Religion

The Hopi conducted religious ceremonies all year long. The purpose of most of these rituals was to affect the weather and bring enough rain to ensure bountiful harvests. Kachinas played a major role in the Hopi religion. These guardian spirits, re-created in masks and dolls by

Hopi kachina doll

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The tribesmen, were also important in the religion of the ZUNI, another Pueblo people on the southern Colorado Plateau.

The Hopi believed that the kachinas were supernatural beings dwelling in their own world high up in the mountains to the west. Every year, at the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, the kachinas supposedly traveled to the world of humans, where they entered people’s bodies and stayed in residence until the summer solstice, the longest day of the year. Hopi men impersonated the kachinas with elaborate painted masks of wood, feathers, and other materials.

The masked kachina dancers performed at many festivals, such as the 16-day summer festival called the Niman Kachina. One of the many rain dances was the Snake Dance, performed last of all. The kachinas danced with live snakes wrapped around their necks and arms, and even in their mouths. At the end of the dance, they threw the snakes on a design made with corn meal. The snakes were released outside the pueblo, and the kachina dancers were sent off at the same time to bring cloudbursts of rain.

Scare-kachinas had faces with long teeth and bulging eyes. Hopi men wore scare-kachina masks to frighten children who had misbehaved.

Children could learn the names of the different kachi-nas, and what they stood for, through the dolls their fathers and grandfathers carved for them. These are known as kachina dolls, but a better description would be statues or god-figures. They are not for play, but to be treasured, studied, worshiped, and passed on to one’s own children.

The fear caused by the scare-kachinas, as well as great love and attention from their parents, helped the Hopi children grow up to be friendly and sharing. This was the Hopi Way: to be in balance with both nature and other people. If a child or adult acted with cruelty, he was shunned by others until he changed. But the Hopi Way also taught forgiveness.