640 EXPEDITION TO ARIZONA IN 1895 [ETH. ANN. 17 
The present appearance of Sikyatki (plate cxv) is very desolate, and 
when visited by our party previously to the initiation of the work, 
seemed to promise little in the way of archeological results. No walls 
were standing above ground, and the outlines of the rooms were very 
indistinct. All we saw at that time was a series of mounds, irregu- 
larly rectangular in shape, of varying altitude, with here and there 
faint traces of walls. Prominent above all these mounds, however, was 
the pinnacle of rock on the northwestern corner, rising abruptly from 
the remainder of the ruin, easily approached from the west and sloping 
more gradually to the south. This rocky elevation, which we styled 
the acropolis, was doubtless once covered with houses. 
On the western edge of the ruin a solitary farmhouse, used during 
the summer season, had been constructed of materials from the old 
walls, and was inhabited by an Indian named Lelo and his family dur- 
ing our excavations. He is the recognized owner of the farm land 
about Sikyatki and the cultivator of the soil in the old plaza of the 
ruins. Jakwaina, an enterprising Tewan who lives not far from Isba, 
the spring near the trail to Hano, has also erected a modern house 
near the Sikyatki spring, but it had not been completed at the time of 
our stay. Probably never since its destruction in prehistoric times have 
so many people as there were in our party lived for so long a time at 
this desolate place. 
The disposition of the mounds show that the ground plan of Sikyatki 
(plate OXv1) was rectangular in shape, the houses inclosing a court in 
which are several mounds that may be the remains of kivas. The 
highest range of rooms, and we may suppose the most populous part 
of the ancient pueblo, was on the same side as the acropolis, where a 
large number of walled chambers in several series were traced. 
The surface of what was formerly the plaza is crossed by rows of 
stones regularly arranged to form gardens, in which several kinds of 
gourds are cultivated. In the sands north of the ruin there are many 
peach trees, small and stunted, but yearly furnishing a fair crop. 
These are owned by Teino,' and of course were planted long after the 
destruction of the pueblo. 
In order to obtain legends of the former occupancy and destruction 
of Sikyatki, I consulted Nasyuiweve, the former head of the Kokop 
people, aud while the results were not very satisfactory, I learned that 
the land about EY atki is still claimed by that phratry. Nasyunweye,? 
1Tcino lives at Sic homovi i, and in the SacikS dance at E We lpi formerly Pear the part of the old man 
who calls out the words, ‘‘A wahaia,” etc, at the kisi, before the reptiles are carried about the plaza. 
These words are Keresan, and Tcino performed this part on account of his kinship. He owns the 
grove of peach trees because they are on land of his ancestors, a fact confirmatory of the belief that 
the people of Sikyatki came from the Rio Grande. 
2Nasyuiiweye, who died a few years ago, formerly made the prayer-stick to Masauwfh, the Fire or 
Death god. This he did as one of the senior members of the Kokop or Firewood people, otherwise 
known as the Fire people, because they made fire with the fire-drill. On his death his place in the 
kiva was taken by Katei. Nasyuiweve was Intiwa’s chief assistant in the Walpi katcinas, and wore 
the mask of Eototo in the ceremonials of the Niman. All this is significant, and coincides with the 
theory that katcinas are incorporated in the Tusayan ritual, that Eototo is their form of Masauwth, 
and that he is a god of fire, growth, and death, like his dreaded equivalent. 
