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Updated: May 26, 2025
The manner in which a bone whistle is used in imitation of a bird's call has been noticed by me in the accounts of several ceremonials, and I will therefore quote the description of its use in the Nimankatcina at Walpi. This was repeated four times, accompanied by song and rattle. He first inserted the bone whistle on the north side, then on the other cardinal points in turn.
It is claimed by the folklorists of the Tataukyamû, a priesthood which, controls the New-fire ceremonies at Walpi, and is prominent in the Soyaluña, or the rites of the winter solstice, that the Piba or Tobacco phratry brought the fetishes of that society to Walpi, and there are many obscurely known resemblances between the Mamzrauti and the Wüwütcimti celebrations in Walpi which appear to support that claim.
In this respect it resembled Awatobi, but apparently differed from the latter pueblo in having the inclosed plaza. In the same way it was unlike Walpi or the ancient and modern pueblos of Middle Mesa and Oraibi. In fact, there is no Tusayan ruin which resembles it in ground plan, except Payüpki, a Tanoan town of much later construction.
More often, in modern and probably also in ancient usage, a roll of paper-bread or piki served the same purpose, being dipped into the stew and then eaten with the fingers. Possibly the Sikyatkian drank from the hollow handle of a gourd ladle, as is frequently done in Walpi today, but he generally slaked his thirst by means of a clay substitute.
All these evidences substantiate the Hopi legend that the Tanoan inhabitants of the village of Middle Mesa, above the trail from Walpi to Oraibi, made but a short stay in Tusayan. There is good documentary evidence that Sandia was settled by Tanoan people from Tusayan.
Shrines occupy the same relative position in Sichomovi, Hano, Shipaulovi, and elsewhere, and within them sacred prayer-offerings are still deposited on ceremonial occasions. At Walpi, in the middle of the plaza, there is a subterranean crypt in which offerings are often placed, as I have elsewhere described in treating of certain ceremonies.
It is said that with this removal of the villagers there were found to be no easy means of climbing the precipitous walls, and that the stairway trails were made as late as the beginning of the present century. In those early days there was a ladder near where the stairway trail is now situated, and some of the older men of Walpi have pointed out to me where this ladder formerly stood.
Old Walpi is said to have been abandoned because it was in the shade of the mesa, but doubtless the true cause of its removal was that the site was too much exposed, commanded as it was by the towering mesa above it, and easily approached on three sides.
They build their houses of stone and line them with plaster; and they have many interesting arts, being skilled potters and deft weavers. The seasons are about equally divided between labor, worship, and play. A hundred miles to the northwest of the Zuni pueblo are the seven pueblos of Tusayan: Oraibi, Shumopavi, Shupaulovi, Mashongnavi, Sichumovi, Walpi, and llano.
The small ruin at Kachinba, the halting place of the Kachina people, seems to have escaped the attention of students of Tusayan archeology. It lies about six miles from Sikyatki, about east of Walpi, and is approached by following the trail at the foot of the same mesa upon which Küküchomo is situated. The ruin is located on a small foothill and has a few standing walls.
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