POLYDACTYLY REVISITED - PART 2:

I now pick up my examination of polydactyly in rock art in Chaco Canyon. Chaco canyon is a center or cluster site for six-toed footprints, leading some researchers to speculate that if the Chaco Canyon elites had polydactyly it would come to be seen as special and something to be reproduced.

6-toed footprint trackway, behind Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, San Juan county, New Mexico, Photograph Peter Faris, August 2004.

6-toed footprint in mud plaster and plaster cast of same. Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Crown et al., Footnotes, 2016, p. 434, Fig. 5.

A number of examples portraying foot polydactyly are located in Chaco Canyon, NM. Behind Pueblo Bonito the remains of a small room built against the cliff shows a series of six-toed tracks pecked into the back wall cliff face. In Pueblo Bonito itself three buried individuals were recovered displaying polydactyly of a foot (Crown et al. 2016:431) and foot impressions in the mud wall plaster show at least one six-toed impression (Crown 2016: 432). “Careful morphological examination of reassociated foot bones, as well as of individual elements from Pueblo Bonito, has identified three separate cases of polydactyly, two of which were not previously recognized. Thus, instead of the single previously reported case of polydactyly, it appears that the trait occurred with some frequency within this population.” (Crown et al. 2016:429) These figures were apparently also interred with grave goods and/or in locations that suggested they were elite members of the community, reinforcing Wormington’s suggestion that Native Americans considered the physical differences as a mark of being somehow special.

Jog-toed sandal prints, Glenn Canyon, below Smith's Fork, San Juan County, Utah. Online photograph, Public Domain.

Jog-toed sandal prints, Oljeto Wash. Utah. Photograph Chuck LaRue. 

Since more examples of polydactyly are found that involve the foot than he hand it may have been natural for attention to have been paid to sandals that indicate that they were woven to accommodate the extra toe on the foot. These are referred to as jog-toe sandals. “Recently Crown et al. (p.445) assert that the jog-toed sandal itself evolved as an accommodation to polydactyly in the form of six toes, a trait characteristic of an early elite burial, although no sandal was found in association. The burial in question (Burial 13 in Room 33 in Pueblo Bonito) was recently radio-carbon dated between A.D. 690-887, with a median date of A.D. 741 (p.19623), dates that precede in time the iconography under discussion. Nevertheless, a synthesis of foot imagery at Chaco emphasizes the symbolic role of the foot in Ancestral Pueblo ideology during these years, accounting for its presence in the rock art.” (Schaafsma 2016: 17)

Twined jog-toed sandals, Pueblo Bonito, room 24, Schaafsma, 2016, fig. 34.

It certainly seems reasonable to make these inferences, because not only were portrayals of six-toed footprints produced, but portrayals of the jog-toed sandals to accommodate the sixth toe became common as well.

“The symbolic importance of the sandal as a graphic image is also underscored by its replication in other media found within archaeological contexts that indicate it had a ceremonial role. Thus, its representations in rock art can be viewed as part of the symbolic and ritual repertoire or ‘vocabulary’ that prevailed among the Plateau Pueblo peoples throughout the San Juan and neighboring regions during Pueblo II - III times.” (Schaafsma 2016: 17)

There are also instances that record polydactylism that are not necessarily rock art, not painted or engraved on rock. Special sandals called jog-toed sandals are thought to represent sandals made to accommodate a sixth toe. These are occasionally found illustrated in rock art, but they also are known through discoveries of actual examples of the sandals.

This has been seen as a Pueblo-wide phenomenon. “For example, many twined sandals from the Pueblo II and III periods have what appears to be a stylized sixth toe on the outside of the foot. Sandal-makers might have added these toe-jogs to commemorate real or fictive associations with important leaders at Chaco Canyon, at least of few of whom actually had a sixth toe. Because of that feature, and because these sandals required such intense effort to make, their wearers might have been high-ranking individuals who associated themselves with religious and political movements in the larger Chaco world.” (Bellorado 2018:40)

Sandal stones, larger than life-size, Long House, Mesa Verde, Colorado. Figure 3, p. 2, Schaafsma, 2016.

Knobby Knee Stockade, Site 5MT2525, US Bureau of Reclamation Hovenweep Laterals, photograph from Scott Schumaker.

And not only images and sandals have been recovered. Sandal effigy tablets in both wood and stone have been found, both jog-toed and non jog-toed. “Commonly larger than live-sized, finely worked, ground stone or wooden sandal effigy tablets in plain or jog-toed shape are characteristic. Although the ‘sandal stones’ were once erroneously tagged as utilitarian ‘sandal lasts’, this idea has been not only questioned, but vigorously challenged and dismissed. Further, their associations with caches of ritual paraphernalia or kivas are documented from Mesa Verde, Chaco, and Aztec sites. Wooden forms often bore painted decoration comparable to those seen on sandals in rock art. From Aztec two painted wooden sandal forms (at least one of which is jog-toed and with rounded heel) are painted on both sides with geometric designs. Their archaeological contexts in ritual caches and the investment in time represented in their manufacture are testimony to their iconic status and symbolic significance that can be extended to the graphic examples, and their use as altar furnishings is likely.” (Schaasma 2016)

Miniature jog-toed stone sandal effigy, Little Colorado River drainage. (1963 photograph by Myrtle Perce Vivian; courtesy of R. Gwinn Vivian). P. 15, fig. 17, Schaafsma, 2016.

Aside from their suggested use for “ritual” purposes, the only real suggestion of a possible significance for the jog-toed images and artifacts are as references to the presumed hereditary polydactylism of persons at Chaco Canyon who seem to have been important people in the community. This is suggested as a “me too” second-hand sort of significance by association. I honestly do not know if this is a real answer to the question of the significance of polydactyly in rock art, but it seems to be the best answer we have currently, and it will have to stand until a better answer comes along.

NOTE: Some images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on these reports you should read the original reports at the sites listed below.

REFERENCES:

Bellorado, Benjamin A., 2018 Sandals and Sandal Symbolism in Greater Bears Ears and Beyond, Archaeology Southwest Magazine 32 (1), Tucson, AZ, 39-41.

Crown, Patricia L., Kerriann M. Hedman, and Hannah V. Mattson, 2016 Foot Notes: The Social Implications of Polydactyly and Foot-Related Images at Chaco Canyon, American Antiquity 81, 426-48

Hirthler, Maureen A., and Richard L. Hutchison, 2012 Polydactyly in the Southwest: Art or Anatomy - a Photo Essay, October 16, Hand (Journal), NY.

Shaafsma, Polly, 2016 Sandals as Icons: Representations in Ancestral Pueblo Rock Art and Effigies in Stone and Wood, 7 October 2016, published in Arts, 5, 7, academic editor Robert Bednarik.