Hopi

The Hopi are Native Americans who primarily live in northeastern Arizona. The majority are enrolled in the Hopi Tribe of Arizona and live on the Hopi Reservation in northeastern Arizona; however, some Hopi people are enrolled in the Colorado River Indian Tribes of the Colorado River Indian Reservation at the border of Arizona and California.
The 2010 U.S. census states that about 19,338 US citizens self-identify as being Hopi.
The Hopi language belongs to the Uto-Aztecan language family.
Hopi organize themselves into matrilineal clans. Children are born into the clan of their mother. Clans extend across all villages. Children are named by the women of the father's clan. After the child is introduced to the Sun, the women of the paternal clan gather, and name the child in honor of the father's clan. Children can be given over 40 names. The village members collectively decide the common name. Current practice is to use a non-Hopi or English name or the parent's chosen Hopi name. A person may also change the name upon initiation to traditional religious societies, or a major life event.
The Hopi understand their land to be sacred and understand their role as caretakers of the land that they inherited from their ancestors. Agriculture is significant to their lifeways and economy. Precontact architecture reflects early Hopi society and perceptions of home and family. Many Hopi homes share traits of neighboring Pueblo tribes. Early communal structures, especially Pueblo Great Houses, include living rooms, storage rooms, and religious sanctuaries, called kivas. Each of these rooms allowed for specific activities.
The Hopi encountered Spaniards in the 16th century, and are historically referred to as Pueblo people, because they lived in villages. The Hopi are thought to be descended from the Ancestral Pueblo people, who constructed large apartment-house complexes and had an advanced culture that spanned the present-day Four Corners region of the United States, comprising southeastern Utah, northeastern Arizona, northwestern New Mexico, and southwestern Colorado. It is thought that Hopi people descend from those
Ancestral Puebloan settlements along the Mogollon Rim of northern Arizona.
Hopi villages are now located atop mesas in northern Arizona. The Hopi originally settled near the foot of the mesas but in the course of the 17th century moved to the mesa tops for protection from the Utes, Apaches, and Spanish.
On December 16, 1882, President Chester A. Arthur passed an executive order creating an Indian reservation for the Hopi. It was smaller than the surrounding land that was annexed by the Navajo Reservation, which is the largest reservation in the country.
As of 2005 the Hopi Reservation is entirely surrounded by the much larger Navajo Reservation. As the result of land disputes from 1940 to 1970 or earlier, the two nations used to share the government designated Navajo–Hopi Joint Use Area, but this continued to be a source of conflict. The partition of this area, commonly known as Big Mountain, by Acts of Congress in 1974 and 1996, but as of 2008 has also resulted in long-term controversy.
On October 24, 1936, the Hopi Tribe ratified its constitution, creating a unicameral government where all powers are vested in a Tribal Council. The powers of the executive branch and judicial branch, are limited. The traditional powers and authority of the Hopi Villages were preserved in the 1936 Constitution.

Name

The primary meaning of the word Hopi is "behaving one, one who is mannered, civilized, peaceable, polite, who adheres to the Hopi Way." Some sources contrast this to other warring tribes that subsist on plunder. Hopi is a concept deeply rooted in the culture's religion, spirituality, and its view of morality and ethics. To be Hopi is to strive toward this concept, which involves a state of total reverence for all things, peace with these things, and life in accordance with the instructions of Maasaw, the Creator or Caretaker of Earth. The Hopi observe their religious ceremonies for the benefit of the entire world.

Early history

Oraibi

Old Oraibi is one of four original Hopi villages. It was founded before A.D. 1100 and is one of the oldest continuously inhabited villages within the territory of the United States. In the 1540s the village was recorded as having 1,500 to 3,000 residents.

Early European contact, 1540–1680

The first recorded European contact with the Hopi was by the Spanish in 1540. Spanish General Francisco Vásquez de Coronado went to North America to explore the land. While at the Zuni villages, he learned of the Hopi tribe. Coronado dispatched Pedro de Tovar and other members of their party to find the Hopi villages. The Spanish wrote that the first Hopi village they visited was Awatovi. They noted that there were about 16,000 Hopi and Zuni people. A few years later, the Spanish explorer García López de Cárdenas investigated the Rio Grande and met the Hopi. They warmly entertained Cardenas and his men and directed him on his journey.
In 1582–1583 the Hopi were visited by Antonio de Espejo's expedition. He noted that there were five Hopi villages and around 12,000 Hopi people. During that period the Spanish explored and colonized the southwestern region of the New World, but never sent many forces or settlers to the Hopi country. Their visits to the Hopi were random and spread out over many years. Many times the visits were from military explorations.
The Spanish colonized near the Rio Grande and, because the Hopi did not live near rivers that gave access to the Rio Grande, the Spanish never left any troops on their land. The Spanish were accompanied by missionaries, Catholic friars. Beginning in 1629, with the arrival of 30 friars in Hopi country, the Franciscan Period started. The Franciscans had missionaries assigned and built a church at Awatovi.

Pueblo Revolt of 1680

Spanish Franciscan priests were only marginally successful in converting the Hopi and persecuted them for adhering to Hopi religious practices. The Spanish occupiers enslaved the Hopi populace, forcing them to labor and hand over goods and crops. Spanish oppression and attempts to convert the Hopi caused the Hopi over time to become increasingly intolerant towards their occupiers. The documentary record shows evidence of Spanish abuses. In 1655, a Franciscan priest by the name of Salvador de Guerra beat to death a Hopi man named Juan Cuna. As punishment, Guerra was removed from his post on the Hopi mesas and sent to Mexico City. In 1656, a young Hopi man by the name of Juan Suñi was sent to Santa Fe as an indentured servant because he impersonated the resident priest Alonso de Posada at Awatovi, an act believed to have been carried out in the spirit of Hopi clowning. During the period of Franciscan missionary presence, the only significant conversions took place at the pueblo of Awatovi. In the 1670s, the Rio Grande Pueblo Indians put forward the suggestion to revolt in 1680 and garnered Hopi support.
The Pueblo Revolt was the first time that diverse Pueblo groups had worked in unison to drive out the Spanish colonists. In the Burning of Awatovi, Spanish soldiers, local Catholic Church missionaries, friars, and priests were all put to death, and the churches and mission buildings were dismantled stone by stone. It took two decades for the Spanish to reassert their control over the Rio Grande Pueblos but the Catholic Inquisition never made it back to Hopiland. In 1700, the Spanish friars had begun rebuilding a smaller church at Awatovi. During the winter of 1700–1701, teams of men from the other Hopi villages sacked Awatovi at the request of the village chief, killed all the men of the village, and removed the women and children to other Hopi villages, then completely destroyed the village and burned it to the ground. Thereafter, despite intermittent attempts during the 18th century, the Spanish never re-established a presence in Hopi country.

Hopi-U.S. relations, 1849–1946

In 1849, James S. Calhoun was appointed official Indian agent of Indian Affairs for the Southwest Territory of the U.S. He had headquarters in Santa Fe and was responsible for all of the Indian residents of the area. The first formal meeting between the Hopi and the U.S. government occurred in 1850 when seven Hopi leaders made the trip to Santa Fe to meet with Calhoun. They wanted the government to provide protection against the Navajo, a Southern Athabascan-speaking tribe who were distinct from Apaches. At this time, the Hopi leader was Nakwaiyamtewa.
The US established Fort Defiance in 1851 in Arizona, and placed troops in Navajo country to deal with their threats to the Hopi. General James J. Carleton, with the assistance of Kit Carson, was assigned to travel through the area. They "captured" the Navajo people and forced them to the fort. As a result of the Long Walk of the Navajo, the Hopi enjoyed a short period of peace.
In 1847, Mormons settled in Utah and tried to convert the Indians to Mormonism. Jacob Hamblin, a Mormon missionary, first made a trip into Hopi country in 1858. He was on good terms with the Hopi Indians, and in 1875 an LDS Church was built on Hopi land.

Education

In 1875, the English trader Thomas Keam escorted Hopi leaders to meet President Chester A. Arthur in Washington D.C. Loololma, village chief of Oraibi at the time, was very impressed with Washington. In 1887, a federal boarding school was established at Keams Canyon for Hopi children.
The Oraibi people did not support the school and refused to send their children from their villages. The Keams Canyon School was organized to teach the Hopi youth the ways of European-American civilization. It forced them to use English and give up their traditional ways. The children were made to abandon their tribal identity and completely take on European-American culture. Children were forced to give up their traditional names, clothing and language. Boys, who were also forced to cut their long hair, were taught European farming and carpentry skills. Girls were taught ironing, sewing, and "civilized" dining. The school also reinforced European-American religions. The American Baptist Home Mission Society made students attend services every morning and religious teachings during the week. In 1890, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Thomas Jefferson Morgan arrived in Hopi country with other government officials to review the progress of the new school. Seeing that few students were enrolled, they returned with federal troops who threatened to arrest the Hopi parents who refused to send their children to school, with Morgan forcibly taking children to fill the school.