Norton and Ethel Allen among the Paipai

Abstract

Although Norton Allen is known primarily in connection with the archaeology of the Hohokam, he and his wife, Ethel, also took an inter est in contemporary Native Americans (see Schwartzlose's biography of Allen in this issue). This article examines the Aliens' collection of objects made by the Paipai of Baja California, particularly the pottery, donated by Ethel Allen to the Arizona State Museum (ASM) in Tucson. The Paipai are a Yuman-speaking people who today live in and around the village of Santa Catarina, which is about eighty miles south southwest of Calexico/Mexicali. The village is associated with the former Dominican mission of Santa Catarina (or Santa Catalina) de los Yumas, established in 1797 and destroyed in 1840 by a native revolt (Meigs 1935). The Paipai are linguistically related to the Kiliwa just to the south of them, the Ipai and Tipai (Kamia/Kumeyaay) in southern California and northwestern Baja, the Cocopa on the Colorado River delta, and the Arizona Pai groups (the Hualapai, Havasupai, and Yavapai) (see maps in Luomala 1978:fig. 1 and Owen 1969:fig. 1). The people referred to today as Paipai are actually an amalgam of what were formerly two separate groups, one of which spoke Paipai, the other Kuad, another Yuman language (Wilken 1987:19). Anthropologist Roger Owen stated, It seems likely that Santa Catarina was originally a Kuatl settlement to which Paipai were brought by the missionaries. All of the remembered Kuatl rancher?as were around and to the north of