Puebloan peoples

The Pueblo people are a Native American people in the Southwestern United States.[1] Their traditional economy is based on agriculture and trade. When first encountered by the Spanish in the 16th century, they were living in villages that the Spanish called pueblos, meaning "towns". Of the 21 pueblos that exist today, Taos, Acoma, Zuni, and Hopi are the best-known. The main Pueblos are located primarily in Arizona, and New Mexico and also in Texas and formerly in Colorado.

Contents

Subdivisions

While there are numerous subdivisions of Pueblo People that have been published in the literature, Kirchhoff (1954)[2] published a subdivision of the Pueblo People into two subareas: the group that includes Hopi, Zuñi, Keres, Jemez which share exogamous matrilineal clans, have multiple kivas, believe in emergence of people from the underground, have four or six directions beginning in the north, and have four and seven as ritual numbers. This group stands in contrast to the Tanoan-speaking Pueblos (except Keres) who have nonexogamous patrilineal clans, two kivas or two groups of kivas and a general belief in dualism, emergence of people from underwater, five directions beginning in the west, and ritual numbers based on multiples of three.

Eggan (1950)[3] in contrast, posed a dichotomy between Eastern and Western Pueblos, based largely on subsistence differences with the Western or Desert Pueblos of Zuñi and Hopi dry-farmers and the Eastern or River Pueblos irrigation farmers.They mostly grew maize (corn).

Linguistic differences between the Pueblos point to their diverse origins. The Hopi language is Uto-Aztecan; Zuñi is a language isolate; Keresan is a dialect continuum that includes Acoma, Laguna, Santa Ana, Zia, Cochiti, Santo Domingo, San Felipe. The Tanoan is an areal grouping of three branches consisting of 6 languages: Towa (Jemez), Tewa (San Juan, San Ildefonso, Santa Clara, Tesuque, Nambe, Pojoaque, and Hano); and the 3 Tiwa languages Taos, Picuris, and Southern Tiwa (Sandia, Isleta).

History

The Pueblos are believed to be descended from the three major cultures that dominated the region before European contact:

  1. Mogollon, an area near the Gila Wilderness
  2. Hohokam, archaeological term for a settlement in the Southwest
  3. Ancient Pueblo Peoples (or the Anasazi, a term coined by the Navajos).[4]

Despite forced conversions to Catholicism (as evidenced by the establishment of a mission at each surviving pueblo) by the Spanish, the Pueblo tribes have been able to maintain much of their traditional lifestyle. There are now some 35,000 Pueblo Indians, living mostly in New Mexico and Arizona along the Rio Grande and Colorado River.

These peoples were the first to successfully revolt against the Spanish in the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, which expelled the Spanish for 12 years. The code for the action was a knotted rope sent by a runner to each pueblo; the number of knots signified the number of days to wait before beginning the uprising. It began one day early, August 10, 1680; by August 21, Santa Fe fell to 2,500 warriors.[5] On September 22, 2005, the statue of Po'pay, (Popé) the leader of the Pueblo Revolt, was unveiled in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington D.C. The statue was the second one from the state of New Mexico and the 100th and last to be added to the Statuary Hall collection. It was created by Cliff Fragua, a Puebloan from Jemez Pueblo, and it is the only statue in the collection created by a Native American.

Most of the Pueblos have annual ceremonies that are open to the public. One such ceremony is the Pueblo's feast day, held on the day sacred to its Roman Catholic patron saint. (These saints were assigned by the Spanish missionaries so that each Pueblo's feast day would coincide with a traditional ceremony.) Some Pueblos also have ceremonies around the Christmas and at other times of the year. The ceremonies usually feature traditional dances outdoors accompanied by singing and drumming, interspersed with non-public ceremonies in the kivas. They may also include a Roman Catholic Mass and processions.

Formerly, all outside visitors to a public dance would be offered a meal in a Pueblo home, but because of the large number of visitors, such meals are now by personal invitation only.

Culture

Pueblo prayer included substances as well as words; one common prayer material was ground-up maize—white cornmeal. Thus a man might bless his son, or some land, or the town by sprinkling a handful of meal as he uttered a blessing. Once, after the 1692 re-conquest, the Spanish were prevented from entering a town when they were met by a handful of men who uttered imprecations and cast a single pinch of a sacred substance.[6]

The Puebloans employed prayer sticks, which were colorfully decorated with beads, fur, and feathers; these prayer sticks (or talking sticks) were also used by other nations.

By the 13th century, Puebloans used turkey feather blankets for warmth.[7] Cloth and weaving were known to the Puebloans before the conquest, but it is not known whether they knew of weaving before or after the Aztecs. But since clothing was expensive, they did not always dress completely until after the conquest, and breechcloths were not uncommon.

Corn was a staple food for the Pueblo people. They were what was called "dry farmers". Because there was not a lot of water in New Mexico, they farmed using as little water as possible, which restricted what they could grow. Because of this, they mainly would farm many types of corn, beans and squash. They would use pottery to hold their food and water.

Religion

Further information: Hopi mythology

The most highly developed Native communities of the Southwest were large villages or pueblos at the top of the mesas, rocky tablelands typical to the region. The archetypal deities appear as visionary beings who bring blessings and receive love. A vast collection of myths defines the relationships between man, nature, plants and animals. Man depended on the blessings of children, who in turn depended on prayers and the goddess of Himura. Children led the religious ceremonies to create a more pure and holy ritual.

List of Pueblos

Further information: Ancient dwellings of Pueblo peoples

New Mexico

Further information: List of ancient dwellings of Pueblo peoples in New Mexico

Arizona

Further information: List of ancient dwellings of Pueblo peoples in Arizona

Texas

Further information: List of ancient dwellings of Pueblo peoples in Texas

Feast days

January
May
June
July
August
September
October
December
Variable

Pottery

There is a short history of creating pottery among the various Pueblo communities. Mera, in his discussion of the "Rain Bird" motif, a common and popular design element in pueblo pottery states that, "In tracing the ancestory of the "Rain Bird" design it will be necessary to go back to the very beginnings of decorated pottery in the Southwest to a ceramic type which as reckoned by present day archaeologists came into existence some time during the early centuries of the Christian era." [10]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ On June 2, 1924 these peoples were granted US citizenship. In 1948, they were granted the right to vote in New Mexico.
  2. ^ Paul Kirchhoff, "Gatherers and Farmers in the Greater Southwest: A Problem in Classification", American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 56, No. 4, Southwest Issue (Aug., 1954), pp. 529-550
  3. ^ Fred Russell Eggan, Social Organization of the Western Pueblos, University of Chicago Press, 1950
  4. ^ Cordell, Linda S. Ancient Pueblo Peoples. St. Remy Press and Smithsonian Institution, 1994. ISBN 0-89599-038-5.
  5. ^ Paul Horgan (1954), Great River vol. 1 p. 286. Library of Congress card number 54-9867
  6. ^ Paul Horgan, Great River p. 158
  7. ^ Turkeys domesticated not once, but twice
  8. ^ "Isleta Pueblo". Catholic Encyclopedia (1910) VIII
  9. ^ Newadvent.org
  10. ^ Mera, H.P., Pueblo Designs: 176 Illustrations of the "Rain Bird, Dover Publications, Inc, 1970, first published by the Laboratory of Anthropology, Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1937 p. 1

References

  • Fletcher, Richard A. (1984). Saint James' Catapult: The Life and Times of Diego Gelmírez of Santiago de Compostela. Oxford University Press. (on-line text, ch. 1)
  • Florence Hawley Ellis An Outline of Laguna Pueblo History and Social Organization Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, Vol. 15, No. 4 (Winter, 1959), pp. 325–347
  • Indian Pueblo Cultural Center in Albuquerque, NM offers information from the Pueblo people about their history, culture, and visitor etiquette.
  • Paul Horgan, Great River: The Rio Grande in North American History. Vol. 1, Indians and Spain. Vol. 2, Mexico and the United States. 2 Vols. in 1, 1038 pages - Wesleyan University Press 1991, 4th Reprint, ISBN 0-8195-6251-3
  • Pueblo People, Ancient Traditions Modern Lives, Marica Keegan, Clear Light Publishers, Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1998, profusely illustrated hardback, ISBN 1-57416-000-1
  • Elsie Clews Parsons, Pueblo Indian Religion (2 vols., Chicago, 1939).
  • Ryan D, A. L. Kroeber Elsie Clews Parsons American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 45, No. 2, Centenary of the American Ethnological Society (Apr. - Jun., 1943), pp. 244–255
  • Parthiv S, ed. Handbook of North American Indians, Vol. 9, Southwest. Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1976.
  • Julia M. Keleher and Elsie Ruth Chant (2009). THE PADRE OF ISLETA The Story of Father Anton Docher. Sunstone press Publishing. 

External links