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A sipapuni (sometimes "sipapu") is a "place of emergence" in the creation myths of a number of indigenous American peoples ("Indians"), specifically the region now known as the southwest United States (Arizona, New Mexico, the Grand Canyon). These tribes include the Zuni, Hopi, and Navajo.
A sipapuni can be literal indentation in the earth, perhaps created through a variety of geological processes, an artificial hole in a ritual space (a "kiva"), or simply a mythological idea. In the myths, a sipapuni is also a "hole in the sky". (The "sky" is viewed as a hard shell.) Proto-human entities move from realms of darkness or chaos through this hole, to escape to a "higher" world. In one myth, these entities are threatened by a great flood on all sides, and fly through a hole revealed to them by another being. Typically, the beings move through three worlds until they arrive at the fourth world, where they become human beings.
So the sipapuni allows humans to come "out" of the ground into the world of sunlight and human civilization.
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∙ 12y ago
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Why were the Hopi tribe in northern Arizona?
As far as we know, the Hopi have lived there as long as they have been Hopi, for at least 1100 years.This is what the Hopi say about why they live in the 12 villages on the three mesas in northern Arizona:When the Hopi emerged into the Fourth World from the Sipapuni in the Grand Canyon near where it meets the Little Colorado River, they met Ma'saw, guardian of the Fourth World. They made a spiritual pact with him. They, the Hopi, would act as stewards of the earth and place their footprints throughout the Fourth World as they migrated in a spiritual quest to find their destiny at the center of the universe. Hopi clans embarked on a long series of migrations throughout the Southwest and beyond, settling in various places, until, after many generations, they arrived at their rightful place on the Hopi mesas. It is a hard place to live which is what keeps them on the right path.Archaeologists and anthropologists say that some were living there when other ancient Pueblos people (Anasazi) lived all over the southwest. As the climate changed and those dwelling places were abandoned and clan by clan different groups joined the Hopi as new clans. The last group was in historic times. Some Tewa people came and joined them in 1680 after the Pueblo Revolt.The Hopi language is related to ones spoken as far north as Montana and Wyoming, as far west as California, as far south as southern Mexico and El Salvador and as far east as Texas. So perhaps they really did travel to all the four directions over many generations. Or perhaps they knew from trade and travel that their were people that must be related to them in some way and they are about in the center.
