FEWKES] AWATOBI VISITED IN 1540 597 
closely the site of Awatobi conforms to the narrative. In Castaneda’s 
account of Tobar’s visit we find that the latter with his command 
entered Tusayan so secretly that their presence was unknown to the 
inhabitants, and they traversed a cultivated plain without being seen, 
so that, we are told, they approached the village near enough to hear 
the voices of the Indians without being discovered. Moreover, the 
Indians, the narrative says, had a habit of descending to their culti- 
vated fields, which implies that they lived on a mesa top. Awatobi 
was situated on a mesa, and the cultivated fields were in exactly the 
position indicated. The habit of retiring to their pueblo at night is 
still observed, or was to within a few years. Tobar arrived at the edge 
of Antelope valley after dark (otherwise he would have been discov- 
ered), crossed the cultivated fields under cover of night, and camped 
under the town at the base of the mesa. The soldiers from that point 
could readily hear the voices of the villagers above them. Eyen at the 
base of the lofty East Mesa I have often heard the Walpi people talking, 
while the words of the town crier are intelligible far out on the plain. 
From the configuration of the valley it would not, however, have been 
easier for Awatobians to have seen the approaching Spaniards than 
for the Walpians; still it was possible for the invaders to conceal their 
approach to Walpi in the same way. If, however, the first pueblo 
approached was Walpi, and Tobar followed the Zuni trail, I think he 
would have been discovered by the Awatobi people before nightfall if 
he entered the cultivated fields early in the evening. It would be 
incredible to believe that he wandered from the trail; much more likely 
he went directly to Awatobi, the first village en route, and then 
encamped until the approach of day before entering the pueblo. At 
sunrise the inhabitants, early stirring, detected the presence of the 
intruders, and the warriors went down the mesa to meet them. They 
had already heard from Cibola of the strange beings, men mounted on 
animals which were said to devour enemies. 
It may seem strange that the departure of an expedition against Tusa- 
yan was unknown to the Hopi, but the narrative leads us to believe 
that such was the fact. The warriors descended to the plain, and their 
chief drew a line of sacred meal across the trail to symbolize that the 
way to their pueblo was closed; whoever crossed it was an enemy, and 
punishment should be meted out to him. This custom is still preserved 
in several ceremonials at the present day, as, for instance, in the New- 
fire rites' in November and in the Flute observance in July.2 The 
1“ At evening the chiefs asked that notices be written for them warning all white people to keep 
away from the mesa tomorrow, and these were set up by the night patrols in cleft wands on all the 
principal trails. At daybreak on the following morning the principal trails leading from the four 
cardinal points were ‘closed’ by sprinkling meal across them and laying on each a whitened elk 
horn. Anawita told the observer that in former times if any reckless person had the temerity to 
venture within this proscribed limit the Kwakwantt inevitably put him to death by decapitation 
and dismemberment.” (‘‘ Naacnaiya,’’ Journal of American Folk-lore, vol. v, p.201.) This appears 
to be the same way in which the Awatobians “closed” the trail to Tobar. 
* When the Flute people approach Walpi, as is biennially dramatized at the present time, ‘‘an assem- 
blage of people there (at the entrance to the village) meet them, and just back of a line of meal drawn 
