Cosmos Mindeleff

“ The direct dependence of the savage on nature as he finds it is nowhere better illustrated than on the Navaho reservation. In the three essentials of land, water, and vegetation, his country is not an ideal one. The hard conditions under which he lives have acted directly on his arts and industries, on his habits and customs, and also on his mind and his mythology. In one respect only has he an advantage: he is blessed with a climate which acts in a measure as an offset 481 to the other conditions and enables him to lead a life which is on the whole not onerous. ”

“ Every family is possessed of a flock of sheep and goats, sometimes numbering many thousands, and a band of horses, generally several hundreds, in a few instances several thousands. In recent times many possess small herds of cattle, the progeny of those which strayed into the reservation from the numerous large herds in its vicinity, or were picked up about the borders by some Navaho whose thrift was more 482 highly developed than his honesty. The condition of the tribe, as a whole, is not only far removed from hardship, but may even be said to be one of comparative affluence. ”

“ The kind of house which a man builds depends almost entirely on the purposes which it is to serve and very little on the man or his circumstances. The houses of the richest man in the tribe and of the poorest would be identical unless, as often happens in modern times, the former has a desire to imitate the whites and builds a regular house of stone or logs. If, however, a man builds a summer place to which he intends to return year after year, and such is the usual custom, he usually erects a fairly substantial structure, a kind of half hogán, or house with the front part omitted. ”

“ Although no attempt at decoration is ever made, either of the inside or the outside of the houses, it is not uncommon to hear the term beautiful applied to them. Strong forked timbers of the proper length and bend, thrust together with their ends properly interlocking to form a cone-like frame, stout poles leaned against the apex to form the sides, the whole well covered with bark and heaped thickly with earth, forming a roomy warm interior with a level floor—these are sufficient to constitute a “qoġán nĭjóni,” house beautiful. ”

“ All over the reservation there are hundreds of little structures which are miniature models, as it were, of the hogáns, but they lack the projecting doorway. These little huts, scarcely as high as a man’s hip, look like children’s playhouses, but they occupy an important place both in the elaborate religious ceremonies and in the daily life of the Navaho. ”

“ He may, perhaps, meet half a dozen Indians in a day, or he may meet none, and at sunset when he camps he will probably hear the bark of a dog in the distance, or he may notice on the mountain side a pillar of smoke like that arising from his own camp fire. This is all that he will see to indicate the existence of other life than his own, yet the tribe numbers over 12,000 souls, and it is probable that there was no time during the day when there were not several pairs of eyes looking at him, and were he to fire his gun the report would probably be heard by several hundred persons. ”

“ As the architecture of a primitive people is influenced largely by the character of the country in which they live, a brief description of the Navaho reservation is deemed necessary. Similarly, the habits of life of the people, what a naturalist would term their life history, which in combination with the physical environment practically dictates their arts, is worthy of notice, for without some knowledge of the conditions under which a people live it is difficult, if not impossible, to obtain an adequate conception of their art products. ”

“ The Navajo reservation is better suited for the raising of sheep than for anything else, and the step from the life of a warrior and hunter to that of a shepherd is not a long one, nor a hard one to take. Under the stress of necessity the Navajo became a peaceable pastoral tribe, living by their flocks and herds, and practicing horticulture only in an extremely limited and precarious way. Under modern conditions they are slowly developing into an agricultural tribe, and this development has already progressed far enough to materially affect their house structures ”

“ In a few rods the traveler passes from the comparatively fertile mountain region into the flat, extremely arid valley country, and in 50 or 60 miles’ travel after leaving the mountains he will not find wood enough to make his camp fire, nor, unless he moves rapidly, water enough to carry his horses over the intervening distance.
Throughout the whole region great scarcity of water prevails; in the large valleys during most of the year there is none, and it is only in the mountain districts that there is a permanent supply; but there life is almost impossible during the winter. ”

“ The Navaho are a fine, athletic race of men, living a free and independent life. They are without chiefs, in the ordinary meaning of the term, although there are men in the tribe who occupy prominent positions and exercise a kind of semiauthority—chiefs by 486 courtesy, as it were. Ever since we have known them, now some three hundred years, they have been hunters, warriors, and robbers. When hunting, war, and robbery ceased to supply them with the necessaries of life they naturally became a pastoral people, for the flocks and the pasture lands were already at hand. ”

“ Advantage is taken of the opportunity thus afforded and the flocks are driven out on the plains and grazed in the vicinity of the water so long as the supply holds out, but as this is seldom prolonged more than a few weeks it is not surprising that the house erected by the head of the family should be of a very temporary nature. In fact the most finished house structures of these people must be temporary rather than 483 permanent so long as the conditions sketched above prevail; in other words, so long as they depend principally on their sheep. ”

“ Sheep and goats belong exclusively to her, and the head of the family can not sell a sheep to a passing traveler without first obtaining the consent and approval of his wife. Hence in such a movement as that sketched above the flocks are looked after by the women, while under normal circumstances, when the family has settled down and is at home, the care of the flocks devolves almost entirely on the little children, so young sometimes that they can just toddle about. ”

“ Another result of these conditions is that each family lives by itself and, as it were, on its own ground. Large communities are impossible, and while there are instances where eight or ten families occupy some place of exceptionally favorable location, these are rare. In fact to see even three or four hogáns together is remarkable. There are perhaps more hogáns in Canyon Chelly than in any other one locality, but the people who live here are regarded by the other Navaho as poor, because they own but few sheep and horses and depend principally on horticulture for their subsistence. ”

“ In early times, when the organization of the people into clans was more clearly defined, a section of territory was parceled out and held as a clan ground, and some of the existing clans took their names from such localities. Legends are still current among the old men of these early days before the introduction of sheep and goats and horses by the Spaniards, when the people lived by the chase and on wild fruits, grass seeds, and piñon nuts, and such supplies as they could plunder from their neighbors. ”

“ One result of this industrial development of the people is an increased permanency of dwellings. As the flocks of sheep and goats diminish and their care becomes less important, greater attention is paid to the selection of sites for homes, and they are often located now with reference to a permanent occupancy and with regard to the convenience of the fields, which in some cases furnish the main source of subsistence of the family. ”

“ The region may be roughly characterized as a vast sandy plain, arid in the extreme; or rather as two such plains, separated by a chain of mountains running northwest and southeast. In the southern part of the reservation this mountain range is known as the Choiskai mountains, and here the top is flat and mesa-like in character, dotted with little lakes and covered with giant pines, which in the summer give it a park-like aspect. The general elevation of this plateau is a little less than 9,000 feet above the sea and about 3,000 feet above the valleys or plains east and west of it. ”

“ In a general way the movements of a family are regulated by the condition of the grass and the supply of water. In a dry season many of the small springs cease to flow at an early date in the summer. Moreover, if a flock is kept too long in one locality, the grass is almost destroyed by close cropping, forcing the abandonment of that particular place for two or three years. ”

“ Should the price of wool rise in the near future the change that has been suggested might be checked, but it has received such an impetus that the Navaho will always henceforth pay much more attention to horticulture than they have in the past, and this means necessarily a modification in the present methods of house building. The average Navaho farm, and almost every adult male now has a small garden patch, comprises less than half an acre, while two acres is considered a large area to be worked by one family at one time. ”

“ The doorway always has a flat roof formed of straight limbs or split poles laid closely together, with one end resting on the crosspiece which forms the base of the smoke hole and the other end on the crosspiece of the door-frame. The whole doorway structure projects from the sloping side of the hogán, much like a dormer window. Sometimes the doorway roof is formed by a straight pole on each side of the smoke hole crosspiece to the crosspiece of the door-frame, supporting short sticks laid across and closely together with their ends resting on the two poles. ”

“ When the feast is finished tobacco and corn husks are produced, cigarettes are made, everyone smokes, and convivial gossipy talk prevails. This continues for two or three hours, when the people who live near by get up their horses and ride home. Those from a long distance either find places to sleep in the hogán or wrap themselves in their blankets and sleep at the foot of a tree. This ceremony is known as the qoġán aiíla, a kind of salutation to the house. ”

“ The winter hogáns are the real homes of the people, but as the form and construction of these are dictated by certain rules and a long line of precedents, supported by a conservatism which is characteristic of savage life, the summer shelters, which are largely exempt from such rules, are of considerable interest. Moreover, the effects of modern conditions and the breaking down of the old ideas should have 476 some place in a discussion of this kind, if only for the hint afforded as to the future of the tribe. ”

“ As it is, however, the feed is covered too deeply for the sheep to reach it, and during several months heavy snowdrifts make communication very difficult and at times impossible. In a few favored localities—usually small, well-sheltered valleys here and there in the mountains—some families may remain throughout the winter, but as a rule, at the first approach of the cold season and before the first snow flies there is a general exodus to the low-lying valleys and the low mesa regions, and the mountains are practically abandoned for a time. ”

“ One may travel for 20 miles over this valley and not find a drop of water. Except at Sulphur springs, warm volcanic springs about 30 miles south of the San Juan, the ordinary traveler will not find sufficient water between the foot of the mountains and the river, a distance of over 50 miles. Such is the character of Chaco valley. But the Indians know of a few holes and pockets in this region which yield a scanty supply of water during parts of the year, and somewhere in the vicinity of these pockets will be found a hogán or two. ”

“ A fire is built in the center and the natives dispose themselves around it. Blankets are thrown over outstanding branches here and there, affording an abundance of shade in the hot summer days when even a little shade is agreeable. Rude as this shelter is, it is regarded by the Navaho as sufficient when no better is available. During the recent construction of some irrigating ditches on the reservation, when from 50 to 100 men were employed at one time, this form of shelter was the only one used, although in several instances the work was carried on in one place for five or six weeks. ”

“ In the ceremonies which follow the erection of a hogán today the structure is dedicated to both these deities, but the door is invariably placed to face the east, that the house may be directly open to the influences of the more kindly disposed Qastcéyalçi.
When a movement of a family has been completed, the first care of the qasçíŋ, or head of the family, is to build a dwelling, for which he selects a suitable site and enlists the aid of his neighbors and friends. ”

“ The waters are usually regarded by the Navaho as the common property of the tribe, but the cultivable lands in the vicinity are held by the individuals and families as exclusively their own. Their flocks occupy all the surrounding pasture, so that virtually many of the springs come to be regarded as the property of the people who plant nearest to them. ”

“ The habits of a people, which are to a certain extent the product of the country in which they live, in turn have a pronounced effect on their habitations. New Mexico and Arizona came into the possession of the United States in 1846, and prior to that time the Navaho lived chiefly by war and plunder. ”

“ The north and south timbers are the first to be placed, and each is handled by a number of men, usually four or five, who set the butt ends firmly in the ground on opposite sides at the points previously marked and lower the timbers to a slanting position until the forks lock together. While some of the men hold these timbers in place others set the west timber on the western side of the circle, placing it in such a position and in such a manner that its fork receives the other two and the whole structure is bound together at the top. ”

“ Each family moves back and forth within a certain circumscribed area, and the smallness of this area is one of the most remarkable things in Navaho life.
Ninety per cent of the Navaho one meets on the reservation are mounted and usually riding at a gallop, apparently bent on some important business at a far-distant point. But a closer acquaintance will develop the fact that there are many grown men in the tribe who are entirely ignorant of the country 30 or 40 miles from where they were born. ”