In the summer of 1885 Stevenson arrived at Keam’s Canyon, Arizona, just before a nine-day Navajo healing ceremony drew some 1,200 people to the plateau. He records it day by day: the building of the medicine lodge, the songs, masks and turkey-feather wands, and the elaborate sand paintings made and erased over a man threatened with blindness. The language of the observer is that of 1880s ethnology.
An early first-hand account of Navajo ceremonial and sand painting, valuable to students of Native American religion and art. Download the free EPUB.