The Tewa name for San Juan Pueblo is Ohke, the meaning of which is unknown. The word "pueblo" comes from the Spanish for "village." It refers both to a certain style of Southwest Indian architecture, characterized by multistory, apartment-like buildings made of adobe, and to the people themselves. Rio Grande pueblos are known as eastern Pueblos; Zuni, Hopi, and sometimes Acoma and Laguna are known as western Pueblos. A sacred metaphorical phrase meaning "village of the dew-bedecked corn structure" also refers to the San Juan Pueblo.
Location San Juan Pueblo is located about 25 miles north of Santa Fe, on the east bank of the Rio Grande. The land includes river bottomlands and mountains.
Population In 1990, almost 1,300 Indians lived on the Pueblo, out of a total population of 5,200. Roughly 300 people lived there in 1680.
Language The people spoke a dialect of Tewa.
Historical Information
History All Pueblo people are thought to be descended from Anasazi and perhaps Mogollon and several other ancient peoples. From them they learned architecture, farming, pottery, and basketry. Larger population groups became possible with effective agriculture and ways to store food surpluses. Within the context of a relatively stable existence, the people devoted increasing amounts of time and attention to religion, arts, and crafts. In prehistoric times, the Tewa were generally north and west of their present locations and have inhabited numerous prehistoric villages on both sides (though mostly the west side) of the Rio Grande and the Rio Chama. In the 1200s, the Anasazi abandoned their traditional canyon homelands in response to climatic and social upheavals. A century or two of migrations ensued, followed in general by the slow reemergence of their culture in the historic pueblos.
When the Spanish arrived in the 1540s, the San Juan people were living at the present pueblo and at a more westerly pueblo. The appearance of Gaspar Castano de Sosa in 1591 marked the first contact between San Juan and non-natives. In 1598, Juan de Onate arrived in the area with settlers, founding the colony of New Mexico. Onate carried on the process, already underway in nearby areas, of subjugating the local Indians; forcing them to pay taxes in crops, cotton, and work; and opening the door for Catholic missionaries to attack their religion. The Spanish renamed the Pueblo San Juan Bautista; it was also known as San Juan de los Caballeros. At the same time, they introduced such new crops as peaches, wheat, and peppers into the region. In 1620, a royal decree created civil offices at each pueblo; silver-headed canes, many of which remain in use today, symbolized the governor’s authority.
In 1680 Pueblo Indians organized and carried out a revolt against the Spanish. For years, the Spaniards had routinely tortured Indians for practicing traditional religion. They also forced the Indians to labor for them, sold Indians into slavery, and let their cattle overgraze Indian land, a situation that eventually led to drought, erosion, and famine. Pope of San Juan Pueblo and other Pueblo religious leaders planned the revolt, sending runners carrying cords of maguey fibers to mark the day of rebellion. On August 10, 1680, a virtually united stand on the part of the Pueblos drove the Spanish from the region. The Indians killed many Spaniards but refrained from mass slaughter, allowing them to leave Santa Fe for El Paso.
Although Pueblo unity did not last, and Santa Fe was officially reconquered in 1692, Spanish rule was notably less severe from then on. Harsh forced labor all but ceased, and the Indians reached an understanding with the Church that enabled them to continue practicing their traditional religion.
In general, the Pueblo eighteenth century was marked by smallpox epidemics and increased raiding by the Apache, Comanche, and Ute. Occasionally Pueblo Indians fought with the Spanish against the nomadic tribes. The people practiced their religion but more or less in secret. During this time, intermarriage and regular exchange between Hispanic villages and Pueblo Indians created a new New Mexican culture, neither strictly Spanish nor Indian, but rather somewhat of a blend between the two.
Mexican "rule" in 1821 brought little immediate change to the Pueblos. The Mexicans stepped up what had been a gradual process of appropriating Indian land and water, and they allowed the nomadic tribes even greater latitude to raid. A political rebellion by Indians and Hispanics in 1837 over the issue of taxes led to the assassination of the New Mexican governor and his brief replacement by a Plains/Taos Indian. As the presence of the United States in the area grew, it attempted to enable the Pueblo Indians to continue their generally peaceful and self-sufficient ways. Paradoxically, however, the U.S. decision to recognize Spanish land grants to the Pueblos (they recognized the grant to San Juan in 1858) denied Pueblo Indians certain rights granted under official treaties and left them particularly open to exploitation by squatters and thieves.
San Juan’s reputation as a center of trade was enhanced when a general store opened on the Pueblo in 1863 (see "Trade"). Farming and cattle raising were the other economic mainstays of the pueblo during this period.
Partly because of lobbying from the All Indian Pueblo Council, Congress confirmed Pueblo title to their lands in 1924 by passing the Pueblo Lands Act. The United States also acknowledged its trust responsibilities in a series of legal decisions and other acts of Congress. Still, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) forced Indian children to leave their homes and attend culture-killing boarding schools and in general tried its best to undermine Indian identity and survival. Until the 1940s, the San Juan economy remained almost completely subsistence based.
Since the late nineteenth century, but especially after the 1960s, Pueblos have had to cope with onslaughts by (mostly white) anthropologists and seekers of Indian spirituality. For about 20 years beginning in the 1960s, the people used a number of federal grants to construct various facilities as well as to support a number of social, economic, and cultural programs.
Religion In traditional Pueblo culture, religion and life are inseparable. To be in harmony with all of nature is the Pueblo ideal and way of life. The sun is seen as the representative of the Creator. Sacred mountains in each direction, plus the sun above and the earth below, define and balance the Pueblo world. Many Pueblo religious ceremonies revolve around the weather and are devoted to ensuring adequate rainfall. To this end, Pueblo Indians evoke the power of katsinas, sacred beings who live in mountains and other holy places, in ritual and masked dance. Cikumu (Chicoma Mountain) is a particularly sacred location for the people of San Juan.
In addition to the natural boundaries, Pueblo Indians have created a society that defines their world by providing balanced, reciprocal relationships within which people connect and harmonize with each other, the natural world, and time itself. According to tradition, the head of each pueblo is the religious leader, or cacique, whose primary responsibility it is to watch the sun and thereby determine the dates of ceremonies. Much ceremonialism is also based on medicine societies, and shamans who derive powers from animal spirits use their supernatural powers for curing, weather control, and ensuring the general welfare. Especially in the eastern pueblos, most ceremonies are kept secret. Since at least the seventeenth century, Catholicism has strongly influenced traditional religion and ceremonialism.
Winter (Turquoise) and summer (Squash) groups divided the pueblo. Each had a cacique and a kiva. There were also eight ceremonial societies, including curing, clowning, hunting, and defense. The caciques and the heads of societies, or priests, ran the religious and the political life of the pueblo. All rituals were performed within the winter-summer context. Also, all children were initiated into the masked dance society, Ohuwa.
Government Pueblo governments derived from two traditions. Offices that are probably indigenous include the cacique (two at San Juan), or head of the Pueblo, and the war captains. These officials are intimately related to the religious structures of the pueblo and reflected the essentially theocratic nature of Pueblo government.
A parallel but in most cases distinctly less powerful group of officials was imposed by the Spanish authorities. Appointed by the traditional leadership, they generally dealt with external and church matters and included the governor, two lieutenant governors, two sheriffs, and four fiscales. The authority of their offices was symbolized by canes. Nontraditional positions also often included a ditch boss, who was in charge of the irrigation ditches, as well as a town crier and sacristan. The Spanish canes, plus canes given them by President Lincoln, were a symbol of authority. In addition, the All Indian Pueblo Council, dating from 1598, began meeting again in the twentieth century.
Customs One mechanism that works to keep Pueblo societies coherent is a pervasive aversion to individualistic behavior. Children were raised with gentle guidance and a minimum of discipline. Pueblo Indians were generally monogamous, and divorce was relatively rare. The dead were prepared ceremonially and quickly buried. Their possessions were broken and placed on the grave, along with food, to help them journey to the spirit land. A vigil of four days and nights was generally observed.
At San Juan, a summer and a winter cacique, appointed for life, oversaw the pueblo. Society was divided into two groups, summer (associated with the Squash kiva) and winter (associated with the Turquoise kiva); membership in a group was patrilineal. These groups were further divided into more than 30 clans. A number of secret societies also existed. For instance, the warrior society was concerned with hunting, war, crops, fertility, and curing. Each society had its own dances and ritual paraphernalia. Numerous life-cycle rites, as well as songs, crafts, and communal activities such as maintenance of irrigation canals and performing dances, also ensured that one spent one’s life "becoming" a Tewa.
People of San Juan further classified themselves into three categories: ordinary earth people, youths, and made people (priests of eight separate priesthoods, half of which admit women as full members). Similarly, their physical world was divided into three corresponding categories. Village, farmlands, and other nearby lowlands, accessible to all and particularly the woman’s domain, were delineated by four shrines to ancestors. Hills, mesas, and washes, defined by four sacred mesas and in the spiritual charge of the "youths," were a mediating environment in spatial, social, sexual, spiritual, and even subsistence terms. Mountains, a male realm of hunting and male religious pilgrimages, were in the charge of the made people.
Dwellings San Juan Pueblo originally featured multistory apartment-style dwellings constructed of adobe (earth and straw) bricks, with pine beams across the roof that were covered with poles, brush, and plaster. Floors were of wood plank or packed earth. The roof of one level served as the floor of another. The levels were interconnected by ladders. As an aid to defense, the traditional design included no doors or windows; entry was through the roof. Pit houses, or kivas, served as ceremonial chambers and clubhouses. The village plaza, around which the church and all dwellings were clustered, was the spiritual center of the village, a place where all the balanced forces of the world came together.
Diet Before the Spanish arrived, people from San Juan Pueblo ate primarily corn, beans, and squash. They also grew cotton and tobacco. They hunted deer, mountain lion, antelope, and rabbits. They also gathered a variety of wild seeds, nuts, berries, and other foods. The Spanish introduced wheat, alfalfa, chilies, fruit trees, grapes, sheep, cattle, and garden vegetables, which soon became part of the regular diet.
Key Technology San Juan people used irrigation ditches from well before the arrival of the Spanish.
Trade All Pueblos were part of extensive aboriginal trading networks. Many, such as San Juan, visited nearby Pueblos regularly to attend festivals and occasionally to intermarry. With the arrival of other cultures, Pueblo Indians also traded with the Hispanic American villages and then U.S. traders. At fixed times during summer or fall, enemies declared truces so that trading fairs might be held. The largest and best known was at Taos with the Comanche. Nomads exchanged slaves, buffalo hides, buckskins, jerked meat, and horses for agricultural and manufactured Pueblo products. Pueblo Indians traded for shell and copper ornaments, turquoise, and macaw feathers.
Trade along the Santa Fe Trail began in 1821. The trader Samuel Eldodt opened a general store at San Juan in 1863. Until it burned down in 1973, it was the oldest continuously operated store in New Mexico and furthered San Juan’s reputation as a trade center. By the 1880s and the arrival of railroads, the Pueblos were dependent on many American-made goods, and the native manufacture of weaving and pottery declined and nearly died out.
Notable Arts In the Pueblo way, art and life are inseparable. Traditional arts at San Juan included pottery, weaving, masks, songs, dances, and dramas. The great Pueblo arts revival, begun at San Ildefonso in 1919, came to San Juan in the 1930s.
Transportation Spanish horses, mules, and cattle arrived at San Juan in the sixteenth century.
Dress Men wore cotton and buckskin shirts and kilts. Womens’ traditional dress featured spun cotton dresses and sandals or high moccasin boots. Rabbit skin was also used for clothing and robes.
War and Weapons Though often depicted as passive and docile, most Pueblo peoples regularly engaged in warfare. The great revolt of 1680 stands out as the major military action, but they also skirmished at other times with the Spanish and defended themselves against attackers such as Apaches, Comanches, and Utes. They also contributed auxiliary soldiers to provincial forces under Spain and Mexico, which were used mainly against raiding Indians and to protect merchant caravans on the Santa Fe Trail. After the raiding tribes began to pose less of a threat in the late nineteenth century, Pueblo military societies began to wither away, with the office of war captain changing to civil and religious functions.
Contemporary Information
Government/Reservations San Juan Pueblo contains roughly 12,000 acres. The cacique still oversees religious and political matters, appointing the various governmental leaders. The church officers still function as an important level of government. Women’s role in pueblo government and religious affairs is severely circumscribed. There is also a tribal court.
Economy Many people work in nearby cities and towns or on the pueblo for federal or tribal programs. Crafts, especially pottery, are an important economic activity. The Pueblo hosts the self-sustaining Oke Oweenge Cooperative for artists. It also collects rent for leased land and buildings. The tribe also owns a gas station near Espanola, a recreation center, and a bingo operation and contains gas and oil resources.
Legal Status The Pueblo of San Juan is a federally recognized tribal entity.
Daily Life Although the project of holding on to their identity is a strong challenge, Pueblo people have strong roots, and in many ways the ancient rhythms and patterns continue. Despite the absence of the older generation—still the most important transmitters of traditional culture—in today’s nuclear families, many of the old ceremonies are still performed, and the religion and language are largely intact. There is a palpable and intentional continuity with the past. Since the 1950s, San Juan people have also attended festivals as far away as the Plains, the West, and the Midwest. Traditional religion has also merged to some degree with Catholicism.
Control of local schools since the 1970s has been a key in maintaining the Pueblo culture. The San Juan Day School included a fine bilingual and bicultural program until funding was cut off in 1990. Many people still speak Tewa, and English has served as a common second language since the 1960s. However, increasing rates of intermarriage (already high with the Hispanic community) with other Indians and non-natives threaten the culture to some degree; most of these couples live away from San Juan. Health problems, including alcoholism and drug abuse, continue to plague the Pueblos, and there is no professional health care at San Juan Pueblo. Indian Health Service hospitals often cooperate with native healers. The nuclear family is the basic social and economic unit. Several legal cases regarding water rights remain ongoing.
