Navajo Silversmiths E-Book

Washington Matthews

• Herausgeber: Booksell-Verlag
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

In "Navajo Silversmiths," Washington Matthews meticulously chronicles the artistry and cultural significance of Navajo silverwork, detailing the intricate techniques and tools employed in crafting these remarkable pieces. Through a blend of descriptive narrative and analytical discourse, Matthews situates the silversmiths within the broader tapestry of Southwestern culture, highlighting how their work reflects both tradition and innovation. The text serves not only as an artistic commentary but as an anthropological study, capturing the spiritual and communal dimensions inherent in the art of silversmithing. Matthews adopts a clear, accessible literary style while maintaining an authoritative voice, yielding a book that resonates with both lay readers and scholars alike. Washington Matthews, primarily known for his contributions to ethnology and anthropology, brought a deeply empathetic perspective to the study of Navajo culture. His extensive fieldwork among the Navajo people and their crafts provides him with an authenticity that enriches his analysis. Matthews was not just an observer; his dedication to understanding and preserving Native American traditions allowed him to illuminate the nuances of Navajo craftsmanship in a way that few contemporaries achieved. This work is highly recommended for those intrigued by Native American culture, art history, or anthropology. "Navajo Silversmiths" not only offers insights into the technical expertise of silversmithing but also reveals the profound cultural narratives woven into each piece. Readers will gain a greater appreciation for the artistry of the Navajo people and the enduring significance of their traditions. In this enriched edition, we have carefully created added value for your reading experience: - A succinct Introduction situates the work's timeless appeal and themes. - The Synopsis outlines the central plot, highlighting key developments without spoiling critical twists. - A detailed Historical Context immerses you in the era's events and influences that shaped the writing. - A thorough Analysis dissects symbols, motifs, and character arcs to unearth underlying meanings. - Reflection questions prompt you to engage personally with the work's messages, connecting them to modern life. - Hand‐picked Memorable Quotes shine a spotlight on moments of literary brilliance. - Interactive footnotes clarify unusual references, historical allusions, and archaic phrases for an effortless, more informed read.

Leseprobe

Washington Matthews

Navajo Silversmiths

Enriched edition. Second Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1880-1881, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1883, pages 167-178

In this enriched edition, we have carefully created added value for your reading experience.

Introduction, Studies and Commentaries by Megan Fawcett

Edited and published by Good Press, 2019

[email protected]

EAN 4057664642721

Table of Contents

Introduction

Synopsis

Historical Context

Navajo Silversmiths

Analysis

Reflection

Memorable Quotes

Notes

Introduction

Table of Contents

At its core, Navajo Silversmiths explores how a living art binds community, economy, and identity under the pressures of historical change, following the hands, tools, and exchanges through which raw metal is transformed into adornment and meaning, while tracing the quiet negotiations between continuity and adaptation that guide makers across landscapes of trade, kinship, and memory, and attending to the disciplines of technique, the tacit knowledge of workshops, and the circulation of styles that travel between households, corrals, markets, and ceremonies to anchor a people’s material expression within a wider world.

Written by Washington Matthews, a nineteenth-century American ethnologist and physician, Navajo Silversmiths is an ethnographic study centered in the Navajo homelands of the American Southwest and published in the late nineteenth century, when American anthropology was consolidating its methods and archives. The work belongs to a tradition of descriptive scholarship that sought to document material culture in detail, situating craft within everyday life. Its setting is practical as well as cultural: forges, tools, and markets appear alongside social contexts, placing the craft in relation to households, herding, and the wider networks that linked Native communities and regional trade.

The book offers a meticulous, observational account of silversmithing as practice, describing materials, techniques, and workshop routines with a measured, empirical voice. Readers encounter a steady pace of description rather than argument, a style that privileges process and terminology to illuminate how objects are conceived, made, and used. The mood is restrained and documentary, grounded in field-driven attention to detail. While the narrative remains accessible, it is methodical, favoring clear sequence and plain exposition. The result is an immersive portrait of craft knowledge that treats making as a form of inquiry, a way of knowing encoded in tools, gestures, and shared procedure.

Beneath its descriptive surface, Navajo Silversmiths engages enduring themes: the transmission of knowledge across generations; the interplay of innovation and tradition; and the role of adornment in articulating status, affiliation, and memory. It foregrounds how technique mediates cultural continuity, how materials carry social meanings, and how artisans respond to shifting economic and social conditions. The study also invites readers to consider the relationship between craft and environment, from the sourcing of metal to patterns of mobility and exchange. In doing so, it frames silversmithing not only as an art of objects, but as a living system of skills, relations, and responsibilities.

Matthews’s approach places silversmithing within broader circuits of contact and commerce, noting how designs, tools, and practices move through trade and interaction while remaining grounded in local knowledge. The account records observations about workshop organization, the learning of techniques, and the ways finished pieces circulate within and beyond the community. Attention to origins and development appears in the form of reported accounts and comparisons, presented as part of the craft’s historical context rather than definitive conclusions. Throughout, the emphasis remains on what can be documented: the tangible steps of making, the social uses of objects, and the practical logics that guide artisans’ choices.

For contemporary readers, the book matters both as a detailed record of Indigenous material culture and as a document of its era, revealing how late nineteenth-century scholarship framed and preserved knowledge about living traditions. It encourages reflection on the ethics and limits of observation, reminding us that cultural expression is embedded in relationships, responsibilities, and sovereignty. Artists may find inspiration in its close attention to process; historians and anthropologists will value its precise descriptions; and general readers gain a window onto craft as social practice, illuminating how beauty, utility, and identity intertwine under conditions of change.

Approached with curiosity and care, Navajo Silversmiths offers the experience of standing beside the bench and the fire, watching technique unfold while glimpsing the broader social world that gives craft its purpose. It is a patient book that rewards attentive reading, yielding insights into how knowledge is made durable in objects and passed hand to hand. As an introduction to a pivotal tradition in the American Southwest, it balances focus and breadth, inviting further study of the people, histories, and practices it documents. Readers come away with a clarified sense of craft as both art and archive—alive, adaptive, and profoundly situated.

Synopsis

Table of Contents

Navajo Silversmiths presents Washington Matthews’s systematic account of the rise and practice of silverworking among the Navajo in the nineteenth century. Drawing on direct observation and interviews, he outlines the craft’s relatively recent introduction, its rapid development, and its distinctive products. The work is descriptive rather than argumentative, documenting processes, tools, terminology, and the social contexts in which ornaments are made and used. Matthews situates silversmithing within everyday life and ceremonial display, noting how the craft became a visible marker of status and exchange. The book’s purpose is to record techniques and forms before they changed further under increased contact and trade.

Matthews begins with a brief historical sketch of origins. He reports that Navajo silversmithing started in the mid-nineteenth century, after contact with Mexican metalworkers. Informants name early practitioners, notably Atsidi Sani, and describe how instruction spread from a few smiths to many. The author traces the sequence from initial adaptation of simple methods to more complex procedures as tools and materials became available. He emphasizes that the art is new compared with older textile and leather traditions, yet quickly became integral. The chapter places the emergence of silversmithing within patterns of conflict, captivity, and trade that facilitated the transfer of skills and materials.

Turning to the workshop, Matthews inventories the equipment commonly used. He describes small forges fueled by charcoal, improvised anvils from iron scraps, and hammers, tongs, and files obtained through trade or repurposed from discarded tools. Bellows or blowpipes provide heat control for melting and soldering. Simple dies and punches are fashioned from tempered iron, while molds for buttons and beads are made of iron or stone. The author notes the ingenuity of substituting available materials for specialized apparatus. He records Navajo names for selected tools and explains how a minimal toolkit, maintained by a single artisan, can produce a wide variety of forms.

The account then details materials and methods. Silver is primarily sourced from coins—Mexican pesos earlier, later United States currency—and occasionally from melted spoons or trade silver. Matthews outlines melting, casting, and forging routines, including flattening ingots, drawing wire, and cutting sheet. He describes the use of solder, fluxes, and annealing, as well as cold-working and finishing techniques. Stamping and repoussé are central decorative processes, achieved with hand-cut stamps and chisels. The text explains how uniformity is obtained in repeated elements such as buttons, and how surface treatments produce polish or darkened contrast, depending on the desired effect.