Navajo Medicine Man Sandpaintings

Description

Author: Reichard, Gladys A.   (1893-1955)

Publisher: Dover Books

Pub Date: After 1977

Binding: Paperback

Condition: Fair.  Binding tight.  No marks, tears, folds.  Upper and lower front cover corners each bent, lower approx. 1″, lower approx. 3/4″.  Neither extends beyond the cover.  Upper and lower rear cover corner each bent upper approx. 1/2″.  This is an oversize volume–9″ x 14″–sized to give the sandpainting reproductions some detail.

Notes: Reprint edition.  Originally published in 1939 as Navajo Medicine Man by J.J. Augustin.   The first half of the book is anthropology of the Navajo, ceremonies, religion, etc., followed by 24 full-color plates of Navajo sandpaintings.  “Another kind of sacred object is the sandpainting, a picture of a scene in the life of the Holy Ones, made on the floor of the ceremonial house (hogan) by sprinkling dry sands colored with natural pigments.  The sandpainting is an altar, but an altar composed of the representations of divinity, which becomes sacred in its setting after its placing according to divine tradition.”  (From the Preface)