606 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1920. 



down the trail to the shrine, situated in the foothills west of 

 the pueblo. When they arrived there they placed the prayer sticks 

 in the shrine, and having hastily gathered a pile of such twigs and 

 other bits of wood as were available, they ignited it and then 

 hurriedly left the place, making a quarter circuit of the mesa to a 

 second shrine, situated west of the village, where they made a second 

 fire, and so on until they had made a circuit of the mesa. 



As recorded above in the account of the greater rites, this fire 

 is produced by friction, or, as commonly explained, by rubbing 

 together two sticks. But sufficient heat to produce fire can not be 

 produced by simply rubbing two sticks together. They must be 

 placed in such a way that the friction is concentrated on the smallest 

 possible surface. One may rub two sticks until the muscles refuse 

 to respond and not even produce smoke. Consequently, the invention 

 of fire making was practically how to produce heat by concentrating 

 friction at a point. This was accomplished by primitive man in 

 several w r ays, and among the majority of our Indians it was by 

 rotation of a rod held upright in a depression in a hearth held hori- 

 zontally. The twirling motion of the vertical stick is accomplished 

 among the Hopi by the palms of the hands, the friction necessary 

 for heat being produced by a downward pressure of the hands. The 

 heat thus generated by friction is great enough to ignite some tinder, 

 as com pollen, and by this primitive method fire is made in a very 

 short time by expert celebrants of the new fire rite. 



The two fire implements or sticks by which fire is generated are 

 supposed by the Hopi to have different sexes; the fire drill is male, 

 the fireboard is female. 20 The fire, therefore, is generated by a union 

 of male and female objects, and in this particular the analogy with 

 life is preserved. In ceremonial fire rites corn pollen is added to 

 the slot where friction is generated, which is highly significant. 

 Fire, like life, is generated by the union of male and female elements, 

 and the way of making fire is symbolic and directty concerned w ith 

 the Hopi interpretation of fire as a living being. But this rela- 

 tionship comes out in the clearest light in the association of rites 

 of procreation with those of fire, which appear in the summer fire 

 ceremonies of the Hopi. In these rites we recognize a worship of the 

 generation principles of nature similar to that which occurs in the 

 worship of mother earth and father sun. 



We have in addition objective symbolism and ceremonies that have 

 been transmitted in the form of myths. These surviving explana- 

 tions are preserved in linguistic and philological data by which to 

 check up interpretations by living devotees. The conclusions arrived 

 at by a study of the mythology as told by priests, although of great 



™ Although all things have sex in Hopi conceptions, this conception is a symbolic one 

 and not realistic. 



