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Updated: June 17, 2025
A large and varied collection of bone implements was gathered at Awatobi, and a few additional specimens were exhumed from Sikyatki.
The large series of food bowls from Sikyatki afford abundant material for that purpose, and it may incidentally be said that by this study I have been able to interpret the meaning of certain decorations on Sikyatki bowls of which the best Hopi traditionalists are ignorant.
We may suppose, however, that the survivors of both Küküchomo and Sikyatki sought refuge in Awatobi after the prehistoric destruction of their pueblos, for both were peopled by clans which came from the east, and naturally went to that village, the founders of which migrated from the same direction.
The simplest form of decoration on the exterior of a food bowl is a band encircling it. This line may be complete or it may be broken at one point. The next more complicated geometric decoration is a double or multiple band, which, however, does not occur in any of the specimens from Sikyatki. The breaking up of this multiple band into parallel bars is shown in figure 277.
All my informants agree that on the destruction of Sikyatki some of its people fled to Awatobi, but no one has yet stated that the Kokop people were represented in the latter pueblo. The distinctive clans of the pueblo of Antelope mesa are not mentioned as living in Sikyatki, and yet the two pueblos are said to have been kindred.
In modern Hopi burials the food bowls with the food for the dead are not buried with the deceased, but are placed on the mound of soil and stones which covers the remains. From the position of the mortuary pottery as regards the skeletons in the Sikyatki interments, it is probable that this custom is of modern origin.
This sequence is prescribed in Tusayan ceremonials, and has elsewhere been designated by me as the sinistral circuit, or a circuit with the center on the left hand. The circuit used by the decorator of this box is dextral or sunwise. Several rectangular receptacles of earthenware, some with handles and others without them, were obtained in the excavations at Sikyatki.
One of the largest, and, so far as form goes, one of the most unique vessels, is shown in plate CXXVI, b. This was not exhumed from Sikyatki, but was said to have been found in the vicinity of that ruin. While the ware is very old, I do not believe it is ancient, and it is introduced in order to show how cleverly ancient patterns maybe simulated by more modern potters.
The first attempts at ornamentation appear to have been a simple spattering of the surface with liquid pigment or a drawing of simple encircling bands. By far the greater number of specimens of mortuary pottery from Sikyatki are highly polished and decorated with more or less complicated designs. Of these there are at least three different groups, based on the color of the ware.
The form of pipe used in the above ceremony is typical of ancient Pueblo pipes, several of which were found at Sikyatki. One of these, much smaller than the ó-mow-ûh pipe, was made of lava, and bore evidence of use before burial. It is evident, however, that these straight pipes were not always smoked as above described.
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