Zuñi Folk Tales

by Frank Hamilton Cushing

“Hai!” exclaimed they. But they still looked at each other and at the Sun-father, and did not believe him.

“Yea, ye are verily my children,” continued the Sun. “I am your own father. Around Thunder Mountain there is a city of men. It is called the Home of the Eagles, and there once lived a beautiful maiden who never left her home, but was always shut in her room. Day after day at midday, just at this time, I came down and visited her in my own sunlight. And a great Eagle always stood and watched her. Now, the townspeople grew anxious to see her, so they danced day after day their most beautiful dances, hoping to entice her to come forth; but she never looked out. So her father’s warriors went to the home of Áhaiyúta and his younger brother, Mátsailéma, where they lived with their grandmother, on the middle of Thunder Mountain, and the Twain said that they would go with them and compel her to come forth. Therefore, one day they went and led the dance of the Óinahe. Yet, although they danced four times, she would not come forth, but tried to escape to my home in the heavens on the back of her Eagle; so the two gods shot her, and she fell down the cañon. Then it was that ye two, my children, were born and rolled among the bushes. Now, the people ran down from the village to strive for your mother’s body, and an Acoma got her and carried her away to the home of his people. An old Badger found ye and brought ye home to his wife, and that is the way ye came to live in the home of the Badgers.”

Still the little ones did not believe him.

“Look!” said the Sun-father. “See what I have brought ye!” Then he continued: “Wait; in eight days, in the Home of the Eagles, where your aunts live in the house of your mother’s father, there will be a great dance. Go ye thither. Ye will climb up a crooked path and enter the town through a road under the houses. Do not go out at once into the plaza, but wait until the dancers come out. Then step forth, and over to the left of the plaza ye will see your grandfather’s house. It is the greatest house in the city, and the longest ladder leads up to it, and fringes of hair ornament its poles. On the roof ye will see, if the day be warm, two noisy macaws, and there ye will see your mother’s sisters—your own aunts. When ye go into the plaza the people will rush up to ye and say: ‘Whither do ye come, friends? Will ye not join in the dance?’ And ye must say ye will, and then your aunts will come down and dance for the first time, because they are the most beautiful maidens in the pueblo, and very proud. But they will take hold of your hands and dance with ye, and when they have done will ask ye to come into their house; and ye must go.

“Now, the one who sits over in the northern corner is the first sister of your mother, therefore your mother; and the one who sits next to her is your next mother, and so on. There will be eight of them, and the youngest will be like a sister unto ye. They will place stools for ye, and ye must sit down and call them aunts. They will say: ‘Certainly, we are the aunts of all good boys in the cities of men who are not our enemies.’ And then ye must tell them that they are your real aunts, that this is your house, that your mother used to live there—was the maiden who never went out, but always sat making beautiful basket-trays of many-colored splints. Then ye must lead them into the next room, and the next, and then into the next one, and point to the beautiful basket-trays on the walls. There on the northern wall will hang a yellow tray, on the west wall will hang a blue one, and on the south wall, a red tray, then on the east wall will hang a white tray, and fastened to the ceiling will be a tray of many colors, while a black one will stand under the floor. And then ye must point to the trays and say: ‘These our mother made.’ Then they will believe and embrace ye and will not want to let ye go; but after ye have sat and eaten with them, ye must come back to the home of the Badgers. And the next day ye must go to Acoma to get your mother. Just before ye arrive at the town of Acoma ye will meet an old, wrinkled hag carrying a big bundle of wood on her back. Ye must call her ‘grandmother’ and greet her pleasantly. She will tell ye she is the dance-priestess of Acoma. Then ye must ask her why she, a woman, comes out to gather wood, and she will reply that she gets the wood to make a light. Then ask her why she wishes a light, and she will say to ye that day after day she lights a fire in her ceremonial chamber and that when she reaches home with her wood the young men of her clan come together and give her food, and that at night she takes the wood to the ceremonial chamber and then sits on a stone seat by the side of the fireplace and builds a fire; that the young men gather in the chamber and prepare for a dance. And when they are ready she takes the bones of your mother from a niche in the west end of the chamber and distributes them among the young men, who carry them in the dance. She gives the skull to the first one, the breast-bone to the next, the ribs to another, and so on until they all have bones to carry in the dance. When the dance is over, she goes around and takes all the bones back again and replaces them in the niche. Then the young men depart for their homes, but some of them sleep there in the chamber, and then she lies down to sleep and to keep guard over the bones.

“Now, when she has told ye these things, ye must ask her if that is all. If she says ‘Yes,’ kill her; then skin her, and the younger brother must wave his hands over her skin and put it on, and he will look just like the old woman. And he must climb up to the town of the Acomas and enter and do just as the old woman said that she did.

“Now, after the dance is over and he has taken back all of the bones and replaced them in the niche, he must lie down and pretend to sleep, and some of the young men will go home; others will sleep there. When they all begin to snore, he must gather all the bones, and the two dried eyes, and the heart of his mother, and bring them away as fast as ever he can to where his brother waits. And when he gets there,—lo! she will come to life again and be just as she was before she was killed by the Twain. Now, mind, ye must not leave a single bone nor any part, for if ye do, your mother will lack that when she comes to life again.”

“Very well,” replied the boys, “we will do as you have told us; certainly we will.”

“Now, I have given ye with your birth the power to slay all game; but mind that not a single rabbit, nor deer, nor antelope, nor mountain sheep, nor elk—though he be the finest ye have ever seen—shall ye slay, for in that case ye shall perish with your mother.”

So the two boys promised they would not. “Of course we will not,” said the younger brother. “When one’s father commands him, can he disobey?”