Navajo / Diné

This plate from Washington Matthews' seminal 1902 work depicts eight distinct masks worn by dancers during the Night Chant, a complex nine-day Navajo healing ceremony. Each mask represents a specific deity (Haashchʼééh), such as the white-faced Talking God (A) and the blue-faced Calling God (B), adorned with sacred materials like eagle feathers and spruce branches. These illustrations provided the Western world with some of the first detailed visual records of Navajo sacred regalia, documenting the precise iconography required for the ceremony's efficacy.

This image depicts a portion of a sacred Navajo dry painting, or sandpainting, used in the Mountain Chant ceremony. These intricate designs are created by medicine men using colored sands to invoke healing and restore harmony, featuring stylized deities and botanical elements that represent the interconnectedness of the Navajo spiritual world.

This plate from Washington Matthews' 1902 study 'The Night Chant' documents the complex visual language of Navajo ceremonialism. It depicts several sandpaintings (ijeeh) and a series of ritual prayer sticks (kethawns), which are used to invoke spiritual healing and restore cosmic order.

This intricate illustration records the 'Second Dry Painting' of the Navajo Mountain Chant ceremony. It features two highly stylized female deities with tiered triangular bodies, surrounded by ritual symbols and a protective rainbow guardian. These ephemeral artworks were traditionally created with colored sands to invoke spiritual healing.