On Tuesday Feb 7th we drove from Santa Fe where
we were staying at my sister-in-law’s house to the Santa Domingo Pueblo to
visit with Henry Rosetta to learn more about rattles. Henry is an engaging,
charismatic man of many talents. He is an accomplished and well respected
jeweler and in the Pueblo community he is known by many as “the gourd man.”
During the early 70s he spent time in the SF Bay Area and his wife Esther is
actually from Hayward but they have lived in Santa Domingo for many years. Henry’s
house was full of spectacular art much of which he created including
sculptures, pottery, jewelry and more.
Henry has been growing gourds for many years and learned the
art of rattle making from his grandfather who lived to be 106. He was reluctant
to discuss the function of the rattle in Hopi and Navajo culture but his gourds
are highly prized and people come from far and wide to purchase them and make
their own rattles following their own traditions. Henry took us into his
storage room where he had bundles of finished rattles tied together. The walls
were covered with additional dance regalia and the room also contained boxes of
ceremonial gourd water ladles and even a box of gourds painted like pink
flamingos. Henry is clearly full
of boundless creativity and he told us so with his only concern being that some
health issues might prevent him from finishing some of his many projects.
Henry was careful not to tell us anything that was
considered inappropriate to share with non Indian people but he was still
forthcoming with some fantastic details. We learned that in the Pueblo cultures
of the Rio Grande the rattle is indeed a sacred object and that the large flat rattles
are used exclusively by men. You
have your rattle from birth to death and the rattle is in some ways a protector
of your spirit. The rattle is also a central part of your warrior spirit and
Pueblo men carry this knowledge with them at all times, in real military
battles as well as personal battles against other sorts of challenges in
everyday life.
In the old days when his grandfather made a rattle it could
take up to a day or more to complete one rattle. The larger, thinner gourds are
highly valued for their more resonant and, frankly, louder tone. The most
traditional rattles were filled with small pebbles from “borrowed” ant hills
and the ants were given corn meal in exchange for borrowing their pebbles. When
a person dies the pebbles were returned to the ants. We asked Henry to help us
pick out a rattle and as he tested them, he had a least 50 already assembled,
he intuitively and automatically began to chant and move his feet a bit.
Clearly the connection of certain rattle patterns to the dances they accompany
are ingrained in the essential beings of the participants. You can’t really
disconnect the sounds of the rattle from the dances that they are part of.
I tried to ask Henry if Pueblo people considered the rattle
to be a musical instrument but he chose not to really answer the question
directly.
We visited for a couple of hours, including a tour of his
jewelry making workroom and wonderful stories about some of his high profile
jewelry customers including Maria Carey and Donald Trump. . . .what a crack up!
We gave him a copy of my textbook and when we finally said goodbye we left with
promises to reconnect when they come to the Bay Area to visit their daughter
who lives in Dublin. I’ll keep my fingers crossed that we can get Henry out to
DVC for a lecture / demo someday soon.
You can check Henry here
http://web.mac.com/makebelievetv/2008_Clients/Henry_Rosetta.html
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| Sign on the old Santa Domingo trading post one block from Henry Rosetta's House. The trading post burned down mysteriously on the early 1990s |
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