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Discoveries on the Colorado
By Joseph F. Anderson of the Utah Archological Expedition 1913

IX.-Life and Customs of the Zuni Indians

In a little isolated world of its own, separated by many miles from any of the other pueblos of the Southwest, is the quaint little pueblo village of the Zuni Indians. The Zuni community was the first of the New World pueblo communities to be seen by Old World eyes-and those eyes, as related in a previous article, were the eyes of a negro.

Since that time (1539), in spite of constant contact with Spaniards, Mexicans and Americans, the history of the people of Zuni has been marked by the strictest conservatism. Living alternately on the mesa top and on the bank of the Zuni river below, about fifty miles west of Arizona's petrified forest, these queer people have adhered tenaciously to their old religion and social customs against all invasions of new ideas from without. The descriptions written by the early Spanish intruders of the industrial life and social and religious customs of the Zuni differ in but few details from the up-to-date accounts published by the United States Bureau of Ethnology-so successful have the Zunis been in preserving their individuality as a type of the Americans of yesterday.

Although the Zunis compose a distinct linguistic group, they strongly resemble the Hopi physically and are not widely different in many phases of their social, religious and industrial life. Like the Hopi, they have always, so far as known, supported themselves by agriculture and hunting. In this they are also like the pueblos along the Rio Grande.

While the Zunis are wards of the government, they are practically self-supporting and are gradually increasing in numbers, as recent counts show. Their population grew from 1,574, in 1906, to 1,640, in 1910. They have their own tribal government which is closely interwoven with their religious and social organization, and which is said to suit them far better than the "Washington way." They are quiet, good-tempered, and industrious, but less peace-loving than the Hopi. They are friendly toward Americans but distrust Mexicans, and are bitter enemies to the Navajo.

Men in all lands and in all ages have been seekers for happiness; the quest is universal. In their quest, the Zunis have developed a philosophy influenced profoundly by the things about them.

They are noted for their wonderful system of mythology and folklore, for they live in a world of mysticism and symbolism. To them the world is a universe of animals. Plants are animals under a spell of enchantment and cannot travel. The stars are animals compelled by magic to travel around the world, and the sun-god is the most potent of their many deities. To the Zuni, every object possesses a spiritual life. The waters writhe in waves of anger; the hills and mountains tremble in distress, and the earth-mother nourishes all.

Living in a land of little rain, where they must obtain their meager living from the soil, and where drouth frequently means famine, it is not strange that many of their rites and ceremonies are supplications for rain. One of their beliefs is that their dead go to the underworld, where their gods also dwell, and there become rain-makers for the upper world. These rain-makers ascend at times to the upper world and soar back and forth over the earth, shielded by the cloud-masks from the view of the people below. It is not the clouds which fall in rain; the rain-makers pour the water through the cloud masks from large ollas which they carry. Every Zuni child must have its ears pierced at birth, otherwise it is believed that they cannot become rain-makers in the nether world. According to Zuni philosophy, the members of their bow-priesthood become lightning makers after death. Thunder is produced by the rain-makers gaming with stones, the players rolling stones back and forth to one another in their sports. So the Zuni have their own explanation for every phenomenon about them. They revel in a wealth of folk-lore which is said to rival the mythology of the ancient Greeks.