They then went on to the watchers, guardians of the entrance to the Sun’s house, whom they subdued in the same manner. They also spurted the charm on the sides of the cliff, so that it ceased its oscillations and remained open until they had passed.
These dangers being past, they entered the Sun’s house and were greeted by the Sun’s wife, who laid them on a bed of mats. Soon Sun came home from his trip through the underworld, saying,
I smell strange children here; when men go away their wives receive the embraces of strangers. Where are the children whom you have?
So she brought the Twins to him, and he put them in a flint oven and made a hot fire. After a while, when he opened the door of the oven, the Twins capered out laughing and dancing about his knees, and he knew that they were his sons.[12]
[12] From “The Destruction of the Tusayan Monsters,” by J. Walter Fewkes; Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, April-June, 1895, pp. 136-137.
The Hopi, like many people, look back to a mythic time when they believe their ancestors lived in a “paradise,” a state or place where food (corn) was plenty and rains abundant—a world of perpetual summer and flowers. Their legends recount how, when corn failed or rains ceased, culture heroes have sought this imaginary or ideal ancestral home to learn the “medicine” which blessed this happy land. Each sacerdotal society tells the story of its own hero, who generally brought from that land a bride who transmitted to her son the knowledge of the altars, songs, and prayers which forced the crops to grow and the rains to fall in her native country. To become thoroughly conversant with the rites he marries the maid, since otherwise at his death they would be lost, as knowledge of the “medicine” is transmitted not through his clan, but to the child of his wife. So the Snake hero brought the Snake maid (Corn-rain girl) from the underworld, the Flute hero, her sister, the Little War God the Lakone mana. A Katcina hero, in the old times, on a rabbit hunt, came to a region where there was no snow. There he saw other Katcina people dancing amidst beautiful gardens. He received melons from them and carrying them home told a strange story of a people who inhabited a country where there were flowering plants in midwinter. The hero and a comrade were sent back and they stayed with these people, returning home loaded with fruit during February. They had learned the songs of those with whom they had lived and taught them in the kiva of their own people.[13]
[13] The Journ. Amer. Eth. and Arch., Vol. II, p. 152. The Kachina hero in this story would appear not to have brought a wife from this people.
Most of the migration traditions are full of mythic elements which have been incorporated with what has often been found to be veritable history. One of these, recounting the wanderings of certain Southern clans, is given by Dr. Fewkes.
At the Red House in the south internecine wars prevailed, and the two branches of the Patki people separated from the other Hopi and determined to return to the fatherland in the north. But these two branches were not on the best of terms, and they traveled northward by separate routes, the (later settlers of) Miconinovi holding to the east of the (later settlers of) Walpi.
The Patki traveled north until they came to the Little Colorado River, and built houses on its banks. After living there many years the factional dissensions, which seem to have ever haunted these people, again broke out, and the greater portion of them withdrew still farther north and built villages the ruins of which are still discernable not far from the site of the villages their descendants inhabit at present.
The Squash (Miconinovi) also trended slowly northward, occupying, like all their legendary movements, a protracted period of indefinite length—years during which they planted and built homes alternating with years of devious travel. They grew lax in the observance of festivals, and Muinwu inflicted punishment upon them. He caused the water to turn red, and the color of the people also turned red; he then changed the water to blue, and the people changed to a similar color. The Snow katcina appeared and urged them to return to their religion, but they gave no heed to him, so he left them and took away corn. Muinwu then sent Palulukon who killed rabbits and poured their blood in the springs and streams, and all the water was changed to blood and the people were stricken with a plague. They now returned to their religious observances, and danced and sang, but none of the deities would listen to them.
A horned katcina appeared to the oldest woman and told her that on the following morning the oldest man should go out and procure a root, and that she and a young virgin of her clan should eat it. After a time she (the old woman) would give birth to a son who would marry the virgin, and their offspring would redeem the people. The old woman and the virgin obeyed the katcina, and the former gave birth to a son who had two horns upon his head. The people would not believe that the child was of divine origin; they called it a monster and killed it.
After this all manner of distressing punishments were inflicted upon them, and wherever they halted, the grass immediately withered and dried. Their wanderings brought them to the foot of the San Francisco Mountains, where they dwelt for a long time, and at that place the virgin gave birth to a daughter who had a little knob on each side of her forehead. They preserved this child, and when she had grown to be a woman, the horned katcina appeared and announced to her that she would give birth to horned twins, who would bring rain and remove the punishment from their people. This woman was married, and the twins, a boy and a girl, were born; but she concealed their divine origin, fearing they would be destroyed.
The Patun (Squash) now moved to the Little Colorado, where they built houses and met some of the Patki people to whom they related their distresses. A wise man of the Patki came over to see them, and on seeing the twins at once pronounced them to be the Alosaka. They had no horns up to this time, but as soon as this announcement was made, their horns became visible and the twins then spoke to the people and said it had been ordained that they were to be unable to help their people until the people themselves discovered who they were. The Patun were so enraged to think that the Alosaka had been with them, unknown so many years, that they killed them, and still greater sufferings ensued.
They again repented, and carved two stone images of the Alosaka which they painted and decked with feathers and sought to propitiate the mother. She was full of pity for her people and prayed to the Sky-god to relieve them. A period elapsed in which their troubles were in great measure abated.
The Patun then sought to join the Patki clans, but the Patki would not permit this, and compelled them to keep east of Awatobi.
Many ruins of phratry and family houses of the Patun people exist on the small watercourses north of the Puerco at various distances eastward from the present village of Walpi. The nearest are almost fifteen miles, the farthest about fifty miles.
Their wandering course was now stayed. When they essayed to move farther eastward, a nomadic hunting race who occupied that region besought them not to advance farther. Their evil notoriety had preceded them, and the nomads feared the maleficent influence of their neighborhood. It would seem, however, that instead of hostile demonstrations the nomads entered into a treaty with them, offering to pay tribute of venison, roots, and grass-seeds, if they would abstain from traversing and blighting their land, to which the Patun agreed.
But these unfortunate wretches were soon again embroiled in factional warfare which finally involved all the Hopi, and the stone images of the Alosaka were lost or destroyed. Famine and pestilence again decimated them, until finally the Alosaka katcina appeared to them and instructed them to carve two wooden images, but threatening them that if these images should be lost or destroyed, all the people would die.