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Black God (Navajo Mythology)
{{short description, God in Navajo mythology According to one version of the Navajo creation story, Black God is first encountered by First Man and First Woman on the Yellow (third) world."Navajo Creation Story." Navajo Legends. Web. . Black God is, first and foremost, a fire god. He is the inventor of the fire drill and was the first being to discover the means by which to generate fire.Washington, Matthews. The Night Chant, A Navaho Ceremony. New York: American Musiem, 1902. Print. He is also attributed to the practice of witchcraft.Levy, Jerrold. In the Beginning: The Navajo Genesis. U of California, 1998. 79-93. Print. Black God is not portrayed in the admirable, heroic fashion of other Navajo Gods. Instead, he is imagined as old, slow and apparently helpless. Other times he is imagined as a “a moody, humorless trickster” who “passes himself off as poor so that people will be generous to him.” Appearance Black God has a crescent moon on his forehead, a fullmoon for a mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Navajo People
The Navajo (; British English: Navaho; nv, Diné or ') are a Native American people of the Southwestern United States. With more than 399,494 enrolled tribal members , the Navajo Nation is the largest federally recognized tribe in the United States; additionally, the Navajo Nation has the largest reservation in the country. The reservation straddles the Four Corners region and covers more than 27,325 square miles (70,000 square km) of land in Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico. The Navajo Reservation is slightly larger than the state of West Virginia. The Navajo language is spoken throughout the region, and most Navajos also speak English. The states with the largest Navajo populations are Arizona (140,263) and New Mexico (108,306). More than three-fourths of the enrolled Navajo population resides in these two states. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diné Bahaneʼ
( nv, "Story of the People"), the Navajo creation myth, describes the prehistoric emergence of the Navajo as a part of the Navajo religious beliefs. It centers on the area known as the Dinétah, the traditional homeland of the Navajo, and forms the basis of the traditional Navajo way of life and ceremony. The basic outline of begins with the creation of the (Holy Wind) as the mists of lights which arose through the darkness to animate and bring purpose to the four (Holy People) in the different three lower worlds. This event happened before the Earth and the physical aspect of humans had come into existence, but the spiritual aspect of humans had. The Holy People then began journeying through the different worlds, learning important lessons in each one before moving on to the next. The fourth and final world is the world in which the Navajo live in now. The First or Dark World, , was small and centered on an island floating in the middle of four seas. The inhabitants of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lunar Phase
Concerning the lunar month of ~29.53 days as viewed from Earth, the lunar phase or Moon phase is the shape of the Moon's directly sunlit portion, which can be expressed quantitatively using areas or angles, or described qualitatively using the terminology of the 4 major phases: new moon, first quarter, full moon, last quarter and 4 minor phases: waxing crescent, waxing gibbous, waning gibbous, and waning crescent. The lunar phases gradually change over a synodic month (~29.53 days) as the Moon's orbital positions around Earth and Earth around the Sun shift. The visible side of the Moon is variously sunlit, depending on the position of the Moon in its orbit. Thus, this face's sunlit portion can vary from 0% (at new moon) to 100% (at full moon). Each of the 4 major lunar phases (see below) is ~7.4 days, with +/− 19 hours in variation (6.58–8.24 days) due to the elliptical shape of the Moon's orbit. Phases of the Moon There are four ''principal'' (primary/major) lunar phase ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fullmoon
The full moon is the lunar phase when the Moon appears fully illuminated from Earth's perspective. This occurs when Earth is located between the Sun and the Moon (when the ecliptic longitudes of the Sun and Moon differ by 180°). This means that the lunar hemisphere facing Earth—the near side—is completely sunlit and appears as an approximately circular disk. The full moon occurs roughly once a month. The time interval between a full moon and the next repetition of the same phase, a synodic month, averages about 29.53 days. Therefore, in those lunar calendars in which each month begins on the day of the new moon, the full moon falls on either the 14th or 15th day of the lunar month. Because a calendar month consists of a whole number of days, a month in a lunar calendar may be either 29 or 30 days long. Characteristics A full moon is often thought of as an event of a full night's duration, although its phase seen from Earth continuously waxes or wanes, and is full onl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pleiades
The Pleiades (), also known as The Seven Sisters, Messier 45 and other names by different cultures, is an asterism and an open star cluster containing middle-aged, hot B-type stars in the north-west of the constellation Taurus. At a distance of about 444 light years, it is among the nearest star clusters to Earth. It is the nearest Messier object to Earth, and is the most obvious cluster to the naked eye in the night sky. It is also observed to house the reflection nebula NGC 1432, an HII Ionized region. The cluster is dominated by hot blue luminous stars that have formed within the last 100 million years. Reflection nebulae around the brightest stars were once thought to be left over material from their formation, but are now considered likely to be an unrelated dust cloud in the interstellar medium through which the stars are currently passing. This dust cloud is estimated to be moving at a speed of approximately 18 km/s relative to the stars in the cluster. Computer sim ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Temple (anatomy)
The temple is a latch where four skull bones fuse: the frontal, parietal, temporal, and sphenoid. It is located on the side of the head behind the eye between the forehead and the ear. The temporal muscle covers this area and is used during mastication. Cladists classify land vertebrates based on the presence of an upper hole, a lower hole, both, or neither in the cover of dermal bone that formerly covered the temporalis muscle, whose origin is the temple and whose insertion is the jaw. The brain has a lobe called the temporal lobe. Etymology The word "templar" as used in anatomy has a separate etymology from the other meaning of word ''temple'', meaning "place of worship". Both come from Latin, but the word for the place of worship comes from ', whereas the word for the part of the head comes from Vulgar Latin *', modified from ', plural form ("both temples") of ', a word that meant both "time" and the part of the head. Due to the common source with the word for time, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Buckskin (leather)
Buckskin is the soft, pliable, porous preserved hide of an animal – usually deer – tanned in the same way as deerskin clothing worn by Native Americans. Some leather sold as "buckskin" may now be sheepskin tanned with modern chromate tanning chemicals and dyed to resemble real buckskin. Buckskin is preserved with a dressing of lubricant, physically manipulated to make it soft and pliable, and usually smoked with woodsmoke. Smoking gives buckskin its typical dark honey color, and is highly recommended. Smoking prevents the tanned hide from becoming stiff if it gets wet, and deters insects from eating it as well. Unsmoked buckskin is lighter, even white, in color. Clothing made of buckskin is referred to as buckskins Buckskins are clothing, usually consisting of a jacket and leggings, made from buckskin, a soft sueded leather from the hide of deer. Buckskins are often trimmed with a fringe – originally a functional detail, to allow the garment to s .... Notes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Comet
A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena are due to the effects of solar radiation and the solar wind acting upon the nucleus of the comet. Comet nuclei range from a few hundred meters to tens of kilometers across and are composed of loose collections of ice, dust, and small rocky particles. The coma may be up to 15 times Earth's diameter, while the tail may stretch beyond one astronomical unit. If sufficiently bright, a comet may be seen from Earth without the aid of a telescope and may subtend an arc of 30° (60 Moons) across the sky. Comets have been observed and recorded since ancient times by many cultures and religions. Comets usually have highly eccentric elliptical orbits, and they have a wide range of orbital periods, ranging from several years to potentially several mill ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blessingway
The Navajo song ceremonial complex is a spiritual practice used by certain Navajo ceremonial people to restore and maintain balance and harmony in the lives of the people. One half of the ceremonial complex is the Blessing Way, while the other half is the Enemy Way (). The Blessing Way The rites and prayers in the Blessing Way are concerned with healing, creation, harmony and peace. The song cycles recount the elaborate Navajo creation story (). One of most important Blessing Way rites is the ''Kinaaldá'' ceremony, in which a young girl makes the transition to womanhood upon her menarche.Joanne McCloskey, ''Living Through the Generations: Continuity And Change in Navajo Women's Lives'', University of Arizona Press, 2007pp. 159–162 . During the course of the ceremony, the girl enacts the part of Changing Woman (), the powerful spirit woman responsible for fertility entering the world. The ''Kinaaldá'' ceremony includes the girl demonstrating endurance by ritualised running, ea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hogan
A hogan ( or ; from Navajo ' ) is the primary, traditional dwelling of the Navajo people. Other traditional structures include the summer shelter, the underground home, and the sweat house. A hogan can be round, cone-shaped, multi-sided, or square; with or without internal posts; timber or stone walls and packed with earth in varying amounts or a bark roof for a summer house, with the door facing east to welcome the rising sun for wealth and good fortune. Today, while some older hogans are now still used as dwellings and others are maintained for ceremonial purposes, new hogans are rarely intended as family dwellings. Traditional structured hogans are also considered pioneers of energy efficient homes. Using packed mud against the entire wood structure, the home was kept cool by natural air ventilation and water sprinkled on the dirt ground inside. During the winter the fireplace kept the inside warm well into the night. This concept is called thermal mass. Modern application ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coyote (Navajo Mythology)
Coyote ( Navajo: ) is an irresponsible and trouble-making character who is nevertheless one of the most important and revered characters in Navajo mythology.Zolbrod, P.G. (1984) ''Diné bahaneʼ: The Navajo creation story. University of New Mexico Press.'': USA. Even though is the Navajo god of rain, Coyote also has powers over rain. Coyote’s ceremonial name is which means "first scolder". In Navajo tradition, Coyote appears in creation myths, teaching stories, and healing ceremonies. Mythology Coyote is a key figure in Navajo mythology, and of all the figures in Navajo mythology, Coyote (Mąʼii) is the most contradictory. He is a shadowy figure that can be funny or fearsome. Coyote is greedy, vain, foolish, cunning and also occasionally displays a degree of power. "In common with Tricksters generally, he serves to test the bounds of possibilities and order." Coyote looks like a coyote in animal form and she looks like a sagacious woman in human form. Creation myths The or ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Milky Way
The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. The term ''Milky Way'' is a translation of the Latin ', from the Greek ('), meaning "milky circle". From Earth, the Milky Way appears as a band because its disk-shaped structure is viewed from within. Galileo Galilei first resolved the band of light into individual stars with his telescope in 1610. Until the early 1920s, most astronomers thought that the Milky Way contained all the stars in the Universe. Following the 1920 Great Debate between the astronomers Harlow Shapley and Heber Curtis, observations by Edwin Hubble showed that the Milky Way is just one of many galaxies. The Milky Way is a barred spiral galaxy with an estimated D25 isophotal diameter of , but only about 1,000 light years thick at the spiral arms (more at the bulg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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