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Show Her first interview in 1933 was with Ondulacy and his son, who informed her that Lalio was Governor and had been appointed by the six caciques: Seowtewa, Head Priest; Chico; Tsichu, or Saiuxilunga (Waihusiwa's successor); La my; Hustitu; and the Bekwinne or Sunpriest. All were chosen for life except the Sun Priest. There were seven secular officials: a governor, lieutenant governor and five tenientes. There was more discussion with the Ondulacys on Zuni political divisions, and then the old leader discussed Kolhu/wala:wa: 154 THE SACRED LAKE, was next discussed. The old ex-governor waxed as impassioned on this subject, as he had in discussing politics, the chief realm of his life experience. Religion and government are allied. Can the U. S. Government set aside for the Zunis, the Sacred Lake region in Arizona, as Blue Lake has been set aside for the Taos people? "It is the seat of our ceremonies," he said, and with an anxious look told how at this very moment the party from the pueblo that every four years makes the pilgrimage to the lake before the first rain dance would be discovering whether or not the Lake was dry-as it was when last visited. The old man drew a map of the region, the lake being situated between two mountains with the Zuni River flowing between. It was here at the crossing of the River that half of the Zunis, according to the myth of creation, were drowned-the women becoming frightened because their children were transformed in their arms into snakes, frogs, tadpoles. Those who perished went into the Lake, which then became the Sacred Lake of the Dead, where the dead go and where those ancestral gods impersonated in the masked dances live eternally. The rest of the tribe reached Zuni the Middle of the World. In order that the old man should realize that I knew the importance of this place in Zuni ritual I told him what Waihusiwa had related about the Lake and the pilgrimage-how the party was chosen, proceeding on foot, or burros to Arizona, how the prayer plumes were 154. Stevenson, 1904, og. cit,, pp. 148-162, reported meeting a Mexican coming from the lake in 1881. Surveys in the 1880s also show several Hispanic homesteads in the vicinity of Kolhu/wala:wa. - 103 - |
