Historical Introduction to Studies Among the Sedentary Indians of New Mexico Part 10

Of course, Castaneda reports the story which every Indian tribe tells of themselves; namely, that the Pecos Indians were the bravest and the most warlike of the pueblos, and that in every encounter they were always victorious.[145]

Historical data, founded upon positive written records, begin for Pecos towards the fall of the year 1540, when Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, then at Zuni or Cibola, sent the Captain Hernando de Alvarado with twenty men to visit a village called "Cicuye."[146] Indians from that village, "situated seventy leagues towards the east"[147] from Zuni, had visited the latter town, and offered to the Spanish leader "tanned hides, s.h.i.+elds, and helmets." The hides were buffalo-robes, for the woolly hair was still on them.[148] Alvarado reached Cicuye, pa.s.sing, as I have elsewhere stated, through Acoma and Bernalillo. I have already identified Cicuye with Pecos. Besides the proofs already given, a few descriptive abstracts from the report of Castaneda will add to the strength of the evidence:--

(p. 71.) "Five days' journeys further, Alvarado reached Cicuye, a well-fortified village, whose houses are four stories high."

(p. 176.) "It is built on the summit of a rock. It forms a great square, in the centre of which are the _estufas_." (Compare general description and diagrams.)

(p. 177) "The village is surrounded besides by a stone wall of rather low height. There is a spring which might be cut off."

In regard to the wall, I refer to the plans and descriptions; as for the spring, it trickles out beneath a ma.s.sive ledge of rocks on the west side of the arroyo, nearly opposite to the field. Its water, slightly alkaline, is still limpid and cool, and a great source of comfort. The sketch upon the next page will give an idea of its appearance.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Spring]

There is no trace of work about it. At sunset of the 3d of September, Mr. Bennet and I saw a herd of many hundred sheep and goats driven to this spring by Mexicans for water, although the creek still had a fillet of clear water running, and the pond in the old field was filled nearly to its brim; they still preferred the old source.

Finally, it must be borne in mind, that the name of Pecos, in the language of its former inhabitants and of those of Jemez, is "aqiu," and that, in an anonymous report of the expedition of Coronado from the year 1541, Cicuye is spelt Acuique.[149]

Castaneda gives some few details concerning the mode of life and the customs of the inhabitants. Aside from those which I have already mentioned, he notices the ladders (p. 176); that at night the inhabitants kept watch on the walls, the guard calling each other by means of "trumpets" (p. 179); that the unmarried females went naked until their marriage (p. 177); that the pueblo could muster 500 warriors (p. 176); and finally, that it was situated in a narrow valley in the midst of mountains covered with pines, and traversed by a small river where excellent trout is caught; very large otters, bears, and good hawks are found there (p. 179). The inhabitants received Alvarado with the sound of "drums and flutes, similar to fifes, which they use often."

They presented to him a great quant.i.ty of cloth and turquoises, which are common in this province (p. 72). I must here add that the turquoise mines of "Serrillos" are, in a direct line, only about twenty miles nearly west of Pecos, in a country between the former pueblos of the Tanos and those of the Tehuas. I have seen splendid specimens of the mineral from that locality, and Mr. Thurston found and I have sent on a perforated bead of bluish color which he picked up among the rubbish of the house _B_.

When, in 1543, Coronado left Nuevo Mexico with his whole army to return to Mexico, two ecclesiastics remained there,--Fray Juan de Padilla, who was subsequently killed by the Indians near Gran Quivira,[150] and a lay brother called Luis, who took up his abode at Pecos. Before Coronado left Bernalillo ("Tiguex"), he sent to brother Luis the remainder of the sheep. He was then of good cheer, but still expected to be killed some day by the old men of the tribe, who hated him, although the people were friendly to him in general.[151] Nothing was afterward heard of him.

Thus Pecos was the first "mission" in New Mexico; perhaps, also, the first place where domestic quadrupeds became introduced.

Forty years elapse before we again hear of Pecos. The unfortunate father, Augustin Ruiz, who, in 1581, attempted to convert the pueblos, did not reach further north than Puaray, where the Tiguas killed him, with his two companions.[152] But Antonio de Espejo, who, with fourteen soldiers, explored New Mexico in 1582 and 1583, visited Pecos. There can be no doubt but that the pueblos of the "Hubates"--two journeyings of six leagues to the east of the "Quires"--are the Pecos and the "Tamos,"

the Tanos.[153] Espejo is very liberal in his estimates: he gives to the "Hubates" five towns with 25,000 inhabitants, and to the "Tamos" even 40,000 souls. He says they had cotton cloth; he also says there was much good pine and cedar in their country, and that their houses were four and five stories high. His visit to the pueblo was of very short duration.

In 1590, Gaspar Castano de la Sosa, "being then Lieutenant-Governor and Captain-General of the kingdom of New Leon," made a raid into New Mexico. It is possible that the pueblo which he came to on the 11th January, 1591, may have been Pecos.[154]

The "Spanish conquest of New Mexico" proper took place in the years 1597 and 1598, under Don Juan de Onate. He met with little opposition, and his conquest amounted to little else than a military occupation, followed by the foundation of Santa Fe. On the 25th of July, 1598, he went to "the great pueblo of Pecos,"[155] and on the 9th of September, 1598, in the "princ.i.p.al _estufa_" of the pueblo of San Juan, the Pecos pledged fidelity to the crown of Spain. On the same occasion, Fray Francisco de San Miguel became the first regular priest of the pueblo.[156] Here terminates the second period of the second epoch; and the last one begins where the history of the Pecos tribe, whatever is left of it, becomes almost exclusively doc.u.mentary.[157]

Before, however, leaving this period, I must recall here two facts elicited by the reports of the forays and travels above mentioned. One is, that the Pecos Indians, however warlike they may have been towards outsiders, still were of an orderly, gentle disposition in every-day intercourse. This is a natural consequence of their organization and degree of development. The other and more important one is, that Pecos was the most easterly pueblo in existence in 1540, and that even at that time it was quite alone.

Castaneda says (p. 188): "In order to understand how the country is inhabited in the centre of the mountains, we must remember that from Chichilticah, where they begin, there are eighty leagues; thence to Cicuye, which is the last village, they reckon seventy leagues, and thirty from Cicuye to the beginning of the plains."

Juan Jaramillo, another eye-witness of "Coronado's march," intimates a similar fact.[158]

In regard to Pecos being "quite alone," Castaneda is positive; so is Juan de Onate, who received and registered its submission. It is true, however, that Castaneda mentions a small pueblo as subject to Cicuye, which pueblo, however, he says was half destroyed at his time. He locates it "between the road and the Sierra Nevada."[159] This may have been the small ruin noticed near Kingman.

These facts are very interesting in their bearings upon the older ruins of Pecos. It goes far towards furnis.h.i.+ng additional proof that they were indeed abandoned and decayed already in 1540. In regard to building _B_, it is ignored in the reports, _A_, with its vast court and its _estufas_, claiming exclusive attention. Still there is no room left for doubt that _B_ was occupied during this period. But it is evident, from the statements of the eye-witnesses, that _A_ was the princ.i.p.al abode of the Pecos tribe in 1540 and afterwards.

THE DOc.u.mENTARY PERIOD,

commencing in 1598, and running up to the present time. Here we should be ent.i.tled to find, of course, ample and detailed doc.u.mentary evidence.

Two unfortunate occurrences, however, have contributed to destroy the records of the territory of New Mexico.

In the month of August, 1680, when the pueblo Indians rose in successful revolt against the Spanish rule, and captured the "villa" of Santa Fe, they brought the archives, ecclesiastical and civil, into the plaza, and made a bonfire of the entire pile. This was an act of barbarous warfare.

But few papers escaped the general destruction; these were saved by Governor Don Antonio de Otermin, and sent to El Paso del Norte, where they are still supposed to remain. We are, therefore, as far as the period of 1598-1680 is concerned, almost exclusively reduced to general works like the "Teatro Mexicano" of Fray Augustin de Vetancurt, and to the collections of doc.u.ments published at Mexico and at Madrid. That, nevertheless, some doc.u.ments were saved, and subsequently carried back to Santa Fe, is proved by the fact that Mr. Louis Felsenthal, of this city, has recovered one, a copy of which it is hoped will appear in the Journal of the Inst.i.tute in time.

Subsequent to the return of the Spaniards, the archives of Santa Fe were kept in good order by its administrators, the last revision thereof being made by Governor Donaciano Vigil. In 1870, however, the man who then acted as Governor of the Territory, although otherwise of irreproachable character, permitted an act of vandalism almost without its parallel. The archives had acc.u.mulated in the palace to a vast extent: the original good order in which they were kept had been totally neglected during and since the war of secession; there was not even a custodian for them. So the head of the executive of this territory suffered its archives to be sold as waste paper, even sometimes used as kindling in the offices. Of the entire carefully nursed doc.u.mentary treasures, the acc.u.mulation of 190 years, the Hon. Samuel Ellison, of this city (notwithstanding his feeble health), has been able to register about fifty bundles (_legajos_), whereas wagon-loads were scattered or sold for wrapping.

Many of the intelligent inhabitants attempted to save what they could, and there are some who succeeded to a limited extent; but of what yet remained in the palace, reduced to a sufficiently small bulk as not to be "in the way" any longer, even the valuable journals of Otermin and Vargas were considerably reduced through further decay.

This has been, in times of profound peace and in the nineteenth century, the fate of the archives of New Mexico.

Ever since, the legislature of the territory has been, in fact, utterly neglectful of its public doc.u.ments. Each and every reminder in the shape of a pet.i.tion has been disregarded, and only Governor L. Wallace has at last succeeded in having them overhauled. Hon. W. G. Ritch effected their removal to a suitable place, and it is to the acts of these gentlemen, and to the labor of love of Mr. Ellison, that we owe the preservation of what now remains.

What little doc.u.mentary evidence has, therefore, been left at my disposal, contains, as might be supposed, meagre information concerning the pueblo of Pecos. The older church annals I have not been able to find, for those at the Plaza de Pecos date back only to 1862. Whither they have gone I am unable to tell, except that they are not at Santa Fe.

About the year 1628, through the action of Fray Francisco de Apodaca,[160] then Commissary-General of the Franciscan order in Mexico, religious life in this territory obtained a new impulse. Until then the work performed had been almost exclusively missionary work; the priests had (and still have) enormous districts to visit. Thus: that of the first priest of Pecos embraced from N. to S. a country of over 60 miles long, and 30 to 50 wide from E. to W. However, after Fray Geronimo de Zarate Salmeron had addressed to his superior at Mexico his remarkable report in the year 1626,[161] a new life began. It is therefore after 1629 that the large church at Pecos was erected, but I am as yet unable to give the exact dates. This church and the "convent" were both built by Indians, whom the fathers had taught to square timbers, to ornament them with simple friezes and scroll-work, and to make adobe in the manner now practised, namely, mixing straw with the clay and moulding it in boxes. They were also taught to grow wheat and oats, and their flocks increased. In addition to being a horticultural people they became herders, and the pueblo was prosperous. Its church was renowned as the finest in New Mexico.[162] Whereas Santa Fe, in 1667, had but 250 inhabitants,[163] Pecos, as late as 1680, sheltered 2,000 Indians.[164]

Still, during this very time of comparative prosperity, a storm was brewing in New Mexico, from whose effects its sedentary Indians never recovered. This was the great rebellion of 1680. The Indians of Pecos claim to have remained neutral during that b.l.o.o.d.y ma.s.sacre, and I am inclined to believe their statements. Nevertheless, it is a positive fact that, on the 10th of August of the aforesaid year, their priest, Fray Fernando de Velasco, was murdered and their church sacked.[165] By whom, then, was it done? The reply is intimated by the place where the great bell was found, and by the events intervening between 1680 and 1692, when Diego de Vargas recaptured Santa Fe. It will be remembered that the bell was left on the slope of the high mesa towards the S.W., in the rocky and desolate gorge descending towards the pueblo San Cristobal, the old home of the Tanos tribe.[166] Father Jose Amanda Niel writes, about twenty-five or thirty years after the rebellion, that the Tanos secured the greatest part of the booty, among which were bells (_campanas_).[167] That this bell was not carried to the high _mesa_ by the Pecos I believe I have proved; its proximity to the Tanos village, and its actual position in the _canada_ leading towards the latter, shows that it was either to be carried down to it or carried up from it.

If it is (as current report has it) the bell of Pecos, then it was a trophy which the Tanos secured when they, on the 10th of August, 1680, committed the atrocities at the pueblo of Pecos; and this would make it extremely probable, also, that the slaughter of Father Velasco was accompanied by that partial destruction of the buildings _A_ and B_,_ which I have described, and which appears to have been partly repaired by means of material taken from the church, and of adobe containing wheat-straw. This is rendered more likely by the events subsequent to the driving out of the Spaniards, and it does not appear that the Pecos Indians took any part even in their expulsion.

After the victorious aborigines had returned from their pursuit of Otermin, dissensions arose among them, and intertribal warfare, in conformity with their pristine condition, set in. The Pecos, aided by the Queres, made a violent onslaught on the Tanos, compelling them to abandon San Cristobal and San Lazaro.[168] This looks very much like an act of retaliation. During that time the Spaniards were not idle. In 1682, Governor Otermin penetrated as far as Cochiti,[169] but appears to have taken no notice of Pecos. In 1689, however, Don Domingo Gironza Petroz de Cruzate made a successful raid into New Mexico, in which raid the warriors of Pecos a.s.sisted him against the other tribes. In reward of their services he, on the 25th of September, 1689, after his return to El Paso del Norte, executed there the doc.u.ment a copy of which is hereto appended, and for which I am indebted to the kindness of my friend David J. Miller, Esq., chief clerk of the Surveyor General's Office at Santa Fe. It is a grant to the tribe of Pecos of all the lands one league north, south, east, and west from their pueblo ("una legua en cuadro"), therefore four square leagues, or 18,763-33/100 acres, to be therefore their joint and common property. When, therefore, in the afternoon of the 17th of October, 1692, Diego de Vargas Zapata, having recaptured Santa Fe from the Tanos who then held its ruins,[170] moved upon Pecos, he was received by the whole tribe with demonstrations of joy,[171] and the "capitan de la guerra" of the pueblo afterwards a.s.sisted him in subduing a second outbreak in 1694.[172]

The result for the pueblos of the great revolt in New Mexico was a gradual diminution in the numbers of their inhabitants. It was the beginning of decline. The Tanos had been in some places nearly exterminated, and all the others more or less weakened.[173] The distant Moqui, far off in Arizona, were the sole gainers by the occurrence, receiving accessions from fugitives of New Mexico.[174] But it would be incorrect to attribute this weakening of the pueblos during that time to the warfare with the Spaniards, or to the latter's retaliatory measures after final triumph. Vargas was energetic in action, but not cruel. A few of those who had committed peculiar atrocities were executed, but the remnants of the pueblos were reestablished in their franchises and privileges as autonomous communities. It is the intertribal warfare, which commenced again as soon as the aborigines were left to themselves, and drouth accompanying the bitter and b.l.o.o.d.y feuds, which destroyed the pueblos of the Rio Grande Valley.[175] The Pecos, isolated and therefore less exposed, suffered proportionately less; still, their time was come also, though in a different way.[176]

I have already stated that, in the beginning of the eighteenth century, the Utes introduced near the pueblo of Taos another branch of the great Shoshone stock,--the _Comanches_. This tribe soon expelled the Apaches,[177] who had not been exceedingly troublesome to the pueblos, and, a vigorous northern stock, became that fearful scourge of all the surrounding settlements, which they have continued to be for 150 years.

Their efforts were mainly directed against the pueblo of Pecos, as the most south-easterly village exposed to their attacks. On one occasion the Comanches slaughtered all the "young men" of Pecos but one,--a blow from which the tribe never recovered. Thus, when the Indians of the Rio Grande rose in arms against the Mexicans in 1837, as has been so ably described by Mr. D. J. Miller,[178] the Pecos did not take any part, for there were only eighteen adults left, huddled together in the northern wing of the huge building _A_, and watching the sacred embers in the face of slow, inevitable destruction.

Then, in the following year, 1838, an event took place which, simple and natural as it is, still ill.u.s.trates forcibly the powerful link which the bond of language creates between distant Indian communities. The pueblos of Pecos and Jemez had been almost without intercourse for centuries; but in the year 1838, says Mariano Ruiz, the princ.i.p.al men of Jemez appeared in person on the site of Pecos and held a talk with its occupants. They had heard of the weakness of their brethren, of their forlorn condition, and now came to offer them a new home within the walls of their own pueblo. The Pecos took the proposal under consideration, but were loth to leave the home where they had lived for so many centuries. In the following year "mountain fever" broke out among them, and only five adults remained alive. These, by joint indentures, sold the majority of the lands granted to them in 1689 by Cruzate.[179] Another portion was left to Ruiz as "son of the tribe." In 1840 these five men, named respectively Antonio (_gobernador_, and still living at Jemez), Gregorio, Goya, Juan Domingo, and Francisco, appeared before Don Manuel Armijo, then Mexican governor of the territory, and declared to him their intention to abandon their home and to seek refuge among their kindred at Jemez. Soon after, the _gobernador_, the _capitan de la guerra_ and the _cacique_ of Jemez, with several other Indians of that tribe, appeared at Pecos. The sacred embers disappeared, tradition being, according to the Hon. W. G. Ritch, Secretary of the Territory, that they were returned to Montezuma.[180] The remnants of the tribe moved on with their chattels, and guided by their friends, to Jemez, where, in a few months, I hope to visit "the last of the Pecos."

MISCELLANEOUS OBSERVATIONS.

About the mythology of the Pecos Indians, aside from the Montezuma story and the sacred embers, the tale of the _Great Snake_ ("la vivora grande") appears to be widely circulated. It is positively a.s.serted[181]

that the Pecos adored, and the Jemez and Taos still adore, an enormous rattlesnake, which they keep alive in some inaccessible and hidden mountain recess. It is even dimly hinted at that human sacrifices might be a.s.sociated with this already sufficiently hideous cult. I give these facts as they were given to me, and shall not believe them until I am compelled. It has always been the natural tendency in everything which (like the idolatrous practices still existing among the pueblos, of which there is no doubt) we do not positively know, to make bad look worse and good better than it actually is. The prospect of securing a knowledge of it is, however, not very good. The Indians themselves appear to deny it, and are generally very reticent about their aboriginal beliefs.

I have previously mentioned that Ruiz had been called upon by the Indians of Pecos to do his duty by attending to the sacred fire for one year, and that he refused. The reason for his refusal appears to have been that there was a belief to the effect that any one who had ever attended to the embers would, if he left the tribe, die without fail, and he did not wish to expose himself to such a fate.

About the social organization of the Pecos Indians, it has not been possible, of course, to ascertain anything as yet. That they lived on the communal plan is plainly shown by the construction of their houses.

That they were originally, at least, organized into clans or _gentes_, can be inferred; but here I must remark that it may be difficult to trace those cl.u.s.ters among the Rio Grande pueblos, on account of their weakness in numbers, and of the intermixture of the Tehua, Tanos, and Queres stocks resulting from the convulsion of 1680. It may be possible, however, to find them at Jemez. They exist at Laguna and among the Moquis, according to Mr. Morgan, and I do not doubt but that Mr.

Cus.h.i.+ng, who is so thoroughly studying the Zuni Indians, has by this time settled the question for that tribe. One fact, however, I consider to be ascertained; namely, that there were neither castes nor cla.s.ses among the pueblos, therefore not at Pecos. At the head of their communal government were the usual three officers,--the _gobernador_, the _capitan de la guerra_, and the _cacique_. I am not quite clear yet as to the proper functions of each, except that the first two are both warriors ("ambos son guerreros," Ruiz); that the _capitan_ has also the supervision of the lands of the tribe; and that the _cacique_ is more or less a religious functionary. Mr. D. J. Miller states that the latter very seldom leaves the pueblo. It was therefore an unusual act when the _cacique_ of Jemez came to Pecos in 1840, and I presume it was brought about through his connection with the holy fire. I asked Sr. Ruiz very distinctly as to whether these three officers were elective or not, and he promptly affirmed that they were ("son elegidos por el pueblo"). I then inquired if the sons succeeded to the fathers in office, and his reply was that there was no objection to their being elected thereto if they were qualified ("si son buenos"). This disposes of the question of heredity in office, rank, and t.i.tle, and it is almost identical with the customs found by Alonzo de Zuevita among the Indians of Mexico in the middle of the sixteenth century. How the presumable "gentes" of the Pecos might have localized for dwelling in the great communal houses I am, of course, unable to conjecture.

In regard to their marriage customs, their mode of naming children, etc., I have not been able to gather much information as yet. The old marriage customs are supplanted by those of the church. Still, they may be traced up eventually. Every Pecos Indian had, besides his Spanish name, an Indian name; and there is, according to Mr. Ritch, still a Pecos Indian at Jemez whose aboriginal appellation is "Huaja-toya"

(Spanish p.r.o.nunciation). I heard of him this morning (Sept. 17) through an Indian of Jemez. What I know of their burials is already stated.

Of their agriculture, or rather horticulture, I have also spoken; the modes of cultivation have not been explained to me as yet. Irrigation is therefore the only part of their tillage system upon which I have been able to gather any information. In addition to what the preceding pages may contain, Sr. Vigil has a.s.sured me that they also irrigated their _huerta_ from the _arroyo_. This thin fillet of clear water, now scarcely 0.50 m.--20 in.--in width, fills at times its entire gravelly bed, 100 m. to 150 m.--327 ft. to 490 ft.--from bank to bank. This does not occur annually, but at irregular intervals. Sr. Ruiz said that while the Pecos Indians were living at their pueblo the streams were filled with water ("en ese tiempo, corrieron los arroyos con agua, muy abundante"). It is further said that the tribe worked other "gardens"

besides, on the banks of the river Pecos, two miles to the east.

For their arts and industry I must refer to the collections, however meagre and unsatisfactory they are; a condition for which I have already apologized. Nowhere did I find a trace of iron nor of copper, although they used the latter for ornaments (bracelets, etc.), and there can be no doubt that they had the former metal also,--after the Spanish conquest, of course. The squaring of timbers, the scroll-work and friezes in the church, could only be done with instruments of iron. But all traces of these implements have disappeared from the ruins, as far as the surface is concerned. I cannot refrain, however, from dwelling at greater length upon two products of industry, so common among the ruins as hardly to attract the attention of curiosity-hunters any more.

These are the flakes of obsidian and lava and the painted pottery.

I have called these flakes a product of industry; while the material itself is of course a mineral, the fragments scattered about are undoubted products of skill. They are chips and splinters. There is neither lava nor obsidian cropping out in or about the valley,[182] but highly volcanic formations are abundantly found to the north, within fifty miles from Pecos, in the high Sierra de Mora; perhaps, also, nearer yet. At all events, the mineral has been brought to the pueblo and chipped there. The same is the case with the flint flakes, agates, jaspers, and moss-agates, with the difference, however, that, in the case of these, water has done a great part of the carrying, if not all; whereas the drift of the _arroyo_ contains no obsidian nor lava, except such as has clearly been washed into it from the ruins. Among the flakes there will be noticed several which may have been used for knives, whereas still others approximate to the arrow-head. A small perfect arrow-head was found and transmitted by me to the Inst.i.tute,--the only one I met with on the premises.[183]

The fact that several localities at Pecos are completely devoid of obsidian has already been mentioned. These are the oldest ruins. In the case of the ruins along the mesa and those south of the church, I can only speak of the surface; but where the corrugated pottery was found the whole section of the bluff was exposed for more than 100 m.--327 ft.,--and still not a trace of the mineral appeared, while flint, agate, and jasper were rather conspicuous.[184] This may be accidental, but it is certainly suspicious and suggestive.