Navajo creatiion - Squash Blossom: a Navajo art

Sterling silver Squash Blossom Necklace
Photo credit: Internet

 

This necklace is beautiful. The pure aesthetic quality of this jewelry piece has a direct link to the Navajo people of the American southwest.

 

My work in the area of Navajo oral history has allowed for me to hear a plethora of traditional stories of the legacy of Navajo jewelry from the beginnings of Navajo creation to the present day 21st century.

 

Of those stories the most intriguing are those histories that are linked the Navajo Squash Blossom necklace. This jewelry piece is a pure Navajo creation that was inspired by the mother-land of the Navajo. As Navajo people were introduced to European silversmith techniques, soon many artists who were making jewelry were influenced by their immediate surroundings.

 

The arrival of the Anglo pioneers, Mexican groups and Spaniard conquistadors to the desert lands of the Navajo and Pueblo people, definitely influenced the artistry of many early Navajo jewelry artists. One of the focal inspirations was the metal pendants of fully adorned Spaniard horses, who wore such 'half-moon- medallions on their foreheads. But, before the Navajo were a making the 'naja' medallions they were wearing the Spaniard pendants that they would have taken from the horses, as a way of 'counting coup.'

 

As the Navajo artist became more skilled in the techniques of silversmith work, they would soon add the accompanying side 'blossoms.' Many non-Indigenous researches say this addition as do to the Navajo's influence by pomegranate fruits, which could be nothing further from the truth. In the early days, Navajo people did not see, use or consume such exotic fruits, for such fruits do not grow in the desert southwest. Instead the flora and fauna the Navajo people seen, utilized and ate was elements of the desert yucca plant and its fruit.

 

Soon the Navajo jewelry artists created and added the Navajo 'blossoms' to the 'naja' medallion. The 'blossoms' were a direct inspiration from the blossoming yucca flower blossoms.

 

Nowadays, the Squash Blossom necklace is made by other southwestern tribal people, and recently I have found that non-Native, non-tribal people are making the Squash Blossom necklace. There are pros and cons to this activity, but if a collector of fine Navajo jewelry wants to be true the artistry of the necklace, they should buy a Squash Blossom Necklace designed and created by a Navajo jewelry artist.

 

Blessings.