466 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1900. 



in the United States National Museum, the Field Columbian Museum, 

 and the Feabody Museum. 



The region where the Hopi live is remarkable for its natural col- 

 ors, which are displayed in marvelous profusion and brilliancy in the 

 bad lands, known as the Painted Desert. The love of color might 

 well arise from the tints of the native corn, on which the Hopi prin- 

 cipally depend for nourishment. This corn presents a variety of beau- 

 tiful colors, sufficient to represent the six regions, and for this purpose 

 it is used in the ceremonies. The same observation applies to the 

 multifarious varieties of Hopi beans. 



The Hopi apparently do not discriminate indigo, blue, and green; 

 at least, the}' do not have separate words to describe these colors. 

 Violet is classed with the red; orange is not differentiated from yellow 

 or red. Thus, as has been observed among primitive peoples, the Hopi 

 recognize the primary colors and have given them names. Probably 

 primitive man could see onl}- the })rimar3'' colors, a reasonable 

 hypothesis from the survival of these terms, but in the present cul- 

 ture stage of the Hopi it must not be inferred that the}' lack practical 

 knowledge of all the spectrum colors. 



Abstract terms belong far above the Hopi plane of culture, hence 

 it is found that the term for a color denotes some object having the 

 color. Frequently the name of a pigment refers to the place of its 

 origin or to the use to which it is to be put, or, if a compound, to the 

 principal constituent. 



While the Hopi appreciate color, their applications of it are crude 

 and inartistic, the tendency being to barbaric gaudiness. It may be 

 noted that in the Hopi dwellings almost no colors are applied for 

 decoration, the band of red ocher sometimes painted on the walls of a 

 room near the floor being a modern innovation. One remarks also 

 that the Hopi costume is plain, the weaver producing only stuffs of 

 white, dark blue, or brown, without patterns, except in belts and hair 

 tapes, and in garments of a ceremonial character. The leather for 

 moccasins may be dyed according to individual fancy, and in the bril- 

 liant shoulder scarfs of cotton print a riot of color is allowable, but 

 the costume without these recent additions is sober and relieved only 

 by ornaments of shell and turquoise. 



Of articles in common use pottery shows two colors, a red and a dark 

 brown, and baskets present several colors. These articles, however, 

 are ceremonial in decoration and to a large extent as to use, and' as 

 they are })uried with the dead it would seem that the symbolic orna- 

 mentation has some deeper meaning than that of mere ornament. 



The use of pigments among the Hopi is then confined to that large 

 element in Hopi life, ceremony, and colors are displayed in profusion 

 on the paraphernalia of their complex religion. 



The Hopi apply color with meaning, if not with art, and these 



