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Four Sacred
Plants are assigned to the cardinal points, and amongst the Navajos Maize is the
plant of the North, Beans of the east. This means that both are male and as both
are grown for edible seeds, recognition of the physiological function of the male
was probably involved in the selection. This is entirely possible since the convention
could have been established only very late, after settlement in America. Squash,
for the Navajos, is the plant of the South, which is fitting since its fruit is
called "eight-sided" and the eight-sided earth (an alternative to the
square earth, taking account of the diagonal directions) is female. Also the stalk
is angled in sections, a feature deliberately exaggerated when the plant is depicted
in sand paintings, and crooked things are female. Tobacco, which the Navajos put
on the west, is female because it is used to make smoke which is blown out with
the breath, and that is female. Below the Plants are white roots, the significance
being that these plants still have their roots in the lower world.
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