368 ZUNI CREATION MYTHS. (eth.ann.I3 



the key to their sociology as well as to their mythic conceptious of 

 space and the universe. In common with all other Indian tribes of 

 North America thus far studied, the Zufiis are divided into clans, or 

 artificial kinship groups, with inheritance in the female line. Of tbese 

 clans there are, or until recently there were, nineteen, and these in turn, 

 with the exception of one, are grouped in threes to correspond to the 

 mythic subdivision I have above alluded to. These clans are also, as are 

 those of all other Indians, totemic; that is, they bear the names and 

 are suj)posed to have intimate relationship with various animals, plants, 

 and objects or elements. Named by their totems they are as follows : 



Ka'lokta-kwe, Crane or Pelican people; Poyi-kwe (nearly extinct), ' 

 Grouse or Sagecock people; Ta'hlui)tsi-kwe (nearly extinct), Yellow- 

 wood or Evergreen-oak people; Aifi'shi-kwe, Bear people; Siiski-kwe, 

 Coyote peojde; Aiyaho-kwe, Eed-top plant or Spring-herb people; Ana- 

 kwe. Tobacco peojjle; Ta'akwe, Maize-plant jieople; Tonashi-kwe, 

 Badger people ; Shohoita-kwe, Deer jjeople ; Maawi-kwe (extinct), Ante- 

 lope people; Tonakwe, Turkey people; Ya'tok'ya-kwe, Snn people; 

 Apoya-kwe (extinct), Sky jieople; K'yii'k'yali-kwe, Eagle people; 

 Tiik'ya-kwe,Toad or Frog people; K'yana-kwe (extinct), Water people; 

 Chitola-kwe (nearly extinct), Rattlesnake people; Pichi-kwe, Parrot- 

 Macaw people. 



Of these clans the first group of three appertains to the north, the 

 second to the west, the third to the south, the fourth to the east, the 

 fifth to the upper or zenith, and the sixth to the lower or nadir region; 

 while the single clan of the Macaw is characterized as "midmost," or of 

 the middle, and also as the all-containing or mother clan of the entire 

 tribe, for in it the seed of the priesthood of the houses is supposed to 

 be preserved. The Zufii explanation of this very remarkable, yet when 

 understood and comprehended, very simple and natural grouping of the 

 clans or totems is exceedingly interesting, and also significant whether 

 it throw light on the origin, or at least native meaning, of totemic sys- 

 tems in general, as would at first seem to be the case, or whether, as is 

 more probably the case in this instance, it indicates a native classifica- 

 tion, so to say, or reclassification of clans which existed before the cul- 

 ture had been elaborated to its present point. Briefly, the clans of the 

 north — that is, those of the Crane, the Grouse, and Evergreen-oak — 

 are grouped together and are held to be related to the north because of 

 their peculiar fitness for the region whence comes the cold and wherein 

 the season of winter itself is supposed to be created, for the crane each 

 autumn appears in the van of winter, the grouse does not flee from the 

 approach of winter but puts on his coat of white and traverses the 

 forests of the snow-clad mountains as freely as other birds traverse 

 summer fields and woodlands, caring not for the cold, and the ever- 

 green oak grows as green and is as sturdy in winter as other trees are 

 in spring or summer; hence these are totems and in a sen.se god-beings 

 of the north and of winter, and the clanspeople named after them and 



