The domestic equipment of the Navaho is simplicity itself and reflects the simple life of the tribe. Of household furniture there is none. The bedding consists usually of a few sheepskins; cooking utensils are earthen pots of their own making, and cups, knives, and spoons of civilization. Plates they do not need, as the family eat directly from the pot in which the food is cooked. The principal food is mutton, boiled, and corn prepared in many ways. Considerable flour obtained from traders is consumed; this is leavened slightly and made into small cakes, which are cooked over the embers like Mexican tortillas.
The women are an important factor in the Navaho tribe. The sheep usually, and the house, with all that pertains to it, always are the property of the wife. The independent spirit of the women, instilled by this incontestable property right, manifests itself throughout the tribe, and by reason of it the Navaho husband is not apt to seek an opportunity to criticise his wife so long as she is in a position to say, "If I and the hogán do not suit you, go elsewhere!" Polygamy is common, but as a rule the wives of one man are sisters, an arrangement conducive to domestic harmony.
Many of the Navaho men are skilled silversmiths. Every well-to-do Navaho possesses a silver belt consisting of a dozen or more wrought oval discs, each about two by three inches, fastened to a leather strap. Such a belt, weighing several pounds, is of course a valuable piece of property. The wearer may also have a broad silver bracelet set with turquoise, a heavy string of silver beads with a massive pendant of the same material, and a[pg 077] pair of deerskin leggings with a row of silver buttons on the outer side. Frequently their horses are gaily bedecked with bridles and saddles heavily weighted with silver ornaments. The long strap over the shoulder, from which the pouch of the medicine-man is suspended, is always studded with silver buttons. Mexican coins, especially the peso, are the principal source of all this silverwork, the Navaho preferring this coin to our own dollar because it is heavier. Buttons and beads also are made from American dimes and twenty-five cent pieces; the small beads from dimes, and the larger ones from two coins of the same value. They learned silversmithing from the Mexicans, but since their first lessons have developed a high degree of individuality in the art. While the metal-work of the Navaho at the present time is practically all in silver, only a few copper objects being made, their earliest work in metal was with iron, and occasionally an example of this is found. The silver and shell bead jewelry of the Navaho is his savings bank. During times of prosperity he becomes the possessor of all the jewelry his means afford, and when poor crops or long winters threaten distress he pawns it at a trader's, so that many of the traders often have thousands of dollars' worth of silverwork and shell beads on hand at one time. The system seems to be a very fair one, and in time of stress is certainly a boon to the impecunious Navaho.
The little pottery made by this people is an undecorated ware for utilitarian purposes only. For carrying water a gum-coated water bottle of basketry is in general use. Few baskets are made, and these are of but a single pattern—a flattish tray for use in ceremonies. Most of the baskets used by the Navaho in their ceremonies, however, are purchased from neighboring tribes, especially the Havasupai and the Paiute, who weave them primarily for purposes of trade. Such baskets must be of a prescribed pattern, with a break in the design at one side. When the basket is in use this side is always placed toward the east.
Most Navaho ceremonies are conducted, at least primarily, for the purpose of healing disease; and while designated medicine ceremonies, they are, in fact, ritualistic prayers. There are[pg 078] so many of these ceremonies that no student has yet determined their number, which reaches into scores, while the component ritual prayers of some number hundreds. The principal ceremonies are those that require nine days and nine nights in their performance. Of the many now known the names of nine are here given: Kléjĕ Hatál, Night Chant;[4] Tzĭlhkí̆chĭ Hatál, Mountain Chant; Hozhónĭ Hatál, Happiness Chant; Natói Hatál, Shooting Chant; Toi Hatál, Water Chant; Atsósĭ Hatál, Feather Chant; Yoi Hatál, Bead Chant; Hochónchĭ Hatál, Evil-Spirit Chant; Mai Hatál, Coyote Chant. Each is based on a mythic story, and each has four dry-paintings, or so-called altars. Besides these nine days' ceremonies there are others whose performance requires four days, and many simpler ones requiring only a single day, each with its own dry-painting.
Pĭké̆hodĭklad - Navaho
From Copyright Photograph 1907 by E.S. Curtis
This, the first of the dry-paintings employed in the rites of the Mountain Chant—a nine days' healing ceremony of the Navaho—as in the Night Chant, is used on the fifth night, when the purpose of the performance is to frighten the patient, and thus banish the evil within him. The name of this painting, "Frighten Him On It," is identical with that of the one used at the corresponding moment in the Night Chant.
The whole represents the den of a hibernating bear. Inside the ceremonial hogán is thrown up a bank of earth two or three feet high, with an opening toward the doorway. Colored earths picture bear-tracks leading in; bear-tracks and sunlight—sun dogs—are represented at the four quarters, and the bear himself, streaked with sunlight, in the centre. The twigs at the entrance of the bear den represent trees, behind which bears are wont to dig their dens in the mountain side. Everything tends to make the patient think of bears. He enters midst deep silence and takes his seat upon the pictured animal. The play of his imagination has barely begun when a man, painted and garbed as a bear, rushes in, uttering hideous snarls and growls, in which all assembled join. Women patients seldom fail to faint.