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[[image - photograph]]
[[caption]] Star designs of Yavapais [[/caption]]

mother or grandmother and then they just remember them. However, there is a question as to how much longer they will be remembered. In olden times, it is said that about six out of every ten women wove baskets. Today, there are not one-half of one per cent of the Pima women who are weavers, and I know only one girl under twenty years of age who weaves baskets. Every encouragement possible is being given to continue this craft, but the compensation for the time used in weaving a basket is the lowest of any occupation I know. As a result, this craft will soon be a lost art among the Pima people.

About fifty miles across the Salt River Valley to the north of the Pima country lie the rolling foothills of the Mazatzal Mountains. This the home of the Yavapai Indians. These are mountain people and in many ways quite different to the Pimas and Papagos who live in the desert country. The Yavapai are not inclined toward agriculture but lean more toward stock raising. In this they are limited by the poor condition of their range and the small acreage of their reservation. The Fort McDowell reservation contains only twenty-six thousand acres. At one time their tribal holdings amounted to twenty thousand square miles, or about thirteen square miles per person. The Yavapai are generally known as Mojave Apaches which is very confusing as it causes them to be regarded as a Apache band. As a matter of fact, they are a member of the Yuman family and are unrelated to the Apaches.

In the early history of Arizona, they were closely associated with the Apaches with whom they were friendly. They were hostile to the coming of the white man into Arizona and fought along with the Apaches to prevent it. In 1875, they were confined with several Apache bands on the Military Reserve at San Carlos and they were not released until 1900. In the olden times, the Yavapai were foragers who depended on wild food for their subsistence. In the summer they gathered and dried cactus fruit from the southwestern part of their vast domain. In the autumn they picked walnuts and pinon nuts in the higher elevations of the northeastern part of their country. All these foods they stored in caves in the Mazatzal Mountains where they lived during the winter months. From the above, it will be seen that they lived a more or less nomadic life.

The Yavapai had no horses so all their household effects had to be carried when they were on the trail. Their baskets formed a most important part of their equipment. Some of them were used for cooking. This was done by placing the acorn meal or meat with water in the basket and then dropping in heated stones until the food was cooked. These old cooking baskets are now extinct. They have been replaced by a more modern craft that is identical to that of the Apaches who live across the mountains to the east. I have asked the weavers of both tribes to account for this similarity in not only material and technique, but also in the decorative designs. The present-day wavers can offer no explanation but, apparently, the craft was developed during a time when the two tribes were closely associated. Whether or not this was during the period when both tribes were confined at San Carlos is not known to the Indians of either tribe.

[[image - photograph of a women tilling land]]
[[caption]] The Apaches, formerly fine basket weavers, have limited tillable land. [[/caption]]