Sedona, Arizona: This month's "1st Friday" celebration in Sedona is another SGA "Art of Gold" event, this one with the unifying theme: Art with a Heart. For Turquoise Tortoise Gallery, in the center of Sedona's "Gallery Row," the "Heart" they are celebrating is the very core of Native American jewelry-making.
Archeological evidence shows that turquoise found in Hohokam excavations in southern Arizona dates back to 200 B.C., even though turquoise, as a mineral deposit, is found in only a limited region of the American Southwest. Other stones were used as well, with trade bringing in material such as spiny oyster from its only source: off the coast of Baja California. Evidence is abundant that prehistoric Indians turned mined turquoise into jewelry – drilled beads and other ornamentation – with prehistoric mining operations uncovered in New Mexico, Colorado and the Kingman and Morenci regions of Arizona.
Descendants of the Anasazi, Mogollon and Mimbres exist in today's Hopi and Pueblo people, and with the Diné (Navajo) arriving after the 14th century, and being greatly influenced by the existing Pueblo cultures, the ancient ways carried on. Later, as contact with the Spanish grew, their elaborate style of personal adornment bore influence as well, as did certain Moorish-inspired designs. Speculation remains as to what extent specific influence was felt: while designs of pomegranate blossoms may have influenced the well-known Diné Squash Blossom necklace, the Dine word for the "squash blossom" bead is yo ne maze disya gi, which simply means "bead that spreads out." Whether as spoils of conflict or successful trade, German silver, copper and brass found their way into Indian jewelry.
By the mid-1800s the Dine had learned silver making and these techniques traveled throughout the region. Silver coins were melted as were silver tea pots and candlesticks when special orders from traders came in. The Zuñis, by the time they learned silver making, were already skilled metalworkers and, from prehistoric times, skilled lapidaries.
