Navajo Humpback Yei Vessel - Jonathan Black (#050)

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About the artist:

Jonathan Black, the sixth son of Mary Holiday and Jesse Black, is married to Alicia Nelson. Jonathan is the reserved type. As individuals, and as a couple, they are two of the most dynamic and inspired contemporary Navajo basket weavers. See full biography | See all items by Jonathan Black

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Navajo Baskets See all items in this category

Related legends:

Corn Spirits in Navajo Mythology

Then it was that they moved upward, leaving the dark world behind. They climbed on top of the Four Mountains, which grew upward with them, and they all moved up onto a lighter world. The Wind People brought seeds into the new world, and they planted them:?

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Hunchback God
Hunchback God (ya'ackidi') (P) is possibly so called because of the hump which represents the black bag he carries on his back, or because he is a deified mountain sheep. Matthews defines him as 'a god of harvest, a god of plenty, a god of mist.'
Stevenson says the hump is of clouds containing seeds of all vegetation. Sapir's text has the hump made of rainbow? More about this legend

Yeis
Every creature, every aspect of nature has its holy people . . . . even the stinkbug. Sometimes you can see them, if only for an instant. They are represented, some of them, by colors: the blue sky, the evening dusk, the night these are holy people and one prays to them. There are iron people, crystal people, then the other rocks " and such people." There are dawn people, twilight people, air, thunder, and cloud people. One does not talk about such things in nature when they and their holy people are present. More about this legend

Corn in Navajo Traditional Life

The Supernaturals also warn him of taboos connected with the use of corn. It should not be cooked until it is ripe nor eaten before it is fully cooked, or frost and floods will damage the crop. In the "vigil of the corn" ceremony the corn is fed with dried meat; if it were to be fed with corn it would thus consume itself, just as feeding meat to the masks would cause men to eat each other. When giving this warning Talking God refers to the time that ugly woman fed corn to the corn with result that " the people starved and men ate the flesh of other men."?

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Navajo Basketry

Basketry is a woman's industry, which is also pursued by the nadle (he changes), hermaphrodites, or men skilled in the arts and industries of both men and women. Basketry, however, is not classified with textile fabrics (yistl'o), but with sewing (nalkhad). It is of interest also that, while the basket is in progress, the sewer is untouched and avoided by the members of her family?

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Certificate of Authenticity

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