Since the destruction of Awatubi only one other serious affray has occurred between the villages; that was between Oraibi and Walpi. It appears that after the Oraibi withdrew their colonies from the south and west they took possession of all the unoccupied planting grounds to the east of the village, and kept reaching eastward till they encroached upon some land claimed by the Walpi. This gave rise to intermittent warfare in the outlying fields, and whenever the contending villagers met a broil ensued, until the strife culminated in an attack upon Walpi. The Oraibi chose a day when the Walpi men were all in the field on the east side of the mesa, but the Walpi say that their women and dogs held the Oraibi at bay until the men came to the rescue. A severe battle was fought at the foot of the mesa, in which the Oraibi were routed and pursued across the Middle Mesa, where an Oraibi chief turned and implored the Walpi to desist. A conciliation was effected there, and harmonious relations have ever since existed between them. Until within a few years ago the spot where they stayed pursuit was marked by a stone, on which a shield and a dog were depicted, but it was a source of irritation to the Oraibi and it was removed by some of the Walpi.
In the early part of the eighteenth century the Ute from the north, and the Apache from the south made most disastrous inroads upon the villages, in which Walpi especially suffered. The Navajo, who then lived upon their eastern border, also suffered severely from the same bands, but the Navajo and the Tusayan were not on the best terms and never made any alliance for a common defense against these invaders.
Hano was peopled by a different linguistic stock from that of the other villages—a stock which belongs to the Rio Grande group. According to Polaka, the son of the principal chief, and himself an enterprising trader who has made many journeys to distant localities—and to others, the Hano once lived in seven villages on the Rio Grande, and the village in which his forefathers lived was called Tceewáge. This, it is said, is the same as the present Mexican village of Peña Blanca.
The Hano claim that they came to Tusayan only after repeated solicitation by the Walpi, at a time when the latter were much harassed by the Ute and Apache. The story, as told by Kwálakwai, who lives in Hano, but is not himself a Hano, begins as follows:
Long ago the Hopi´tuh were few and were continually harassed by the Yútamo (Ute), Yuíttcemo (Apache), and Dacábimo (Navajo). The chiefs of the Tcuin nyumu (Snake people) and the Hánin nyumu (Bear people) met together and made the ba´ho (sacred plume stick) and sent it with a man from each of these people to the house of the Tewa, called Tceewádigi, which was far off on the Múina (river) near Alavia (Santa Fé).
The messengers did not succeed in persuading the Tewa to come and the embassy was sent three times more. On the fourth visit the Tewa consented to come, as the Walpi had offered to divide their land and their waters with them, and set out for Tusayan, led by their own chief, the village being left in the care of his son. This first band is said to have consisted of 146 women, and it was afterwards followed by another and perhaps others.
Before the Hano arrived there had been a cessation of hostile inroads, and the Walpi received them churlishly and revoked their promises regarding the division of land and waters with them. They were shown where they could build houses for themselves on a yellow sand mound on the east side of the mesa just below the gap. They built there, but they were compelled to go for their food up to Walpi. They could get no vessels to carry their food in, and when they held out their hands for some the Walpi women mockingly poured out hot porridge and scalded the fingers of the Hano.
After a time the Ute came down the valley on the west side of the mesa, doing great harm again, and drove off the Walpi flocks andiron Then the Hano got ready for war; they tied buckskins around their loins, whitened their legs with clay, and stained their body and arms with dark red earth (ocher). They overtook the Ute near Wípho (about 3 miles north from Hano), but the Ute had driven the flocks up the steep mesa side, and when they saw the Tewa coming they killed all the sheep and piled the carcasses up for a defense, behind which they lay down. They had a few firearms also, while the Hano had only clubs and bows and arrows; but after some fighting the Ute were driven out and the Tewa followed after them. The first Ute was killed a short distance beyond, and a stone heap still (?) marks the spot. Similar heaps marked the places where other Ute were killed as they fled before the Hano, but not far from the San Juan the last one was killed.
Upon the return of the Hano from this successful expedition they were received gratefully and allowed to come up on the mesa to live—the old houses built by the Asa, in the present village of Hano, being assigned to them. The land was then divided, an imaginary line between Hano and Sichumovi, extending eastward entirely across the valley, marked the southern boundary, and from this line as far north as the spot where the last Utah was killed was assigned to the Hano as their possession.