March, 1905. The Traditions of the Hopi — Voth. 3 



writing on the tablets. Hereupon the deities taught these two a 

 language.' After they had taught them the language, the goddess of 

 the east took them out of the kiva and led them over a rainbow, to 

 her home in the east. Here they stayed four days, after which 

 Huruing Wuhti told them to go now and select for themselves a 

 place and live there. The two proceeded forth saying that they 

 would travel around a while and wherever they would find a good 

 field they would remain. Finding a nice place at last, they built a 

 small, simple house, similar to the old houses of the Hopi. Soon 

 the Huruing Wuhti of the west began to think of the matter again, 

 and said to herself: "This is not the way yet that it should be. We 

 are not yet done," and communicated her thoughts to the Huruing 

 Wuhti of the east. By this time Spider Woman had heard about 

 all this matter and she concluded to anticipate the others and also 

 create some beings. So she also made a man and woman of clay, 

 covered them up, sang over them, and brought to life her handiwork. 

 But these two proved to be Spaniards. She taught them the Spanish 

 language, also giving them similar tablets and imparting knowledge 

 to them by rubbing their hands in the same manner as the woman 

 of the East had done with the "White Men. " Hereupon she created 

 two burros, which she gave to the Spanish man and woman. The 

 latter settled down close by. After this. Spider Woman continued 

 to create people in the same manner as she had created the Spaniards, 

 always a man and a woman, giving a different language to each pair. 

 But all at once she found that she had forgotten to create a woman 

 for a certain man, and that is the reason why now there are always 

 some single men. 



She continued the creating of people in the same manner, giving 

 new languages as the pairs were formed. All at once she found that 

 she had failed to create a man for a certain woman, in other words, it 

 was found that there was one more woman than there were men. 

 "Oh my!" she said, "How is this?" and then addressing the single 

 woman she said: "There is a single man somewhere, who went away 

 from here. You try to find him and if he accepts you, you live with 

 him. If not, both of you will have to remain single. You do the 

 best you can about that." The two finally found each other, and 

 the woman said, "Where shall we live?" The man answered : "Why 

 here, anywhere. We shall remain together. " So he went to work 

 and built a house for them in which they lived. But it did not take 



' Some Hopi say that these two people were the ancestors of what are now called the 

 White Man, and the people say that they believe this language taught to these two people was the 

 language of the present White Man. 



