Page 107 - TheHopiIndians

MESA FOLK OP HOPILAND 99

When the roof is finished the women put a thick
coating of mud on the floor and plaster the walls. At
'/Aim floors are nearly always made of slabs of stone,
but in Hopi mud is the rule. The process of plaster
ing a floor is interesting to an onlooker. Clay dag
from under the cliffs, crushed and softened in water
and tempered with sand is smeared on the floor with
the hand, a little area at a time. The floor may be
dry and occasionally the mud gets too hard ; a dash of
water corrects this. When the mud dries to the
proper stage, it is rubbed with a smooth stone having
a flat face, giving the completed floor a fine finish like
pottery. As an extra finish to the room a dado is
painted around the wall, in a wash of red ocher by
means of a rabbit skin used as a brush. Formerly a
small space on the wall was left unplastered; it was
believed that a kachina came and finished it, and al
though the space remained bare it was considered cov
ered with invisible mud.
Before the house can be occupied the builder pre
pares four feathers for its dedication. He ties the
nakwakwoci or breath feathers to a willow twig, the
end of which is inserted over one of the central roof-
beams. The builder also appeases Masauah, the God
of Death, by an offering in which the house is "fed"
by putting fragments of food among the rafters or in
a niche in the door lintels, beseeching the god not to
hasten the departure of any of the family to the un
derworld. At the feast of Soyaluna in December, the