FEWEDS | NAVAHO NATIONAL MONUMENT, ARIZONA 7 
One of the most interesting landmarks visible from the road, after 
leaving Indian Tanks, is called Superstition mountain, an elevation 
situated to the north. According to Navaho stories, phantom fires 
are sometimes seen on this mountain on dark nights, recalling an 
incident, mentioned in the Snake legend, which occurred when the 
Snake clans came south in their early migration from Tokénabi. 
This legend states that all this land once belonged to their Fire God, 
Masauti, who was likewise god of the surface of the earth. Lights 
moving around the mesas are said to have been seen by these ancient 
inhabitants much as they are now ascribed to Superstition mountain. 
The traveler over the recent lava beds and cinder plains in the 
neighborhood of the San Francisco mountains can readily accept the 
statement that the early Hopi saw flames issuing from the earth or 
the glow of hot lava, which gave substance to the legend still preserved 
among this people. It was so natural for them to regard such a 
country as the property of their Fire God that their legends state 
they inherited the land from him. 
The legends of the Snake clans recount also that when their 
ancestors migrated from Tokénabi they went south and west until 
they reached the Little Colorado river, where they built many houses 
of stone. They remained there several years, but later left these 
houses and continued in an easterly direction to Walpi. Where are 
the ruins of these ancient houses of the Snake clans on the Little 
Colorado? There are several Little Colorado ruins, as Homolobi 
near Winslow, but Hopi traditions affirm these were built by people 
who came from the south. Lower down the river at the Great Falls 
are other ruins, but these likewise are ascribed to southern clans. 
The cluster of stone buildings near the Black Falls conforms in posi- 
tion and direction from Walpi to Hopi legends of the site of Wuk6ki, 
the Great Houses built by Snake clans before they went to Walpi. 
In their migration from Tokénabi, probably the Snake people tarried 
here and built houses, and then went on to the Bear settlements or 
the Hopi pueblos, where their descendants now live. More extensive 
archeologic work on these ruins may shed additional light on this 
identification, and it is interesting to compare in point of architecture 
the buildings at Black Falls* with those of extreme northern Arizona. 
a For plates representing ruins at Black Falls, see Twenty-second Annual Report of the Bureau of American 
Ethnology. Plate 3 (hitherto unpublished) of the present report represents one of the characteristic Black 
Falls ruins, which closely resembles several of the characteristic ruins standing on low hills near the road to 
Marsh pass, beyond Red Lake. 
The architecture of the ruins on the Little Colorado near Black Falls resembles that of the open ruins, 
especially Ruin A, and those near the road from Bekishibito to Marsh pass. While great weight can not be 
given to this resemblance, since we find much uniformity in stone ruins everywhere in the Southwest, it is 
interesting to take in connection with this fact the close likeness in minor objects from the Laguna Creek 
ruins and the Black Falls cluster. The prevailing ware from both is the gray pottery with black geometri- 
cal ornamentation and red ware with black or brown decoration. The red ware and the yellow ware, so 
abundant higher up the river, are not the prevailing kinds. The pottery of the Black Falls ruins is essen- 
tially the same type as that of the San Juan and its tributaries. 
44453°—Bull. 50—11 2 
