Ethnographic References to Music.
(Stephen, 1936a:767): Snake clan informant, “And the old man distinctly says in reply to my query whether there is any connection between the Flute and Snake societies, “Paihi’shat shu’nantu, long ago the same. Le’lenti pu Chu’chubti paihi’shat shu’nantu, Flute and Snake-Antelope long ago the same,” laying his two forefingers together while he speaks. The songs are all of similar intent, prayers for clouds and rain, for vegetation in abundance.”
(Stephen, 1936b:769): “The Snake clan is still represented in the [Hopi Flute] ceremony, perhaps for the aforesaid historic reason; or it may be because their Snake-Antelope ceremony is affiliated conceptually with the Flute or Lightning ceremony. Between snake and lightning there is ever in Pueblo ideology a close relationship. …The ritual patterns of the Flute ceremony are much the same as those of the Snake-Antelope ceremony. The ceremony is to promote rainfall and to initiate [new members] after lightning shock. … Anyone who has been struck by lightning or whose field has been struck is eligible for
membership…. the owner reports to the Flute society chief who recovers the arrow point which Lightning has implanted.”
(Parsons’ footnote to Stephens, 1936b:769): “And in June the two Flute groups hold a one day ceremony to make prayer-sticks for the Sun. (Voth 6 : 129—136). This may be evidence for their Keresan origin; all Keresan societies participate in solstice ceremoniaI.” Sho’tokwinuniih
ibid. 770: “The god of lightning, the sky war god, Sho’tokununwu, is inferably the supernatural patron of the Flute society. This would explain the representation of the Patki clan in the ceremony, as Sho’tokununwu is associated with that clan of water and corn, of fertility.” [Fewkes: Sho’tokununwu is Heart of Sky, the Plumed Serpent, Katoya]
(Stephen, 1936a:864): Mamzrau ceremony, “Like other Hopi ceremonies the women’s ceremony of Mamzrau presents ritual for various objects, for reproduction or fertility, for favorable weather, for war, and for cure. Girl novices are put through a rite which appears to be for the promotion of their fertility and in the final dance there is a dramatization of lightning striking in the corn field, “which is regarded as the acme of fertilization. …Voth inclines to the opinion that the songs of Mamzrau are from the Eastern pueblos. In some of them Payatemu of the Keres is referred to. …curing features of Mamzrau are more determined [than war features]. They are concerned with the “twisting sickness” and with venereal disease” [cha’chus, syphilis]. “…the Mamzrau altar is made in imitation of the first Mamzrau altar in the underworld (at’kyabi), which was brought up by the people of that early society when they climbed the reed and emerged from the si’papu” (ibid., 928).
(Stephen, 1936a:718): Hopi informant, “All the songs of the Snakes and the Antelopes are Laguna, or, as Ho’ni calls it, Hopa’klavai’yi, Northeast talk; and Sikya’piki, Snake chief of Shipau’lovi (who is also present), and Ho’ni again both say that long ago the Flute and Snake (Lentu and Chu’atu) were the same. But they also say that the wi’mi [supernatural fetishes] of the two were and are different. I suppose they mean that their object was the same, i. e. rain. They also say that the songs of the Singers, Wu’wuchimtu, Snake-Antelope and Flutes are all in hopa’klavai’yi, the language of the Northeast or Laguna.” [Laguna and Acoma and possibly Sia were thought to be at some point one tribe, White, 1964:83] “There is no Snake society today at Acoma, but there are Snake societies at Sia and Jemez (ibid. 578).”
(Fewkes, 1894:100): Hopi Antelope-Snake ceremony, “One is immediately struck with the many resemblances between Hopi and Zuni music. This is what we had expected from the close relationship of the religious ceremonials of the two peoples . As far as I am aware, nothing has yet been published on characteristic Hopi songs. The sixteen songs naturally fell into two divisions of eight each, separated by the smoking of the great O’-mow-uh [Cloud-blower] pipe. Many of the words were not Hopi, and were repeated over and over again, apparently meaningless even to the singer. Both song and words, which were reputed to be very ancient, were probably archaic or borrowed from some other tribe.”
“Music, numbers, elements, order, spaces, times, colours – fundamental cosmic laws that appear, suggestively, throughout the width and breadth of the planet. ’It is common in Mesoamerican traditions to find that the four colours associated with the quadrants of the earth’s surface were symbols of an order that governed the entire universe. In Mesoamerica, the four colours represented the correspondence between times and spaces, and they designated the places through which time flowed. At the ends of the world, four trees held up the skies, and the divine forces that came from on high and from below flowed inside their trunks. The colours might vary, and it is possible that besides the four colours at the ends of the world there was a fifth colour, that of the central tree, the axis of the universe. But in the codices, in songs, and in narrations the symbolism of colour was always important. …
“Now, turning to the myth itself:-
’There were two characters who represented the two halves of the universe. One, Tezcatlipoca [the great Sorcerer], was the god of darkness. The other, the sun [Quetzalcoatl], was warm and celestial. Tezcatlipoca had the assistance of his agent and creature Ehecatl, the wind god, cold like himself, black, shadowy, and armed with a bloody thorn. The sun, on the other hand, had an orchestra composed of musicians dressed in four colours [e.g., rainbow of cardinal directions reference].
’Tezcatlipoca’s dark son had the mission of trapping the musicians with his melodious song. The sons of the sun had the obligation to ignore the dark, cold, nocturnal call. What did Tezcatlipoca propose to do? He wanted to begin the fight, the alternation of the two opposites. The sun, in turn, wanted to keep the light of his sons pure. He didn’t want it to alternate with the wind’s blackness and coldness. But the world had to begin its course, and destiny had to be fulfilled. The song’s strength was greater than the musicians’ resistance, and one by one they were captured so that the dances and feasts could begin ….
“The mention of the four colours indicates the distribution of the musicians at the four corners of the universe. The lord of night’s successive conquest of each of the sun’s servants shows the way in which each unit of time emerged in its turn from one of the four corners of the world by way of one of the cosmic trees. Time was the union of the opposing forces – the luminous and the obscure, the colourful and the black, the day and the night, the dry and the wet. The alternation and the cycles were established. The dance and the feast were thus changed into symbols of the gyration of the gods, converted into time. They represented the existence on the earth’s surface of a motion that created all the realities of history” (Lopez Austin, 1996).
Ethnographic References to the Recurved Cane
Left: Olmec avian serpent with maize tail sign from Juxtlahuaca cave (Taube, 2000:fig. 12e after Geertz). The trident on the tail is the trident seen in the right hand of the earliest known depiction of the warrior maize king in that cave, who also carries a serpentine staff in his left hand that reiterates this form. In the Olmecan tradition we began to see the association of sun and wind: “Cholula, located in the Puebla/Tlaxcala valley of Mexico‟s central highlands, was clearly identified with the Olmeca-Xicallanca in Colonial period “mythstories.‟ For example, the native informant Ixtlilxochitl recorded the sequence of world ages, or suns, in which the Olmeca arrived during the Ehecatonatiuh (“sun of the wind god”),” that is, this current age and world (McCafferty, Chiykowski, 2008:1). This idea is very likely the inspiration for the Toltec’s Quetzalcoatl (“twin,” bird-serpent) as the Wind god who represented the Sun god (Seler, 1902:156). Cholula was the Mexican mother ship of the tower-building Quetzalcoatl cult.
The rise and fall of the Toltec culture c. 900-1150 CE and the cult of the Feathered Serpent as the patron of rulers coincided with the rise and fall of Chaco Canyon as the spiritual heart of Chacoan culture. The Aztec culture synthesized Quetzalcoatl out of Feathered Serpent imagery and ideology mainly from the Toltecs and Teotihuacans who had come before. Quetzalcoatl’s staff represents the genius of the cosmic serpent as it manifests itself as a nahual in the emblems of authority and weapons of those who are born to lead.
ML018882. The Moche’s aged Aia Paec and the Dragon, his complement, battle at the change of seasons with serpent scepters (image courtesy of Museo Larco, Lima, Peru). At other times Aia Paec fights with a snake-bird or snake-feline scepter. Aia Paec is strengthened and restored to youth through blood sacrifice.
(Parsons, 1920:126 fn 1): “Breathing from, or ritualistic inspiration, at Laguna is called kuityia. The officers on being installed breathe from the canes—to get a new spirit. Also, breathing on, [e.g., expiration] g’oputs, is ” to show what you want.”
(Stephen, 1936b:1217): hi’shanavaiya (heshanavaiya) referring (1) to the
butterfly tile of Antelope altar, p. 617; (2) to the patron spirit of the Antelopes, p. 675, 697, 718. The butterfly stone Heshanavaiya, “it fell from the clouds,” at To’konabi (p. 617). See Hopi Antelope altar for the butterfly stone of the Snake-Antelope ceremony; the butterfly stone sits in the SW corner of the altar and so North is to the right in the photograph. The Flute society retained four directional cloud-stone effigies.
(Stephen, 1936a:673-674, 697): “The mountain lion effigies (toho’poko) are the watchers (tu’tuwala). The arrows (ho’ hu) guard, watch, the doorways. Hu’chiwa, doorway, through these come the clouds and their blessings, from the four corners. The crooks (nulu’kpi) represent the old men bent with age, the wu’wuyomo, the wise, thinking old men, who have passed away. The crooks at the Antelope altar represent those of the Antelope society ; those at the Snake altar represent those of the Snake society. The long straight prayer-sticks (wu’ya paho) represent the younger men , who yet walked erect when they died. Hi’shanavaiya is the mystic first chief of the Antelopes that Snake youth [Tiyo] found in the Antelope kiva in the mythic island.” “Hi’shanavaiya sits at the southwest, he was the first chief of the Antelopes.”
(Stephen, 1936a:929): Mamzrau ceremony, “In the underworld the ancients (hi’shato wu’wuyumu) made four kinds of prayer-sticks as shown in this altar. The young people made short ones; the young men, a little longer; the mature men, the longest ones. These were all straight and were carried in the hands because these ancients were straight. But the old men made a crook which they used as a staff to keep them from falling. That is the reason why these prayer-sticks are there in the altar.”
(Stephen, 1936a:817 fn 1): “The runners carry green corn or chili or onions. As the runners reach a place below Walpi, to the north, they encounter Crier chief standing at a shrine and holding the crook cane. As the runners pass, each touches the cane, “to be an old man.” (Crier chief is a Snake clansman. In the account of the race at Shipaulovi, the holder of the crook is described as a member of the Snake ceremony”). Racing “…hasten[s] the ripening of the fruits and cultivated vegetation” (ibid., 851).
(Judd, 1954:331): Material culture of Pueblo Bonito, “Besides the two planting sticks with No. 8 [burial, room 326, Pueblo Bonito], we noted decayed remnants of others and staves with crooked ends in association with other skeletons. A planting stick in Hopi graves is an aid to resurrection, since it represents the ladder into the house of Masauwu, god of death;” at Acoma the prospective traveler is offered a crook stick as a cane and crook prayer sticks are given to the dead “because they are going away” (Parsons, 1939, pp. 71, 271).” As the proprietor of “land and life” Maasaw is also the patron of travelers (Malotki, Lomatuway’ma, 1987:67).
(Fewkes, 1898b:80 fn 2): Winter solstice ceremony at Walpi, “These crooks or gnela have been called warrior prayer-sticks, and are symbols of ancient weapons. In many folk-tales it is stated that warriors overcame their foes by the use of gnelas, which would indicate that they had something to do with ancient war implements. Their association with arrows on the Antelope altars adds weight to this conclusion. It is easy to see, on this theory, why they are particularly appropriate as symbols carried by novices in warrior initiations.” As an historical sidenote, the bent canes of office have at times also been described in Mexico as weapons and as a symbolic representation of the Little Dipper (Nuttall, 1901:34).
(Boyd, 2016): Context of mural of the White Shaman: “S-shaped weapons such as those wielded by the moon goddess in the White Shaman mural are portrayed in the codices as well. These have been interpreted as ceremonial atlatls representing lightning, serpents, and the constellation Ursa Major (Olivier 2003:206). Ursa Major is associated with the lunar deity Tezcatlipoca, who is often portrayed brandishing the xonecuilli (Olivier 2003:266).”
Lightning-struck Wood
What is the significance of lightning-struck wood? Obviously lightning is an aspect of the supernatural cloud-serpent and is associated with both transformation and fertility. The Puebloan’s association of smoke clouds and rain clouds is also well known. In searching for comparisons or correlations between the ancestral Puebloans and the Maya and Moche, a strong correlation is seen in all three cultures between vegetal smoke and transformation. In Maya mythology God K (K’awiil, GII) is the patron of rulers and associated with the transcendent state that allows a ruler to embody the supernatural powers of ancestors and gods as an axis mundi. It was Linda Schele who pointed out that she began to understand K’awiil when she learned that k’awil referred to statues made of wood and stone and that the way or soul companion of K’awiil was the vision serpent (och chan), which is represented as K’awiil’s snake leg (Freidel et al, 2001:197); it is interesting to consider that an ancestral Puebloan ceremonial vessel decorated with lightning bolts and the Chaco signature rendered in carbon or mineral paint fits this description. Recall that the Moche’s Aia Paec wears his snake way around his waist and it serves the same functions as K’awiil’s way, and that an effigy vessel with a snake way and similar in its humpbacked Mountain/cave form to Aia Paec has been recovered from a Chaco outlier. It should also be restated that the Twisted Gourd symbol was explicitly conflated with the powers of both K’awiil and Aia Paec as shown previously. When we look at function associated with a deity it becomes clear that all three cultures shared the same or very similar notion about the transformative role of the God K archetype, which correlates with the emphasis placed on lightning-struck wood in the Acoma Keres origin story and in current Puebloan Snake-Antelope rituals. What is not obvious about God K because his way and his embodiment in ritual objects like the serpent staff are usually discussed separately is the fact that God K is at once form and function. God K and his way cannot be separated; the iconic snake scroll and a recurved staff are the way of God K and are God K in that form. What an idol like the Chacoan effigy or the Antelope clan’s recurved cane of office share in common is a snake scroll, and the snake scroll can materialize as a drool or breath scroll attached to the mouth of the effigy, which are associated with the cloud, or as a smoke scroll, which is associated with fire. God K is a complex chameleon in his many guises (Alexander, n.d.), but three characteristics define his functions as transformative process and gateway to the Otherworld– his spirit companion as mentioned above is the vision serpent (subjective transcendent state), he is a personified lightning bolt, and he is the supernatural agency of flame and smoke, e.g., he is a tinkuy and resolution of the igneous : aquatic paradigm, which makes him an all-directions supernatural water wizard like Itzamna, Aia Paec, Quetzalcoatl, and Heshanavaiya, and like the culture heroes he empowered such as Quetzalcoatl priests and by extension the Puebloan’s Poshaiyanne with his rainbow mystery medicine:
“Many of the smoke scrolls within which God K sits are specifically marked as vegetal. This may be a significant clue about the method of God K conjuring rituals or simply a recognition that most fire is made from wood, that is, vegetally based, although the usual interpretation of God K as the embodiment of lightning should be kept in mind. Two immediate connections from nature come to mind. Lightning striking a tree causes it to smoke or burn. Second, lightning fixes the nitrogen in the air into a nitrate that combines with rain to form a natural fertilizer, nourishing in this case, maize. On Vessel 3151 flowers decorate the head of God K, making the flower association absolutely clear. The somewhat ambiguous vessels K2295 and 5366 also show floral decoration. On K2295 God C sits in the flower blossoms. One is reminded of the God C appearing prominently in the ears of the och chan on the Snake Lady vessels. Since the och chan is the way of God K, the close association of God K and God C helps to identify, at least tentatively, the heads on K2295 as God K heads. Since K5366 is nearly identical to K2295 with the exception of the God C heads, the inference is clear that these vessels both depict God K heads in their most vegetal incarnation. God K, usually associated with lightning, a non-vegetally based fire, is marked on these vessels as the power of a fire that is vegetal, either associated with lightning, or not. The fire on these vessels as discussed above may be related to the burning of psychoactive plants, either tobacco, or
perhaps water lily buds” (Alexander, n.d.:14-15; see Maya Kerr vases).
Tsamaiya
The two fetishes are also referred to as Tsamai’ya and Tsamahi’ya (Stirling, 1942:37:100), which highlights the fact that the Keres language not only is tonal (an inflection can change the meaning of the word) but there are also male and female pronunciations for most words. Add to this the confusion that there are also ritual and secular names for the supernaturals and it becomes obvious that what was lost in translation were the original tsamaiyas that reiterated the supernatural power couple, Iatiku and Tiamunyi, as corn-ear fetishes. Apparently ethnologists with the one exception cited here often weren’t able to distinguish between iarikos (“tiponi,” or in Keres “honani”) and tsamaiyas– everything was a “tiponi” when they saw a corn-ear fetish on an altar. “On the altar of the Kapina society, laid for the installation of War chiefs and presumably on other occasions, were two fetiches “made of buckskin [ ?] with feathers at the top called Tsamai’ye on the east side [male], and Tsamahi’a on the west side. A large stone lion was in the middle of the altar” (Parsons’ footnote 1 to Stephen, 1936b:745). As on the Snake altar, the mountain lion is positioned between the fetishes as the animal lord or War chief. As a sidenote this adds mounting weight to the idea that the jog-toed sandals represented the dew claw of the mountain lion and was associated with tcamahias (lightning celts) and supernaturally strengthened the men who wore the sandals.
(Fewkes, 1922:594): “The Ala [Horn], Flute, and Snake clans are closely associated and once inhabited cliff houses at Tokonabi, on the San Juan and its tributaries. They were among the ancestors of the Hopi, being the first to settle at the so-called East Mesa of the Hopi. In corroboration of the claim of the Horn priests that their fraternity originated in the north, we find many pictographs of the mountain sheep and men with horns on their heads playing flutes on cliffs near the cliff houses of the north. fn 7: The author [Fewkes] applies the name, Tcamahia, to the cliff dwellers of the San Juan. The same name is also given by the Hopi to celts characteristic of this valley, several of which are owned by the Ala and Snake families at Walpi.”
(Stephen, 1936a:745): Regarding the Hopi Sand clan chief and the Snake-Antelope ceremonies: “He has one chama’hia (celt) about twelve inches long and four inches at the wide end. It is set on the small end, leaning against the northwest corner beside the bundle of unused long prayer-sticks. …The chama’hia came from the Below, were at Toko’nabi and at A’kokyabi (Acoma). One who sits here tells me he has seen them there They are lo’lomai, good, he says, and bring rain, but I can not make out whether or not he means people or stone celts.” Parsons, ibid. 745: “…it is almost certain that the ceremony is not Hopi, but Keresan. The songs are in Keresan; the stone fetiches are associated with Keresan supernaturals.” …fn 8: “Note the tradition that the clan associated with the ceremony, the Snake-Sand clan, once spoke Keresan.”
(Stephen, 1936a:675): “Ha’hawi asserts that the A’kokabi (Acomans) and the Chama’hia are the same. …The Acoma dwelt here, a famine occurred, no food for the weeping women and children, so these Chama’hia people traveled away to Zuni, then to Isleta, then to the present site of Acoma, some going to Laguna and beyond. At Acoma they know the wi’mi of Antelope and Snake, but at no other place.” Fewkes, 1900b:589, fn 3: “There is said to be a ruin on the Awatobi mesa called Akokaiobi [Acoma].” Awatobi (Awatovi) was first settled in the 13th century, or late PIII (Woodbury, 1954:6).
(Stephen, 1936b:1084): Lineages– Second to arrive at Hopi after Bear, “Snake clan and Sand clan, A’kokabi, Acoma people, and Kawai’ka, Laguna people….Snake clan, Mountain lion and Dove lineages: They dwelt at Toko’nabi, near the junction of the San Juan and Colorado Rivers.”
(Stephen, 1936a:714): Antelope-Snake ceremony, “The Laguna are the Chama’hia, the Acoma, the Yomai’hia of the aspersing invocation at the dance. The Chamahi’ invoke ( ?) clouds at the northwest. The Awahi’ invoke clouds at the southwest. The Yomahi’ invoke clouds at the southeast. The Chamahai’ invoke clouds at the northeast. This is the invocation at the sprinkling of the Snake bower in the court. …Long ago the Snake society and Antelope society were confined to men of the Snake clan….In the old time the Snake society were actual warriors and when they went on the war trail (tu’ovuta) they carried neither spear nor bow and arrow. They had the battle axe (kala’pikya’inwa) and the nodule club (pu’vwulshonni). They knew no fear and marched up to the enemy and seized him by the throat (as we seize a snake) and knocked him on the head with axe or club. The Antelope society were old men, they remained in the kiva and sang and prayed
while the Snakes were fighting. …Then the Snake clan spoke Laguna, now they speak only Hopi; then the Acoma spoke Hopi, now they speak only Laguna.”
(Stevenson, 1894:69): “…the snake of the north being Ska’towe [Gatoya, Katoya], (Plumed Serpent), the west Ka’spanna, the south Ko’quaira, the east Quis’sera, the heavens Hu’waka, the earth Ya’ai. The Ska’towe (Serpent of the North) and Ko’quaira (Serpent of the South) having special influence over the cloud people, have their bodies marked with cloud emblems; the Ka’spanna (Serpent of the West) and the Quis’sera (Serpent of the East) hold esoteric relations with the sun and moon; hence their bodies are painted with the crescent. Hu’waka (Serpent of the Heavens) has a body like crystal, and it is so brilliant that one’s eyes can not rest upon him; he is very closely allied to the sun. The Ya’ai (Serpent of the Earth) has special relations with Ha’arts (the earth). His body is spotted over like the earth, and he passes about over Ha’arts until someone approaches, when he hastens into his house in the earth.”
(Stephen, 1936a:625): “The old stone hoes are not called hoes, only chama’hia.
They are implement (hoe) and weapon (axe) combined, the war god’s weapon — chama’hia Pu’ukonhoya tu’nipiadta, Pu’ukonhoya’s weapon.”
(Stephen, 1936a:687): “The long prayer-sticks are placed inside the crooks lying upon the
celts (chama’hia), shells are also placed there.”
(Stephen, 1936a:707): “Chama’hiya [asperger] has come in response to the song prayers of this morning. The Chama’hiya were very excellent (pasha’ni hi’hkyata), they well knew all concerning Snake ceremonies, they swallowed the snakes, as the Naso’tan swallow sticks. The chama’hiya, the celts upon the altar, are from the Chiefs of the Directions (Na’nanivak Mon’-mowitu). They are the very precious knives (pasha’ ni hi’hkyaita yo’ishiva) of these deities, the sacred piercers fallen from the Above. …The chama’hiya shinyumu [Chama’hiya shi-“life” people] are originally of the Stone People, Owa’nyumu, Owa’ shinyumu, of the Stone when it had speech and life, and these people were spread to the four corners of the earth, and were known as follows: At northwest, Chama’hiya; at southwest, A’wahi’ya; at southeast, Yo’mahi’ya; at northeast, Chima’hai’ya. We pray for them to come from the four quarters.”
(Ellis, 1967:37): “In 1895 the Hopi told Stephen that, according to their traditions, the Snake people were Keres who, with other Keresan clans, had come from To’konabi (Navajo Mountain) to Hopi as one of the earliest arrivals when the widely distributed components were amalgamating to form the basis of the current Hopi tribe. This amalgamation began in the late 13th century. The Snake clan is associated with warfare at Hopi, as at Jemez. The Snake society, formerly composed of the Snake clan, actually was of warriors who went on the trail with battle axes and nodule clubs [elk antler club, room 32 with warrior/hunter, Pepper, 1920:161] rather than with spears and bows and arrows.” [Was the “nodule club” the trilobe axe? See map of distribution of the trilobe ax.] “The mountain lion, which appears on the Hopi Snake altar, is associated with hunting in all the Pueblos and is especially prominent among the Keres, where it is symbolic of their Hunt society and gives strength to those who pray to it. …The Hunt and Warrior societies, we are told, were closely related because both were accustomed to the use of weapons and could aid each other when necessary.” pg. 38: “The Hopi Snake Priest of the Underworld is known as Chama’hia, the “spiritual chief of the Snake people.” The Hopi say that the spiritual language of the underworld, before the people “came up,” was Keresan, and the bulk of ceremonial organization of Hopi was borrowed from the Keres or came from Awatovi.” pg. 39: “Boas was told at Laguna that these fetishes [tcamahias] originally were human beings [mountain spirits] but became stone when the earth settled, an explanation paralleling those given at Hopi. …Their care is entrusted to old women and passed down through a specific matrilineal lineage which lends them to religious societies for use on an altar..
(Mindeleff, 1891:129-130): “The baho is a prayer token ; the petitioner is not satisfied by merely speaking or singing his prayer, he must have some tangible thing upon which to transmit it. He regards his prayer as a mysterious, impalpable portion of his own substance, and hence he seeks to embody it in some object, which thus becomes consecrated. The baho, which is inserted in the roof of the kiva, is a piece of willow twig about six inches long, stripped of its bark and painted. From it hang four small feathers suspended by short cotton strings tied at equal distances along the twig. In order to obtain recognition from the powers especially addressed, different colored feathers and distinct methods of attaching them to bits of wood and string are resorted to. In the present case these are addressed to the “chiefs” who control the paths taken by the people after coming up from the interior of the earth. They are thus designated [Mindeleff’s color directions do not correspond with those listed by Fewkes for the Hopi and the Keres, possibly because the Keres system was based on the cardinal directions and the Hopi’s on intercardinal directions. The same shift can be seen in Stephen’s data on the directional prey gods, the mountain lion being an example: the Keres have it in the north while the Hopi have it in the NW corner colored yellow and white]:
west: Siky’ak oma’uwu Yellow Cloud.
south: Sa’kwa oma’uwu Blue Cloud.
east: Pal’a oma’uwu Red Cloud.
north: Kwctsh oma’uwu White Cloud.
These are addressed to the zenith, heyap oma’uwu—the invisible [Cloud] space of the above—and to the nadir, Muiyingwa—god of the interior of the earth and maker of the germ of life. To the four first mentioned the bahos under the corner stones are also addressed. These feathers are prepared by the kiva chief in another kiva. He smokes devoutly over them, and as he exhales the smoke upon them he formulates the prayers to the chiefs or powers, who not only control the paths or lives of all the people, but also preside over the six regions of space whence come all the necessaries of life [Chiefs of the Directions, the Tsamaiya, the Stone people]. The ancients also occupy his thoughts during these devotions ; he desires that all the pleasures they enjoyed while here may come to his people, and he reciprocally wishes the ancients to partake of all the enjoyments of the living.”
(Fewkes, 1906:372): “This large spring, situated near the trail leading from the plain to Hano, on the right hand side, is dedicated to the Hano Plumed Serpent, Avaiyo (e.g. Hi-ca-na-vai-ya, Fewkes, 1894:115). It is one of the few large walled springs with a pathway leading down to the water. Monwiba was dug out within a few years ; at the time a festival was held, the workmen personating the Snow Katcina wearing masks on which were depicted the heads of plumed serpents. In the March dramatization, exercises are performed at this spring with the effigies of the Great Serpent of Hano. Tawapa [Sun Spring] is the home of the Walpi Plumed Snake ; Monwiba, of that of the Hano.”
Visual Program of the First Civilizations in the Americas 