Eagle people; Ták‘ya-kwe, Toad

or Frog people; K‘yána-kwe (extinct), Water people; Chítola-kwe (nearly

extinct), Rattlesnake people; Píchi-kwe, Parrot-Macaw people.

 

Of these clans the first group of three appertains to the north, the

second to the west, the third to the south, the fourth to the east,

the fifth to the upper or zenith, and the sixth to the lower or

nadir region; while the single clan of the Macaw is characterized as

"midmost," or of the middle, and also as the all-containing or mother

clan of the entire tribe, for in it the seed of the priesthood of the

houses is supposed to be preserved. The Zuñi explanation of this very

remarkable, yet when understood and comprehended, very simple and

natural grouping of the clans or totems is exceedingly interesting,

and also significant whether it throw light on the origin, or at

least native meaning, of totemic systems in general, as would at

first seem to be the case, or whether, as is more probably the case

in this instance, it indicates a native classification, so to say, or

reclassification of clans which existed before the culture had been

elaborated to its present point. Briefly, the clans of the north--that

is, those of the Crane, the Grouse, and Evergreen-oak--are grouped

together and are held to be related to the north because of their

peculiar fitness for the region whence comes the cold and wherein the

season of winter itself is supposed to be created, for the crane each

autumn appears in the van of winter, the grouse does not flee from the

approach of winter but puts on his coat of white and traverses the

forests of the snow-clad mountains as freely as other birds traverse

summer fields and woodlands, caring not for the cold, and the evergreen

oak grows as green and is as sturdy in winter as other trees are in

spring or summer; hence these are totems and in a sense god-beings

of the north and of winter, and the clanspeople named after them

and considered as, mythically at least, their breath-children, are

therefore grouped together and related to the north and winter as are

their totems. And as the bear, whose coat is grizzly like the evening

twilight or black like the darkness of night, and the gray coyote, who

prowls amidst the sagebrush at evening and goes forth and cries in

the night-time, and the spring herb or the red-top plant, which blooms

earliest of all flowers in spring when first the moisture-laden winds

from the west begin to blow--these and the people named after them are

as appropriately grouped in the west. The badger, who digs his hole on

the sunny sides of hills and in winter appears only when the sun shines

warm above them, who excavates among the roots of the juniper and the

cedar from which fire is kindled with the fire drill; the wild tobacco,

which grows only where fires have burned, and the corn which anciently

came from the south and is still supposed to get its birth from the

southland, and its warmth--these are grouped in the south. The turkey,

which wakes with the dawn and helps to awaken the dawn by his cries;

the antelope and the deer, who traverse far mesas and valleys in the

twilight of the dawn--these and their children are therefore grouped in

the east. And it is not difficult to understand why the sun, the sky

(or turkis), and the eagle appertain to the upper world; nor why the

toad, the water, and the rattlesnake appertain to the lower world.

 

By this arrangement of the world into great quarters, or rather as

the Zuñis conceive it, into several worlds corresponding to the four

quarters and the zenith and the nadir, and by this grouping of the

towns, or later of the wards (so to call them) in the town, according

to such mythical division of the world, and finally the grouping

of the totems in turn within the divisions thus made, not only the

ceremonial life of the people, but all their governmental arrangements

as well, are completely systemized. Something akin to written statutes

results from this and similar related arrangements, for each region

is given its appropriate color and number, according to its relation

to one of the regions I have named or to others of those regions.

Thus the north is designated as yellow with the Zuñis, because the

light at morning and evening in winter time is yellow, as also is the

auroral light. The west is known as the blue world, not only because

of the blue or gray twilight at evening, but also because westward

from Zuñiland lies the blue Pacific. The south is designated as red,

it being the region of summer and of fire, which is red; and for an

obvious reason the east is designated white (like dawn light); while

the upper region is many-colored, like the sunlight on the clouds, and

the lower region black, like the caves and deep springs of the world.

Finally, the midmost, so often mentioned in the following outline, is

colored of all these colors, because, being representative of this

(which is the central world and of which in turn Zuñi is the very

middle or navel), it contains all the other quarters or regions, or

is at least divisible into them. Again, each region--at least each of

the four cardinal regions, namely, north, west, south, and east--is

the home or center of a special element, as well as of one of the

four seasons each element produces. Thus the north is the place of

wind, breath, or air, the west of water, the south of fire, and the

east of earth or the seeds of earth; correspondingly, the north is

of course the place of winter or its origin, the west of spring, the

south of summer, and the east of autumn. This is all because from the

north and in winter blow the fiercest, the greatest winds or breaths,

as these people esteem them; from the west early in spring come the

moistened breaths of the waters in early rains; from the south comes

the greatest heat that with dryness is followed by summer, and from

the east blow the winds that bring the frosts that in turn mature the

seeds and perfect the year in autumn. By means of this arrangement no

ceremonial is ever performed and no council ever held in which there

is the least doubt as to the position which a member of a given clan

shall occupy in it, for according to the season in which the ceremonial

is held, or according to the reason for which a council is convened,

one or another of the clan groups of one or another of the regions will

take precedence for the time; the natural sequence being, however,

first the north, second the west, third the south, fourth the east,

fifth the upper, and sixth the lower; but first, as well as last, the

middle. But this, to the Zuñi, normal sequence of the regions and clan

groups, etc., has been determined by the apparent sequence of the

phenomena of the seasons, and of their relations to one another; for

the masterful, all conquering element, the first necessity of life

itself, and to all activity, is the wind, the breath, and its cold, the

latter overmastering, in winter all the other elements as well as all

other existences save those especially adapted to it or potent in it,

like those of the totems and gods and their children of the north. But

in spring, when with the first appearance of the bear and the first

supposed growls of his spirit masters in the thunders and winds of that

time their breaths begin to bring water from the ocean world, then the

strength of the winter is broken, and the snows thereby melted away,

and the earth is revivified with drink, in order that with the warmth

of summer from the south things may grow and be cherished toward their

old age or maturity and perfection, and finally toward their death or

sleeping in winter by the frost-laden breaths of autumn and the east.

 

Believing, as the Zuñis do, in this arrangement of the universe and

this distribution of the elements and beings chiefly concerned in them,

and finally in the relationship of their clans and the members thereof

to these elementary beings, it is but natural that they should have

societies or secret orders or cult institutions composed of the elders

or leading members of each group of their clans as above classified.

The seriation of these secret and occult medicine societies, or,

better, perhaps, societies of magic, is one of the greatest consequence

and interest. Yet it can but be touched upon here. In strict accordance

with succession of the four seasons and their elements, and with their

supposed relationship to these, are classified the four fundamental

activities of primitive life, namely, as relating to the north and its

masterfulness and destructiveness in cold, is war and destruction;

relating to the west is war cure and hunting; to the south, husbandry

and medicine; to the east, magic and religion; while the above, the

below, and the middle relate in one way or another to all these

divisions. As a consequence the societies of cold or winter are found

to be grouped, not rigidly, but at least theoretically, in the northern

clans, and they are, respectively: ’Hléwe-kwe, Ice-wand people or band;

Áchia-kwe, Knife people or band; Kâ´shi-kwe, Cactus people or band;

for the west: Pí‘hla-kwe, Priesthood of the Bow or Bow people or band

(Ápi‘hlan Shiwani, Priests of the Bow); Sániyak‘ya-kwe, Priesthood

of the Hunt or Coyote people or band; for the south: Máke‘hlána-kwe,

Great fire (ember) people or band; Máketsána-kwe, Little fire (ember)

people or band; of the east: Shíwana-kwe, Priests of the Priesthood

people or band; Úhuhu-kwe, Cottonwood-down people or band; Shúme-kwe,

or Kâ´kâ‘hlána-kwe, Bird-monster people or band, otherwise known as

the Great Dance-drama people or band; for the upper region: Néwe-kwe,

Galaxy people or band or the All-consumer or Scavenger people or

band (or life preservers); and for the lower regions: Chítola-kwe,

Rattlesnake people or band, generators (or life makers).