Turquoise in the Southwest

                                       Navajo matriarch wearing her heirloom turquoise jewelry
                                                 

                                                  

            The use of turquoise among the natives of America was originally limited to the area bordered by the Isthmus of Panama on one side and by a line drawn eastwardly from the Pacific Coast through southern Nevada and Colorado, then south across Texas to the Gulf of Mexico.  In prehistoric cultures of the Americas we find no important turquoise deposits outside of these boundaries.  The abundance of turquoise beads in early sites in the Southwest, as opposed to their absence in other parts of North America, indicates that the original pueblo dwellers did not travel east to trade and had little communication with Indians in the northern, southern, or eastern United States.  They tended to trade via routes to South America or California where specimens of New Mexican turquoise have been unearthed.

            Turquoise was extensively used by aboriginal peoples for several reasons:

1. Turquoise occurred close to the surface so deposits were readily located by the first people.
2. The mineral is relatively soft and easily worked by primitive methods.
3. The colors of turquoise range from the blues of sky and water to the greens of plant and tree.  That held a mystical appeal for Native Americans.

There are numerous turquoise sources, both ancient and modern.  While most of them are now mined by outside operations, it is believed that certain tribes have secret localities known only to themselves where turquoise is still found and used for esoteric purposes. Contemporary Indians, however, do not engage in any systemic mining for turquoise and usually acquire it from itinerant traders, trading posts on the reservation or lapidary supply stores in the bordering towns. 

Within the pueblos and among the Dine people (Navajo), turquoise beads and fetishes have been cherished as part of the family’s wealth and history.  Turquoise deposits of any significance show signs of early exploitation.  The best example is Los Cerillos in New Mexico where excavations date back to pre-Spanish times. The sources of turquoise in the Southwest are easy to document, but difficult to trace down the old trade routes to Mexico and Central America.  In ancient times, there was no meaningful supply south of the Mexican border.  It is surmised that the Aztecs traded with pueblos to acquire turquoise that came from the Cerillos hills and other deposits in the Southwest.  Today this has changed and miners are finding excellent turquoise deposits such as Campo Frio and Nacozari in Mexico.  

                                            Pueblo Indian cutting and polishing rough turquoise

Cabeza deVaca was the first European to record the use of turquoise among the pueblos of Arizona and New Mexico.  In 1535, with three friends, he made the journey from Texas to Sonora on the Pacific Coast that ultimately led to the discovery of New Mexico by the Spanish.  Traveling near the Pacific Coast he was presented with turquoise beads by the natives.  Among the Sierra Madre Indians, about ninety miles east of the Yaqui River in Sonora, deVaca found Indians in possession of turquoise fetishes and beads.  These Indians explained that it was acquired to the north in exchange for parrot feathers and shells.

In 1539, Fray Marcos de Niza in company with Estevan the Black traveled northward as far as present day New Mexico searching for the legendary ‘Seven Cities of Gold,’ also called ‘Seven Cities of Cibola.’  At Rio San Pedro in southern Arizona, the last region of village Indians before the Pueblo of Zuni, he discovered that the Sobaipuris Indians wore great quantities of turquoise beads.  As he neared Cibola (Zuni) he came upon a village at the edge of the desert where the people wore turquoise beads and pendants called ‘cacona’ suspended from their ears and nostrils.  The wearing of these ornaments was called ‘casconados.’  He was told that these beads abounded in Cibola as well as at Marata (the ruined pueblo also called ‘Makyata’ near Zuni), at Acus (the present Pueblo of Acoma), and at Tontonteac (the Tusayan or Hopi lands to the northwest of Zuni).

 The so called ‘Seven Cities of Gold’ were actually a group of adobe pueblos, now in ruins, centered about the present Pueblo of Zuni.  Fray Marcos and Estevan arrived at sunset and the setting sun shining on the adobe created the illusion of gold, so feverishly sought by the early explorers.  They ran crazed into the pueblo, screaming about gold  but there was none.  Instead of gold they were disillusioned to discover the natives valued turquoise above all else and used it as a medium of exchange.  The Indians thought they were crazy.

Coming soon: Coronado in  the Southwest, Pueblo Bonito, Prototype of the Ancient Bead-makers, Plains Indian Medicine Bundles.

                     Inlaid turquoise earrings by Angie Reano Owen of Santo Domingo Pueblo