A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola Part 15

_Significance of structural plan._--The designation of the curious orifice of the sipapuh as the place from which the people emerged in connection with the peculiar arrangement of the kiva interior with its change of floor level, suggested to the author that these features might be regarded as typifying the four worlds of the genesis myth that has exercised such an influence on Tusayan customs; but no clear data on this subject were obtained by the writer, nor has Mr. Stephen, who is specially well equipped for such investigations, discovered that a definite conception exists concerning the significance of the structural plan of the kiva. Still, from many suggestive allusions made by the various kiva chiefs and others, he also has been led to infer that it typifies the four houses, or stages, described in their creation myths. The sipapuh, with its cavity beneath the floor, is certainly regarded as indicating the place of beginning, the lowest house under the earth, the abode of Myuingwa, the Creator; the main or lower floor represents the second stage; and the elevated section of the floor is made to denote the third stage, where animals were created. Mr. Stephen observed, at the New Year festivals, that animal fetiches were set in groups upon this platform. It is also to be noted that the ladder leading to the surface is invariably made of pine, and always rests upon the platform, never upon the lower floor, and in their traditional genesis it is stated that the people climbed up from the third house (stage) by a ladder of pine, and through such an opening as the kiva hatchway; only most of the stories indicate that the opening was round.

The outer air is the fourth world, or that now occupied.

There are occasional references in the Tusayan traditions to circular kivas, but these are so confused with fantastic accounts of early mythic structures that their literal rendition would serve no useful purpose in the present discussion.

_Typical measurements._--The following list is a record of a number of measurements of Tusayan kivas collected by Mr. Stephen. The wide difference between the end measurements of the same kiva are usually due to the interior offsets that have been noticed on the plans, but the differences in the lengths of the sides are due to irregularities of the site. The latter differences are not so marked as the former.

+-----------------+------------------+---------+---------------+ | Width at ends. | Length of sides. |Height at| Height | | | | center. | at ends. | +-----------------+------------------+---------+---------------+ | 13 6 -- -- | 24 0 -- -- | 8 6 | -- -- -- -- | | 12 0 -- -- | 21 9 -- -- | 7 6 | 6 6 -- -- | | 14 6 14 6 | 24 6 23 3 | 8 0 | 6 6 6 6 | | 12 2 12 11 | 23 9 23 9 | 7 10 | 6 1 6 0 | | 12 6 12 6 | 26 0 25 3 | 7 6 | 6 6 6 6 | | 13 4 12 10 | 26 8 26 7 | 7 10 | 7 0 7 0 | | 15 0 13 6 | 26 6 24 11 | 7 4 | 6 3 6 2 | | 12 6 11 5 | 23 7 21 9 | 8 0 | 7 0 7 0 | | 12 5 13 5 | 22 8 24 1 | 7 3 | 6 1 6 9 | | 10 6 13 6 | 27 0 27 0 | 8 3 | 6 3 6 2 | | 13 6 11 6 | 29 9 29 0 | 11 0 | 5 11 -- -- | | 14 6 -- -- | 28 6 28 6 | 9 8 | 6 0 -- -- | | 13 2 14 0 | 28 9 29 9 | 8 6 | 7 0 6 4 | | 15 1 14 0 | 28 6 -- -- | 9 6 | 7 3 6 6 | | 13 0 12 6 | 28 7 29 6 | -- -- | 7 4 6 3 | +-----------------+------------------+---------+---------------+

_List of Tusayan kivas._--The following list gives the present names of all the kivas in use at Tusayan. The mungkiva or chief kiva of the village is in each case designated:

HANO.

1. Tokonabi kiva Navajo Mountain.

2. Hano sinte kiva Place of the Hano.

Tokonabi kiva is the mungkiva.

WALPI.

1. Djivato kiva Goat.

2. Al kiva Ala, Horn.

3. Nacab kiva Nacabi, half-way or central.

4. Pickuibi kiva Opening oak bud.[5]

Wikwalobi kiva Place of the watchers.

5. Mung kiva Mungwi chief.

No. 5 is the mungkiva.

[Footnote 5: These two names are common to the kiva in which the Snake order meets and in which the indoor ceremonies pertaining to the Snake-dance are celebrated.]

SICHUMOVI.

1. Baventcomo Water mound.

2. Kwinzaptcomo Oak mound.

Baventcomo is the mungkiva.

MASHONGNAVI.

1. Tcavwuna kiva A small coiled-ware jar.

2. Honan kiva Honani, Badger, a gens.

3. Gyarzohi kiva Gyarzo, Paroquet, a gens.

4. Kotcobi kiva High place.

5. Al kiva Ala, Horn.

Teavwuna kiva is the mungkiva.

SHUPAULOVI.

1. Atkabi kiva Place below.

2. Kokyangobi kiva Place of spider.

Atkabi kiva is the mungkiva.

SHUMOPAVI.

1. Nuvwatikyuobi High place of snow, San Francisco Mountain.

2. Al kiva Ala, Horn.

3. Gyarzobi Gyarzo, Paroquet, a gens.

4. Tcosobi Blue Jay, a gens.

Tcosobi is the mungkiva.

ORAIBI.

1. Tdau kiva Tdauollauwuh The singers.

2. Hawiobi kiva Hawi, stair; High stair place.

obi, high place.

3. Ish kiva Isauwuh Coyote, a gens.

4. Kw.a.n.g kiva Kwakwanti Religious order.

5. Mazrau kiva Mamzrauti Female order.

6. Nacabi kiva Half way or Central place.

7. Sakwalen kiva Sakwa lena Blue Flute, a religious order.

8. Pongobi kiva Pongo, a circle An order who decorate themselves with circular marks on the body.

9. Hano kiva Hanomuh A fas.h.i.+on of cutting the hair.

10. Motc kiva Momtci The Warriors, an order.

11. Kwitakoli kiva Kwita, ordure; Ordure heap.

koli, a heap.

12. Katcin kiva Katcina A gens.

13. Tcu kiva Tcua, a snake Religions order.

Tdau kiva is the mungkiva.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LXIV. North wall of Kin-tiel.]

DETAILS OF TUSAYAN AND CIBOLA CONSTRUCTION.

WALLS.

The complete operation of building a wall has never been observed at Zui by the writer, but a close examination of numerous finished and some broken-down walls indicates that the methods of construction adopted are essentially the same as those employed in Tusayan, which, have been repeatedly observed; with the possible difference, however, that in the former adobe mud mortar is more liberally used. A singular feature of pueblo masonry as observed at Tusayan is the very sparing use of mud in the construction of the walls; in fact, in some instances when walls are built during the dry season, the larger stones are laid up in the walls without the use of mud at all, and are allowed to stand in this condition until the rains come; then the mud mortar is mixed, the interstices of the walls filled in with it and with c.h.i.n.king stones, and the inside walls are plastered. But the usual practice is to complete the house at once, finis.h.i.+ng it inside and out with the requisite mortar. In some instances the outside walls are coated, completely covering the masonry, but this is not done in many of the houses, as may be seen by reference to the preceding ill.u.s.trations of the Tusayan villages. At Zui, on the other hand, a liberal and frequently renewed coating of mud is applied to the walls. Only one piece of masonry was seen in the entire village that did not have traces of this coating of mud, viz, that portion of the second story wall of house No. 2 described as possibly belonging to the ancient nucleus pueblo of Halona and ill.u.s.trated in Pl. LVIII. Even the rough masonry of the kivas is partly surfaced with this medium, though many jagged stones are still visible.

As a result of this practice it is now in many cases impossible to determine from mere superficial inspection whether the underlying masonry has been constructed of stone or of adobe; a difficulty that may be realized from an examination of the views of Zui in Chapter III.

Where the fall of water, such as the discharge from a roof-drain, has removed the outer coating of mud that covers stonework and adobe alike, a large proportion of these exposures reveal stone masonry, so that it is clearly apparent that Zui is essentially a stone village. The extensive use of sun-dried bricks of adobe has grown up within quite recent times. It is apparent, however, that the Zui builders preferred to use stone; and even at the present time they frequently eke out with stonework portions of a house when the supply of adobe has fallen short.

An early instance of such supplementary use of stone masonry still survives in the church building, where the old Spanish adobe has been repaired and filled in with the typical tabular aboriginal masonry, consisting of small stones carefully laid, with very little intervening mortar showing on the face. Such reversion to aboriginal methods probably took place on every opportunity, though it is remarkable that the Indians should have been allowed to employ their own methods in this instance. Although this church building has for many generations furnished a conspicuous example of typical adobe construction to the Zui, he has never taken the lesson sufficiently to heart to closely imitate the Spanish methods either in the preparation of the material or in the manner of its use. The adobe bricks of the church are of large and uniform size, and the mud from which they were made had a liberal admixture of straw. This binding material does not appear in Zui in any other example of adobe that has been examined, nor does it seem to have been utilized in any of the native pueblo work either at this place or at Tusayan. Where molded adobe bricks have been used by the Zui in housebuilding they have been made from the raw material just as it was taken from the fields. As a result these bricks have little of the durability of the Spanish work. Pl. XCVI ill.u.s.trates an adobe wall of Zui, part of an unroofed house. The old adobe church at Hawikuh (Pl.

XLVIII), abandoned for two centuries, has withstood the wear of time and weather better than any of the stonework of the surrounding houses. On the right-hand side of the street that shows in the foreground of Pl.

LXXVIII is an ill.u.s.tration of the construction of a wall with adobe bricks. This example is very recent, as it has not yet been roofed over.

The top of the wall, however, is temporarily protected by the usual series of thin sandstone slabs used in the finis.h.i.+ng of wall copings.

The very rapid disintegration of native-made adobe walls has brought about the use in Zui of many protective devices, some of which will be noticed in connection with the discussion of roof drains and wall copings. Figs. 32 and 33 ill.u.s.trate a curious employment of pottery fragments on a mud-plastered wall and on the base of a chimney to protect the adobe coating against rapid erosion by the rains. These pieces, usually fragments from large vessels, are embedded in the adobe with the convex side out, forming an armor of pottery scales well adapted to resist disintegration, by the elements.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LXV. Standing walls of Kin-tiel.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 32. A Zui chimney, showing pottery fragments embedded in its adobe base.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 33. A Zui oven with pottery scales embedded in its surface.]

The introduction of the use of adobe in Zui should probably be attributed to foreign influence, but the position of the village in the open plain at a distance of several miles from the nearest outcrop of suitable building stone naturally led the builders to use stone more sparingly when an available subst.i.tute was found close at hand. The thin slabs of stone, which had to be brought from a great distance, came to be used only for the more exposed portions of buildings, such as copings on walls and borders around roof openings. Still, the pueblo builders never attained to a full appreciation of the advantages and requirements of this medium as compared with stone. The adobe walls are built only as thick as is absolutely necessary, few of them being more than a foot in thickness. The walls are thus, in proportion, to height and weight, sustained, thinner than the crude brick construction of other peoples, and require protection and constant repairs to insure durability. As to thickness, they are evidently modeled directly after the walls of stone masonry, which had already, in both Tusayan and Cibola, been pushed to the limit of thinness. In fact, since the date of the survey of Zui, on which the published plan is based, the walls of several rooms over the court pa.s.sageway in the house, ill.u.s.trated in Pl. Lx.x.xII, have entirely fallen in, demonstrating the insufficiency of the thin walls to sustain the weight of several stories.

The climate of the pueblo region is not wholly suited to the employment of adobe construction, as it is there practiced. For several months in the year (the rainy season) scarcely a day pa.s.ses without violent storms which play havoc with the earth-covered houses, necessitating constant vigilance and frequent repairs on the part of the occupants.

Though the practice of mud-coating all walls has in Cibola undoubtedly led to greater carelessness and a less rigid adherence to ancient methods of construction, the stone masonry may still be seen to retain some of the peculiarities that characterize ancient examples. Features of this cla.s.s are still more apparent at Tusayan, and notwithstanding the rudeness of much of the modern stone masonry of this province, the fact that the builders are familiar with the superior methods of the ancient builders, is clearly shown in the masonry of the present villages.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plate LXVI. Kinna-Zinde.]