Chindi
Encyclopedia
In Navajo
religious belief, a chindi is the ghost
left behind after a person dies, believed to leave the body with the deceased's last breath. It is everything that was bad about the person; the "residue that man has been unable to bring into universal harmony". Traditional Navajo believe that contact with a chindi can cause illness ("ghost sickness
") and death. Chindi are believed to linger around the deceased's bones or possessions, so possessions are often destroyed after death and contact with bodies is avoided. After death the deceased's name is never spoken, for fear that the chindi will hear and come and make one ill. Traditional Navajo practise is to allow death to occur outdoors, to allow the chindi to disperse. If a person dies in a house or hogan
, that building is believed to be inhabited by the chindi and is abandoned.
It is also believed that a chindi can be used to cause harm upon someone else. Navajo witches
, followers of the Corpse-poison Way—’áńt’įįzhį, are believed to infect others with chindi sickness by planting a piece of a corpse, such as a bead or powder made from a corpse bone, in a person's body.
Dust devils
are referred to as chiindii and are said to be these spirits. Clockwise dust devils are good spirits and counterclockwise are bad.
In the winter of 1928, Alice Long Salt was found dead three miles from the trading post on Red Mesa.
Navajo people
The Navajo of the Southwestern United States are the largest single federally recognized tribe of the United States of America. The Navajo Nation has 300,048 enrolled tribal members. The Navajo Nation constitutes an independent governmental body which manages the Navajo Indian reservation in the...
religious belief, a chindi is the ghost
Ghost
In traditional belief and fiction, a ghost is the soul or spirit of a deceased person or animal that can appear, in visible form or other manifestation, to the living. Descriptions of the apparition of ghosts vary widely from an invisible presence to translucent or barely visible wispy shapes, to...
left behind after a person dies, believed to leave the body with the deceased's last breath. It is everything that was bad about the person; the "residue that man has been unable to bring into universal harmony". Traditional Navajo believe that contact with a chindi can cause illness ("ghost sickness
Ghost sickness
Ghost sickness is a culture-bound syndrome which some Native American tribes believe to be caused by association with the dead or dying. It is considered to be a psychotic disorder of Navajo origin. Its symptoms include general weakness, loss of appetite, a feeling of suffocation, recurring...
") and death. Chindi are believed to linger around the deceased's bones or possessions, so possessions are often destroyed after death and contact with bodies is avoided. After death the deceased's name is never spoken, for fear that the chindi will hear and come and make one ill. Traditional Navajo practise is to allow death to occur outdoors, to allow the chindi to disperse. If a person dies in a house or hogan
Hogan
A hogan is the primary traditional home of the Navajo people. Other traditional structures include the summer shelter, the underground home, and the sweat house...
, that building is believed to be inhabited by the chindi and is abandoned.
It is also believed that a chindi can be used to cause harm upon someone else. Navajo witches
Witch (Navajo)
There are a number of beliefs in traditional Navajo culture relating to practices which, in English, are all referred to as 'witchcraft.' In the Navajo language, they are actually each referred to distinctly, and are regarded as separate, albeit related, phenomena.The practices lumped together in...
, followers of the Corpse-poison Way—’áńt’įįzhį, are believed to infect others with chindi sickness by planting a piece of a corpse, such as a bead or powder made from a corpse bone, in a person's body.
Dust devils
Dust Devils
Dust Devils is an independently published role-playing game set in the Old West, written by Matt Snyder. It was voted the 2002 Indie RPG of the Year; it also won the Best Synergy of Game and Rules category, as well as placing in the Best Production and Most Innovative Game categories.The game uses...
are referred to as chiindii and are said to be these spirits. Clockwise dust devils are good spirits and counterclockwise are bad.
An account of "ghost sickness"
One famous account of the chindi is the account of the Long Salt family. In the August-September 1967 issue of the magazine Frontier Times, John R. Winslowe wrote of his 1925 encounter with Alice Long Salt, a slender teenage girl. In the periodical, she described the reason for the Long Salts' demise. She believed that after two members of the tribe deceived a blind medicine man, he sent a chindi to destroy the Long Salts. Each member of the family was stricken with an incurable illness, and eventually died.
Curiously, anyone marrying into the family met the same fate as a blood Long Salt. Alice's mother died when the girl reached seven and she was attending the Tuba City boarding school at the Indian agency. Alice's father became skin and bones, dying two years later... The remaining three Long Salts [Alice's two uncles and an aunt] were ill, crippled, and helpless. Friends cared for them, watching them fade into nothing before their eyes.
In the winter of 1928, Alice Long Salt was found dead three miles from the trading post on Red Mesa.