Music Kachina

Many many moons ago, while the war gods were out on a hunting party, they heard wonderful music.  When  they arrived at its source, they found a handsome young man playing a flute.  So impressed and so at peace from the music were they, that upon returning to Zuni, they asked the chief of the Little Fire Society to invite the  young man to play at their ceremonies.  While the youth played, eight corn maidens ground medicine for the  society.  The last time Paiyatemu (which means youth) played, he taught a member of the Little Fire Society to  play with all the magic of the flute.  Thus today, this special music is past on from player to player of the flute  playing order.  Here, the Kachina Paiyatemu plays the flute.  This Kachina represents the prayer, the hope and  the desire of the Zuni people for the return, year after year, of warmth, good crops and the return of the corn  maidens, who are so important in the compounding of medicines.