hitler stole the swastika symbol
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THE HISTORY OF ANANCIENT HUMAN SYMBOL
VISITORS TO NEWMEXICO in the late19th century would have been pleased topurchase a souvenir rug, pot or piece ofsilver jewelry decorated with a swastika.
The tourists loved the motif, wrote Margery
Bedinger in her popular 1973 book IndianSilver: Navajo and Pueblo Jewelers.
Between July,1905 and 1906, 60,000swastikas in various forms, some by Indians
and others not, sold to tourists in NewMexico as genuine
Indian articles.Todays tourists,
particularly thosefrom the Western
hemisphere, would beappalled. Our
association of the
swastika withAdolf Hitler and his
National SocialistParty is so
encompassing wewould immediately
assume any object soimprinted had a direct
link with Nazism.
Yet anyone who
looks at art or
architecture, no
matter how casually,
will eventually see the
symbol. The Navajos,
Tibetans and Turks
incorporated the
swastika into their
rugs. Arizonas
indigenous Pima and
Maricopa people
wove them into their
baskets and painted
them onto their pots.
In Asia the emblem is
found on everythingfrom clothing to
political ballots to the
thresholds of houses.
Swastikas are carved into the Capitol
Building in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia
Museum of Art and many ancient Buddhist
and Mayan temples. At Albuquerques KiMo
Theater, built in 1927 and recently restored,
swastikas adorn the proscenium, entryway
and the buildings exterior. Elsewhere in New
Mexico, they are evident in the architecture
of the Shafer Hotel in Mountainair and the
Swastika Hotel in Raton (now the
International Bank).
One of the oldest symbols made byhumans, the swastika dates back some
6,000 years to rock and cave paintings.Scholars generally agree it originated in
India. With the emergence of the Sanskrit
language came the term swastika, a
combination of su, or good, and asti,
to be; in other
words, well-being.
Theres no clear
answer on how the
figure migrated toother parts of Asia,
Europe, Africa andthe New World.
Early examples ofswastikas on pottery
and householdobjects in China
indicate that theswastika traveled
with traders and withthe spread of
Buddhism
throughout Asia.According to Jim
Clarke, an ancientAsian art expert and
owner ofClarke &Clarke Asian
Antiques and Tribal
Art in Santa Fe, earlyChristian inhabitantsof India and Iran
used the swastika asan amulet or
protective device.
In the 17th century,India and Iran were
exotic places toEuropeans, Clarke
remarks. Thingsbrought back from
these countries wereviewed as exotic. To incorporate these
symbols was considered very avant.
Clarke is intrigued by the notion that the
swastika might have made its way from
China to the New World with Chinese traders
lost on the seas. Remains of Chinese vessels
have been excavated in coastal communitiesin South America, he says, and along with
LOW-FIRED POTTERY BOWL FROM THE
BANSHAN CULTURE MAJIAWANVILLAGE, CHINA
NEOLITHIC PERIOD (21651965 BCE)
LARCE CENTRAL SWASTIKA PROBABLY INTENDED TO
SYMBOLIZE A SUN WHEEL. COURTESY CLARKE & CLARKE
DETAIL FROM LARGE GERMANTOWN PICTORIAL NAVAJO RUG
C1890 COURTESY SHERWOODS SPIRIT OFAMERICA
http://www.cabq.gov/kimohttp://www.cabq.gov/kimohttp://www.ethnoarts.com/http://www.ethnoarts.com/http://www.ethnoarts.com/http://www.ethnoarts.com/http://www.ethnoarts.com/http://www.ethnoarts.com/http://www.cabq.gov/kimohttp://www.cabq.gov/kimo -
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THE HISTORY OF ANANCIENT HUMAN SYMBOL
Pueblo people. The two most popular motifs,according to author and antique Indian
jewelry dealer Cindra Kline, were Indianheads and swastikas.
Kline, who has written a book on Navajo
spoons to be published by the Museum ofNew Mexico Press in
September, 2001,
notes that the first
spoon shes located
with both a swastika
and an engraved date
coincides with the
opening of the
St. Louis Exposition in1904, though the
item was certainly
made years earlier.
The Charles M.
Robbins Co., a
commercial spoon
company, was
manufacturing so-
called Navajo spoons
as mementos of the fair. In 1906, Moore
was the first to offer swastika spoons in its
catalog. By the time the spoon craze died
out around 1915, Kline says, you had so
many stamps and dyes with swastikas that
the symbol appears on bracelets, sides of
rings, ash trays, salt cellars. Any silver-
stamped item was fair game for a swastika
stamp.
In the year 2001 in Santa Fe, swastikascan be found in myriad museums and
galleries. At the Museum of Indian Arts and
Culture, a ceramic rain god made at Tesuque
Pueblo circa 1900, proudly displays one.
At Clarke & Clarke, swastikas adorn 19th
century Thai garments and pre-historic
Chinese bowls. Navajo spoons can be pur-
chased at Kania Ferrin, Medicine Man and
Rainbow Man galleries and Navajo rugs atCristofs, Dewey, Packards and Sherwoods.
And there are many other venues displaying
Himalayan, Islamic, Asian and Native
American art in which swastikas connote the
natural world, good fortune or simply serve
as attractive decorative elements.
Often, however, these pieces will not be
on public view. Its a horrible symbol to
overcome, Kline remarks. But the swastika
can be such a beautiful design. Its a shame
to see all these beautiful pieces hidden
away. Given the difficulty of dating silver,
Kline says, If the viewer can look beyond
Hitlerization, if you have a swastika spoon its
an assurance of age. You know it pre-dates
WW II probably by a good number of years
and it has a fascinating history.How Hitler came
to adopt the swastika
is unclear. VariousGerman citizens are
said to havesuggested it as a
symbol of racialpurity. Hitler was
supposedly obsessedwith numerology and
Eastern religion and
may have seen theimage in Tibetan
manuscripts orpaintings.
Regardless, theswastikas original
meaning, which had
endured formillennia, was diametrically altered.
In 1940, in response to Hitlers regime,
the Navajo, Papago, Apache and Hopipeople signed a whirling log proclamation. It
read, Because the above ornament, which
has been a symbol of friendship among ourforefathers for many centuries, has been
desecrated recently by another nation ofpeoples, therefore it is resolved that
henceforth from this date on and forevermore our tribes renounce the use of the
emblem commonly known today as theswastika . . . on our blankets, baskets,
art objects, sand paintings and clothing.
References and suggested reading
The Swastika Symbol in Navajo Textiles
by Dennis J. Aigner. DAI Press, Laguna
Beach, California, 2000.
Navajo Spoons by Cindra Kline. Museumof New Mexico Press, Santa Fe, New Mexico,2001.
Indian Silver: Navajo and Pueblo
Jewelers by Margery Bedinger. UNM Press,1973.
DOTTIE INDYKE LIVES IN SANTA FE AND WRITES REGULARLY
ABOUT THE ART AND CULTURE OF THIS REGION.2001 WINGSPREAD GUIDES OF NEW MEXICO, INC.
READ MORE ON THE WEB AT www.collectorsguide.com
SWASTIKA SHIELD KIMO THEATRE (1927) RESTORED 2000
423 CENTRALA VENUE NW IN DOWNTOWNALBUQUERQUE
PHOTO BY KIRK GITTINGS
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