Kachina and the Cross (43 page)

Read Kachina and the Cross Online

Authors: Carroll L Riley

Tags: #History, #Native American, #United States, #State & Local, #Southwest (AZ; NM; OK; TX), #Social Science, #Anthropology, #General, #Ethnic Studies, #Native American Studies, #test

BOOK: Kachina and the Cross
10.86Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
Page 209
In the seventeenth century, the Pueblos not only made pottery for their own needs but they also quickly tapped the considerable market of Spanish colonists. To meet the needs of the Spanish settlers, Indian potters began to duplicate Spanish pottery forms. This was especially noticeable at Hopi, where, beginning about 1630, the great Sikyatki tradition began to give way to a coarser ware, San Bernardo Polychrome, with Spanish-derived forms such as soup plates, ring-based saucers, cups, candlesticks, and drain pipes. Spanish decorative elements also appear; floral motifs, rosettes, and eight-pointed stars. There was a reaction to this kind of pottery after the Pueblo Revolt, and Payupki Polychrome (1680-1780), though it melded Hopi and eastern Pueblo styles, made a conscious effort to eliminate Spanish elements both in vessel shape and in decoration. Meanwhile, the brilliant Jeddito potteries dwindled and disappeared, perhaps in part to a Spanish aversion to the coal firing that led to a switch in firing methods. Vetancurt, writing at the end of the century, indicated that the missionaries strongly disliked the foul-smelling sulfur-laden coal available in the area of the Hopi mesas. At some point, dung from domesticated animals became the favored firing method for Hopi pottery. This practice might have been introduced by the missionaries in the late seventeenth century or by eastern Pueblos moving into the Hopi area at the end of the seventeenth and beginning of the eighteenth century. In any case, its full development falls outside the period discussed in this book. The date of disappearance of Jeddito and Sikyatki wares at Hopi is uncertain. They appear as trade wares at Picurís and were being used as late as 1650. Such a date does not necessarily mean that Jeddito wares were being produced at Hopi as late as mid-century. The excellence and elegance of the pottery make it likely that it was treasured and preserved for decades by individual households at Picurís.
A vigorous series of handmade pottery traditions persisted among the Pueblos during the first century of Spanish rule. The competent but not particularly well made San Bernardo Polychrome doubtlessly served the Spanish market, but there is no particular indication that it was in any great demand in other pueblos. But as said above, Jeddito and Sikyatki wares, produced earlier in the century, continued to be prized in the eastern Pueblos.
At Zuni an important seventeenth-century pottery was Matsaki Polychrome, which actually originated sometime around or before A.D. 1500 and lasted until the Pueblo Revolt. A second ware, Matsaki Brown-on-buff, was similar to the polychrome but without red paint. These potteries were probably copied from Sikyatki Polychrome but had coarser, softer paste and inferior brush work in the exterior designs. As in mission-period Hopi pottery, there are Spanish as well as native vessel forms. Another ceramic ware was Hawikuh Glaze Polychrome,
Page 210
which extended roughly over the Spanish period at Zuni (1630-80). Hawikuh Polychrome is rather similar to Matsaki Polychrome except that the black or brown element in the pot has been replaced by glazing, perhaps influenced by the Rio Grande glaze tradition. After the Pueblo Revolt, Ashiwi Polychrome appeared. This pottery was a variant on Hawikuh Polychrome, but without the glazing. Vessel shapes in Ashiwi Polychrome seem to have been affected by Rio Grande forms, and it led directly to later Zuni historic pottery.
For mission-period Rio Grande, the late glazes continued to be popular through the seventeenth century, but there was considerable variation in pottery. In the glaze sequence there were a number of variants on Glazes E and F, including Puaray Glaze Polychrome (1600-1650) and its descendant, Kotyiti Glaze Polychrome (1600-1700 or later), in the central Rio Grande area. Glaze V is found in Pecos during the seventeenth century. Tewa Polychrome in the more northern reaches of the Rio Grande Basin originated in the early part of the century and continued on throughout the period. At Picurís a simple bichrome pottery, Trampas Black-on-white, was made throughout the seventeenth century and may have been involved in trade with the Spaniards. Picurís glazes, including Glazes E and F, persisted until at least the middle of the seventeenth century and perhaps until the temporary abandonment of Picurís Pueblo in 1696.
Although the colonists obtained large amounts of Pueblo pottery, the opposite was not true. Spanish ceramics are rarely found in Pueblo contexts. This is not too surprising considering that the Pueblos seemed to have ministered to the ceramic needs of the ordinary citizen, Pueblo Indian and Spaniard. Pottery shipped up the Camino Real tended to service the elite trade with majolica from central Mexico and even, occasionally, exotic East Asian porcelains and other ceramic items. Governors and their families might have need of majolica and Chinese wares, but no Indian of which we have any knowledge belonged to that elite consumer group. Possibly a man like literate, polylinguistic Esteban Clemente could have had a hankering forand the wherewithal to purchaseSpanish luxury trade wares, but such a situation surely was exceptional. Also, Pueblo Indians normally cooked and served in the same vessel, the table settings of the Spaniards not being a culinary tradition of the Pueblos. But an acculturated Pueblo Indian, like Clemente, might have opted for the Spanish mode of serving and eating.
Another way in which the Spanish presence modified Indian life was in the introduction of new animals and plants. There were several European-derived animals. Sheep (and to a lesser degree, goats) spread rapidly from the herds brought by Oñate and later colonizing parties. They belonged mainly to the clergy, but as the century went on, more and more of the estancias were stocked
Page 211
with sheep. These animals fell into the hands of the Pueblos, by whom they were enthusiastically welcomed. The situation with cattle was similar. Herds grew more slowly, but certainly cattle were in sufficient numbers for a lively, if not entirely legal, trade to the Nueva Vizcaya mining settlements. Probably both sheep and cattle were trickling to the Apachean groups even before the Pueblo Revolt. Among the Navajo in the eighteenth century, sheep became a veritable way of life, shifting this Apachean group from an incipient agricultural society to a herding one.
The prestige domesticated animal in the seventeenth-century Southwest was the horse. Indians were discouraged from owning and using horses, though it seems unlikely that they were absolutely forbidden to ride. They did, after all, serve as herdsmen, and clearly the Pueblos did learn horsemanship during the course of the century. At the same time horses began to spread to the nomadic tribes both east and west (see chapter 11). By 1680 horses were much valued by the Pueblos, and large Spanish herds fell into their hands at the revolt. Both horses and guns were used enthusiastically by the Pueblos during the revolt, the horse utilized by Pueblo military leaders, obviously as a prestige item. Although there is no great amount of evidence for this, it seems very likely that the Pueblos were middlemen for the additional spread of horses to the nomads. Mules and burros were also used, probably extensively, by both Spaniards and Pueblos, though less is known about them.
Two other animals brought by the Spaniards into the Southwest were pigs and chickens. Evidence for pigs is not great, though we know that large herds of them were in northwest Mexico by the 1530s and were brought to the Southwest by Coronado either ''on the hoof" or as salted meat (see chapter 3). One of the inventories of small merchants' stores in the Parral vicinity in 1641 listed two "hides" of lard totaling more than 122 pounds as well as 40 pounds of salt ham. Pig bones have also been found at Awatovi in seventeenth-century midden deposits. It was a regular practice for missionaries newly assigned to New Mexico to bring chickens with them north on the Camino Real. Even though it filled a niche similar to the domesticated turkey, the chicken caught on among the Pueblos. Pueblo gifts to Governor Treviño, discussed below, included both chickens and eggs.
The dog was, of course, an aboriginal domesticate, but the Spaniards introduced their own brand of dogs into the Southwest. Attack dogs called
galgos
, rather like a greyhound, came with Coronado. It also seems likely that Coronado brought herding dogs since he had fairly extensive herds of sheep and cattle on the trail. There is no direct evidence of this, but sheep dogs were routinely used in Spain during this period, and it is difficult to see how large flocks
Page 212
could be moved for hundreds of miles without them. It is very likely that some of these dogs interbred with the local animals as early as Coronado's time, though we have no information on this one way or the other. The early Spanish Southwest had at least two varieties of native dogs: one a small spaniel-like animal and the other, larger with longer hair, analogous to a collie. There also may have been a distribution to the more easterly pueblos of the sturdy Plains travois dog, noted by Coronado only a few days' travel from the Pueblo area.
Cats are another likely Spanish import in the seventeenth century, for these animals were valuable in protecting grain storage areas from mice and rats. They are not mentioned in any of the accounts I have seen, and there has not been enough archaeology on seventeenth-century sites, Spanish or Indian, to shed much light on this situation. However, domestic cat bones were found in a seventeenth-century context at Awatovi. Part of the head and neck of a more-or-less life-sized figurine of a cat with a mouse in its mouth was found, supposedly in the convento area at Pecos, in 1915. This ceramic figure is mold-made, suggesting an origin in Mexico, but the decorations are in bands of glaze paint,
somewhat
reminiscent of the Pueblos. Its date is unclear; it could be seventeenth (or conceivably even sixteenth) century, but it might also be later.
As discussed in previous chapters, a number of new plant foods were also introduced by the Spaniards. Certain ones, such as melons, probably predated Oñate and may have come in with Coronado, but most Spanish domesticates date from Oñate's time or later. They constituted a considerable range of plants, including various fruit trees. Peaches are especially well documented, having been found in seventeenth-century contexts at Awatovi, Abó, Puaray, Paa-ko, Picurís, and (probably seventeenth-century) at Pecos and in the Jemez area. Other fruit trees, especially plum, apricot, and cherry, also appear in the seventeenth century. To what extent they were utilized by the Indians (compared to the missionaries and settlers) is not known, but there certainly was some use. The chile pepper was brought to New Mexico, possibly even before Oñate, where it competed with and largely replaced the native wild chiles. Wheat was planted in the lower Chama area almost immediately by Oñate's settlers. The use of wheat spread to the Rio Grande Pueblos and, today, has religious implications. How much of this took place in the seventeenth century is unknown, for it did involve a new method of milling using hand-, water-, or animal-powered millstones. The Spaniards introduced
molinos
for grinding wheat, but to what extent they spread to the Pueblos in the first eight decades of Spanish rule is not securely known. In any case, a number of garden crops came to the Pueblos via the Spaniards, including cabbage, peas, turnips, onions, garlic, radishes, and cucumbers.
Page 213
"Pecos cat" figurine (photo by Blair Clark, courtesy of the Museum of Indian
Arts and Culture/Laboratory ofAnthropology, 31505/ll)
Along with the material culture, Pueblo Indians learned a number of craft specialties from their Spanish overlords. These included carpentry (see chapter 8 for the special carpentry skills at Pecos), iron and leather working, new techniques of weaving, and a new material, wool, from the domesticated sheep. As
Page 214
already discussed (and something that would be extremely important during the revolt), the Pueblo men learned new tactics and strategies in warfare, and, as auxiliary soldiers, had considerable practice in the chronic struggles with Apaches and Utes. In addition, large numbers of Pueblo men, women, and children learned to speak Spanish, and at least a few learned to read and write the language. All Pueblo people had been indoctrinated into Catholic Christianity. Some of them, indeed, became Christians in the Spanish sense of the word and, during the revolt, threw in with the Spaniards.
One interesting aspect of the Pueblo Revolt was the millenarian mystique that surrounded it. There can be no doubt that the uprising was the result of a long period of nativistic agitation, brought on by the attack on Pueblo religion and society (much the same thing) and by the suppression of revered religious leaders and the life-enhancing ceremonials. The terrible drought years of the late 1660s and early 1670s exacerbated the situation, as did the increasing attacks by nomadic Indians. Infectious disease, which swept over the Pueblo world and which Spanish medicine was totally incapable of alleviating, added to this crisis feeling. The Spaniards were, more and more, beginning to look like evil creatures, monsters out of Pueblo folklore. The nativistic aspect of the revolt was clear in the promises of the revolt leader, Popé, for a return to health and prosperity when the polluting influence (the Spaniards) had been removed from the scene.
There had been, from Oñate's time, rebellions against Spanish rule. As the seventeenth century wore on, these tended to be on the frontiers of the province; Zuni in 1632, Jemez in 1623, and again in the 1640s and 1650s. Taos rose in 1639, and the missions at Zuni and Taos were both abandoned for a time. A very ugly revolt at Jemez during the governorship of Fernando de Argüello Carvajál (1644-47) led to the hanging of twenty-nine Jemez Indians and the imprisonment of others. The Apaches (in this case probably Navajo) were also said to be involved. An uprising of the Keres, Jemez, and Tiwa Pueblos took place during the governorship of Hernando de Ugarte y la Concha (1649-53). As part of this revolt, a herd of mares was turned over to allied Apaches, though most of the horses seem to have been recovered. A revolt among the Piros occurred between 1665-68, and one in the Salinas region a short time later, both during the administration of Fernando de Villanueva. The Piros were in league with the Apaches, and six of them were hanged after their defeat. The Salinas revolt, of which we know all too little, was headed by the Hispanicizing Esteban Clemente, discussed in chapter 10, and there is reason to think that it had roots in a number of the pueblos.
Another Indian governor of all the pueblos of Las Salinas, named Don Esteban Clemente, whom the whole kingdom secretly obeyed, formed another

Other books

Eternity by Elizabeth Miles
Early Decision by Lacy Crawford
Revenge by Mark A. Cooper
Moon of Skulls by Robert E. Howard
Judgment Day by James F. David
A Galaxy Unknown by Thomas DePrima