Although the majority of Hopi priests declare that the earliest clan
to settle Walpi was the Bear, coming from the east, by far the largest
number of early colonists are said to belong to the Snake people which
came from Tokonabi and other great settlements on tributaries of the San
Juan in northern Arizona. The route of their migration is fairly well
known from legendary sources supported in late years by some limited
excavations that have been made in ruins along its course, so that we
know something of the character of the Snake pottery and the symbols,
which these early colonists brought to the Bear settlement at the base of
the East Mesa. These are not unlike those found along the San Juan and
its tributaries from the Mesa Verde to Wukoki near the Black Falls on the
Little Colorado, west of the Hopi Mesa.
[Illustration: FIG. 103.—Conventionalized winged bird with shrine.]
This ware is commonly either black and white, or red, and can be readily
distinguished from that of Sikyatki by the wealth of geometrical
decorations and the poverty of such animal figures as birds, reptiles,
and insects. The designs of that early epoch appear to be uniform and
hardly distinctive from those that occur in all parts of the Southwest.
We may judge of the character of the symbols and designs on pottery from
the San Juan and from the ruins of Wukoki on the Black Falls of Little
Colorado. It is characterized by an abundance of geometric figures and
an almost total absence of life forms or painted figures of men and
animals. The pottery is thin, well made, and sometimes colored red, but
the majority of specimens are gray or black-and-white ware not especially
different from a widespread type occurring pretty generally throughout
the Southwest. Coiled and incised ware is more abundant than smooth
painted, but these are not as varied in form as later examples. There is
no evidence available that there was any very great difference between
the Hopi pottery decorations of the first epoch and that of contemporary
time in the Southwest. When the Snake clans arrived at Walpi they found
the village of Bear people living on the terrace at the base of the East
Mesa, possessed of a symbolism like that of Sikyatki. The combined clans,
Bear and Snake, were later joined by the Horn and Flute, and it is not
unlikely that some of the likenesses between the pottery symbols of the
settlement on the terrace below Walpi and Sikyatki may have developed
about this time.[49]
The designs on the ceramics of the Snake clans are best illustrated
by the prehistoric pottery from ruins and cliff-dwellings in Utah and
along the San Juan area, where geometrical patterns far outnumber those
representing life forms. This does not deny that many of the pieces of
pottery from this region are finely made, equal in technique perhaps to
some of the Sikyatki, but the geometric designs on San Juan pottery and
that from Sikyatki are radically different. This difference conforms with
tradition that the Snake clans left their homes at Tokonabi, in the San
Juan region, and came to Hopi after the foundation of Sikyatki, which had
probably developed its beautiful ceramic art before Walpi was settled.
There is no evidence that the potters of the Snake clan ever introduced
any modification in the symbolic decoration of pottery by the women of
Sikyatki.