﻿NO. 7 



SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I926 



235 



The country in Indian times was literally populated with " petrified " 

 " first people," who lived at the beginning of the world and were trans- 

 formed to stone for one reason or another, as special legends tell. 

 There is a rocky pinnacle on a hilltop which used to be a person and 

 evidently still has some life in it, for it is said to change its position 

 at times, being seen by the Indians now erect, now tilted, now reclined. 

 Two more petrified people shot arrows at each other across a canyon, 

 with the result that one of the rocks is badly shattered. Another rock 

 has horns. Even a whole house is petrified ; a ghastly magical wood- 

 rat described as being some two feet in length is said to live in a rock 





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Fig. 231. — The old and the new: sheet iron stovepipes emerging from Hopi 

 kivas. (Photograph by J. P. Harrington.) 



that looks exactly like a primitive Indian wigwam. Another rock is 

 the home of a magical beaver. Still another rock is a warclub left by 

 the first people. Up another boulder two petrified rattlesnakes are 

 crawling, seen as streaks in the formation of the rock. 



The first people also left their barefooted or sandaled tracks. A 

 good photograph was obtained of one of these footprints. It is a 

 perfect human footprint, fourteen inches long. The god who made 

 this print was heading toward the ocean. 



The Indians also had the custom of placing a small rock on top of 

 a boulder to mark the trails. One would go along the trail looking 

 for these guides, which are always seen bobbing up ahead in con- 

 spicuous places. It is denied that Indians put all of them there ; it is 

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