Elsie Worthington Clews Parsons

Told at St. Michaels, Arizona, by one of the Franciscan Fathers

You may remember having met here a Navaho friend of ours, one of the silver-smiths, whom we familiarly called “John the Jeweler.” Early this year he went over to the Kohonino CaÑon and stayed there four days. The day after leaving the CaÑon he was taken with ague, and every day for twenty days he had a chill followed by fever and delirium. The strangeness of the disease had an extraordinarily depressing effect on him and during these twenty days he was in a state of utter collapse.

John the Jeweler is a medicine man, a minor priest, of considerable repute, and numbers of his friends came to see him, but none of them knew anything about his disease. The priests and the patient were inclined to attribute it to “a bad smell emanating from the Kohonino,” but as there was also a band of wandering Paiutes there during the time of the patient’s visit, they were not sure but that the bad smell may have originated with the Paiutes.

It was concluded in this emergency to call in the best mediciners of the region. The first to officiate was Ojkai yosna. His rites and song-prayers were directed to the YÈ who dwells at the mouth of the pit through which all people came up to this world, and through which the spirits of the dead return to the lower world.

This pit is in the summit of that mountain in the north called Tjolii. Between the patient and the mouth of the pit the priest made a fire with certain woods, and beside this fire he sang prayers to the YÈ who sits on “this side” the mouth of the pit. He beseeched the YÈ not to call the patient to descend the ladder leading to the regions of the dead. He rubbed the ashes and pulverized charcoal of his medicine-fire all over the body of the patient, first having rubbed him with a mixture obtained by melting the fat of the bison, mountain sheep, elk and deer, with a small portion of the fat of the domestic sheep. This grease was to make stick to the skin the charcoal and ashes of the medicine-fire. After the anointment the songs were sung again beside the patient.

The rites of Ojkai yosna lasted two days and nights and his fee was one horse, say fifty dollars.

The next shaman was Kuma byge. In the sick man’s hut, a little hollow mound of clay was made, and within the hollow three stones were set; on these were laid splinters of piÑon and cedar which were set afire. When they had burned to embers, the shaman shook his rattle and sang to the YÈs of his father. He then laid upon the embers five herbs. The patient was laid naked upon the sand, close to the fireplace, and a blanket was spread over the fireplace, and the patient thus inhaled the fumes of the herbs, while the shaman sat alongside, shaking his rattle and continuing his song.

The treatment was performed at sunrise and sunset, and should last four days, with songs, dances and other ceremonies at night. But in this instance, at the close of the second day, an embarrassing circumstance occurred: the patient’s wife’s menstrual flow began. This at once put a stop to all further treatment. Kuma byge’s fee was one horse, say fifty dollars.

After the wife got well, Etsidi bikis was summoned. To the leader of the four winds sang the shaman, the white wind of the East, the blue wind of the South, the yellow wind of the West, and the black wind of the North. Before the people emerged from the lower world the winds were taken up the pit at Tjolii by the “Leader” and their directions assigned them. He caused them to blow upon the muddy surface of the earth while this upper surface was yet new and damp, until the world became dry enough for habitation. The winds expelled the evil influence of the bad YÈs, and the new world became beautiful. So it was to this Leader that Etsidi bikis sang, asking him to bring the winds together, and expel the evil influence that threatened the patient.

The ceremonies lasted four days and nights and consisted of song-prayers, exhibiting fetiches, shaking the rattle, blowing the whistle, and swinging the tsin boosni (which is like swinging the Thunder prayer stick of the Hopi). The fee of Etsidi bikis was a large horse, say sixty dollars.

The next shaman was called Hostin bikÂn. He administered herb roots, both raw and in infusions. The raw root of the Jamestown weed was given the patient at sunrise, noon and sunset. Each dose was something less than half an ounce of the recently dry root. This was chewed and swallowed. Closely following each of these doses, he was given a piece of the stalk of the Golden Alexander, about six inches long and as thick as the thumb. This he chewed, swallowing the saliva, but not the fiber. Between the songs, during the day and night, infusions were given the patient to drink, in quantities never to exceed half a pint at once. There were separate infusions of herbs known as: aze klohi, laughing medicine, aze bini, bad or dreaded talk medicine, thajuhuitso, great chief of water medicines, that is of medicinal herbs growing in marshes, all, I surmise, species of nightshade. Hostin bikÂn’s ceremonies lasted a day and a night. His fee was a horse, say fifty dollars.

The last and most potent of the shamans was Kuma. He is chief of the clan to which the patient belongs. He lives about thirty miles southwest from our CaÑon.

Kuma’s prayers were directed to Hosdjoqun (the Killer) and Hos-(dje) Yelti (the Talker), guardian deities of Tjolii. But all these prayers were more immediately addressed to the YÈs who dwell in the Half-white-house, asking their mediation, that the “Killer” might withhold his hand, that the “Talker” might withhold the word of death. I presume you know that there is a mythic region in the north. It extends from nadir to zenith and has no horizon. It is a land of vertical strata of various colors, each stratum reaching from The Below to The Above. At each stratification is the house of a YÈ, half in one stratum, half in the next.[5]

A sweat house is decorated on the outside with a rainbow in colored sands; a singing-house is built for the occasion; sand pictures (altars) are made on the floor of the singing-house; and there are dances of the masked participants.

Kuma’s ceremonies lasted five days and nights. Every morning at sunrise, the patient was placed in the sweat house for about twenty minutes, say ten minutes in each. Nothing of special significance was done during the day, but from sunset to dawn the maskers danced before the singing-house, while within the singing-house, the priests sang their prayers, made their sand pictures, and placed the proper fetiches before and upon them. For a fee, Kuma received a fine horse and colt, worth one hundred dollars.

Aside from all these fees, sheep were killed to provide mutton, and other provisions were purchased to feed the shamans and their assistants, the dancers, and the numerous spectators who flock around when any of these religious ceremonies are in progress. In these expenses the patient was assisted by all his relatives.

In these ceremonies, three weeks went by, with every day an ague. At the end of that time, the patient said that he was “looking down the descending ladder.”

His friends then cinched him upon a saddle, and brought him here, muffled in a blanket, just like a bag of bones. We had him dumped in the wool room. This was four days ago. We had no calomel, so we gave him a generous dose of blue mass, about thirty grains. On the following morning we administered a liberal draught of castor oil, and then we gave him about thirty grains of quinine, in four doses, daily. Two days ago his ague left him. This morning he and his friends left for home. Just as he was leaving, John the Jeweler told me he was feeling so well, he thought that by to-morrow night he could resume the performance of his marital duties.

A. M. Stephen