We also see a Swastika (turned to the left) scratched on two terra
cotta bowls of the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico, preserved in the
ethnological section of the Royal Museum at Berlin.
G. Nordenskiöld,[261] in the report of his excavations among the ruined
pueblos of the Mesa Verde, made in southwestern Colorado during the summer
of 1891, tells of the finding of numerous specimens of the Swastika. In
pl. 23, fig. 1, he represents a large, shallow bowl in the refuse heap at
the "Step House." It was 50 centimeters in diameter, of rough execution,
gray in color, and different in form and design from other vessels from
the cliff houses. The Swastika sign (to the right) was in its center, and
made by lines of small dots. His pl. 27, fig. 6, represents a bowl found
in a grave (_g_ on the plan) at "Step House." Its decoration inside was of
the usual type, but the only decoration on the outside consisted of a
Swastika, with arms crossing at right angles and ends bent at the right,
similar to fig. 9. His pl. 18, fig. 1, represented a large bowl found in
Mug House. Its decoration consisted in part of a Swastika similar in form
and style to the Etruscan gold "bulla," fig. 188 in this paper. Certain
specimens of pottery from the pueblos of Santa Clara and St. Ildefonso,
deposited in the U. S. National Museum (Department of Ethnology), bear
Swastika marks, chiefly of the ogee form.[262]
_The Navajoes._--Dr. Washington Matthews, U. S. A., than whom no one has
done better, more original, nor more accurate anthropologic work in
America, whether historic or prehistoric, has kindly referred me to his
memoir in the Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, comprising
82 pages, with 9 plates and 9 figures, entitled "The Mountain Chant; a
Navajo ceremony." It is descriptive of one of a number of ceremonies
practiced by the shamans or medicine men of the Navajo Indians, New
Mexico. The ceremony is public, although it takes place during the night.
It lasts for nine days and is called by the Indians "_dsilyídje
qaçàl_"--literally, "chant toward (a place) within the mountains." The
word "_dsilyi_" may allude to mountains in general, to the Carrizo
Mountains in particular, to the place in the mountains where the prophet
(originator of these ceremonies) dwelt, or to his name, or to all of these
combined. "_Qaçàl_" means a sacred song or a collection of sacred songs.
Dr. Matthews describes at length the myth which is the foundation of this
ceremony, which must be read to be appreciated, but may be summarized
thus: An Indian family, consisting of father, mother, two sons, and two
daughters, dwelt in ancient times near the Carrizo Mountains. They lived
by hunting and trapping; but the place was desert, game scarce, and they
moved up the river farther into the mountains. The father made
incantations to enable his two sons to capture and kill game; he sent them
hunting each day, directing them to go to the east, west, or north, but
with the injunction not to the south. The elder son disobeyed this
injunction, went to the south, was captured by a war party of Utes and
taken to their home far to the south. He escaped by the aid of _Yàybichy_
(_Qastcèëlçi_) and divers supernatural beings. His adventures in returning
home form the body of the ceremony wherein these adventures are, in some
degree, reproduced. Extensive preparations are made for the performance of
the ceremony. Lodges are built and corrals made for the use of the
performers and the convenience of their audience. The fête being
organized, stories are told, speeches made, and sacred songs are sung (the
latter are given by Dr. Matthews as "songs of sequence," because they must
be sung in a progressive series on four certain days of the ceremony).
Mythological charts of dry sand of divers colors are made on the earth
within the corrals after the manner of the Navajo and Pueblo Indians.
These dry sand paintings are made after a given formula and intended to be
repeated from year to year, although no copy is preserved, the artists
depending only upon the memory of their shaman. One of these pictures or
charts represents the fugitive's escape from the Utes, his captors, down a
precipice into a den or cave in which burnt a fire "on which was no wood."
Four pebbles lay on the ground together--a black pebble in the east, a
blue one in the south, a yellow one in the west, and a white one in the
north. From these flames issued. Around the fire lay four bears, colored
and placed to correspond with the pebbles. When the strangers (Qastcèëlçi
and the Navajo) approached the fire the bears asked them for tobacco, and
when they replied they had none, the bears became angry and thrice more
demanded it. When the Navajo fled from the Ute camp, he had furtively
helped himself from one of the four bags of tobacco which the council was
using. These, with a pipe, he had tied up in his skin robe; so when the
fourth demand was made he filled the pipe and lighted it at the fire. He
handed the pipe to the black bear, who, taking but one whiff, passed it to
the blue bear and immediately fell senseless. The blue bear took two
whiffs and passed the pipe, when he too fell over unconscious. The yellow
bear succumbed after the third whiff, and the white bear in the north
after the fourth whiff. Now the Navajo knocked the ashes and tobacco out
of his pipe and rubbed the latter on the feet, legs, abdomen, chest,
shoulders, forehead, and mouth of each of the bears in turn, and they were
at once resuscitated. He replaced the pipe in the corner of his robe. When
the bears recovered, they assigned to the Navajo a place on the east side
of the fire where he might lie all night, and they brought out their
stores of corn meal, _tciltcin_, and other berries, offering them to him
to eat; but Qastcèëlçi warned him not to touch the food, and disappeared.
So, hungry as he was, the Indian lay down supperless to sleep. When he
awoke in the morning, the bears again offered food, which he again
declined, saying he was not hungry. Then they showed him how to make the
bear _kethàwns_, or sticks, to be sacrificed to the bear gods, and they
drew from one corner of the cave a great sheet of cloud, which they
unrolled, and on it were painted the forms of the "yays" of the cultivated
plants.
[Illustration: PLATE 17. NAVAJO DRY PAINTING CONTAINING SWASTIKAS. Dr.
Washington Matthews, "The Mountain Chant: A Navajo Ceremony," Fifth Annual
Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1883-84, Pl. XVII.]
In Dr. Matthews's memoir (marked third, but described on p. 447 as the
second picture), is a representation of the painting which the prophet was
believed to have seen at the home of the bears in the Carrizo Mountains.
This is here reproduced as pl. 17. In the center of the figure is a bowl
of water covered with black powder; the edge of the bowl is garnished with
sunbeams, while outside of it and forming a rectangle are the four
_ca'bitlol_ of sunbeam rafts on which seem to stand four gods, or "yays,"
with the plants under their special protection, which are painted the same
color as the gods to which they belong. These plants are represented on
their left hand, the hand being open and extended toward them. The body of
the eastern god is white, so is the stalk of corn at his left in the
southeast; the body of the southern god is blue, so is the beanstalk
beside him in the southwest; the body of the western god is yellow, so is
his pumpkin vine in the northwest; the body of the north god is black, so
is the tobacco plant in the northeast. Each of the sacred plants grows
from five white roots in the central waters and spreads outward to the
periphery of the picture. The figures of the gods form a cross, the arms
of which are directed to the four cardinal points; the plants form another
cross, having a common center with the first, the arms extending to the
intermediate points of the compass. The gods are shaped alike, but colored
differently; they lie with their feet to the center and heads extended
outward, one to each of the four cardinal points of the compass, the faces
look forward, the arms half extended on either side, the hands raised to a
level with the shoulders. They wear around their loins skirts of red
sunlight adorned with sunbeams. They have ear pendants, bracelets, and
armlets, blue and red, representing turquoise and coral, the prehistoric
and emblematic jewels of the Navajo Indians. Their forearms and legs are
black, showing in each a zigzag mark representing lightning on the black
rain clouds. In the north god these colors are, for artistic reasons,
reversed. The gods have, respectively, a rattle, a charm, and a basket,
each attached to his right hand by strings. This basket, represented by
concentric lines with a Greek cross in the center, all of the proper color
corresponding with the god to whom each belongs, has extending from each
of its quarters, arranged perpendicularly at right angles to each other,
in the form of a cross, four white plumes of equal length, which at equal
distances from the center are bent, all to the left, and all of the same
length. Thus are formed in this chart four specimens of the Swastika, with
the cross and circle at the intersection of the arms. The plumes have a
small black spot at the tip end of each.
[Illustration: Fig. 257. WAR SHIELD USED BY THE PIMA INDIANS. Ogee
Swastika (tetraskelion) in three colors: (1) blue, (2) red, (3) white.
Cat. No. 27829, U. S. N. M.]
[Illustration: Fig. 258. WAR SHIELD WITH OGEE SWASTIKA IN CENTER. Pima
Indians. The hole near the lower arm of the Swastika was made by an arrow.
Property of Mr. F. W. Hodge.]
Dr. Matthews informs me that he has no knowledge of any peculiar meaning
attributed by these Indians to this Swastika symbol, and we know not
whether it is intended as a religious symbol, a charm of blessing, or good
luck, or whether it is only an ornament. We do not know whether it has any
hidden, mysterious, or symbolic meaning; but there it is, a prehistoric or
Oriental Swastika in all its purity and simplicity, appearing in one of
the mystic ceremonies of the aborigines in the great American desert in
the interior of the North American Continent.
_The Pimas._--The U. S. National Museum possesses a shield (Cat. No.
27829) of bull hide, made by the Pima Indians. It is about 20 inches in
diameter, and bears upon its face an ogee Swastika (tetraskelion), the
ends bent to the right. The body and each arm is divided longitudinally
into three stripes or bands indicated by colors, blue, red, and white,
arranged alternately. The exterior part of the shield has a white ground,
while the interior or center has a blue ground. This shield (fig. 257) is
almost an exact reproduction of the Swastika from Mycenæ (fig. 161), from
Ireland (fig. 216), and from Scandinavia (figs. 209 and 210). Fig. 258
shows another Pima shield of the same type. Its Swastika is, however,
painted with a single color or possibly a mixture of two, red and white.
It is ogee, and the ends bend to the left. This shield is the property of
Mr. F. W. Hodge, of the Bureau of Ethnology. He obtained it from a Pima
Indian in Arizona, who assured him that the hole at the end of the lower
arm of the Swastika was made by an arrow shot at him by an Indian enemy.