Diné Silversmithing

Navajo silversmiths are recognized for their artistic creations in a variety of forms using silver and turquoise.  Navajos probably learned smithing from Mexican ironworkers in the 1850s, and by about 1875 some were working in silver.  The first artisans were men; women began to work silver around 1918.

Navajo silversmiths developed a wide variety of forms, such as bracelets, necklaces, conchas, buckles, bridle decoration, tobacco canteens, rings, wrist guards, buttons and other objects.  Navajo artists obtained their silver by melting down U.S. and later Mexican silver coinage.  Silver ornaments could be wrought, an ingot pounded into the desired form, or molded.  Turquoise, traded from Zuni and Hopi, and later obtained from mines in Nevada and Colorado, was added to Navajo silverwork about 1880.

Early designs were made with an awl or chisel.  By 1895, die stamps were in wide use, creating designs of crescents, rosettes, triangular forms with radiating patterns, wavy and zigzag lines.  By the turn of the 20^th Century, decorative elements included arrows and swastikas.  Commercialization began about this time, when the Fred Harvey Company ordered Navajo silverwork to sell to American tourists.  Traders to the Navajo provided the implements and raw materials needed to encourage production.

The famous squash blossom type necklace, as seen here, developed after 1880.  The first step was to figure out how to solder together two halves of beads.  In Navajo, the term is “bead that spreads out,” and probably has nothing to do with squash blossoms.  Rather, the form probably came from Spanish/Mexican pomegranate designs.

Navajo artists today continue their robust tradition of silversmithing, and their artistry is renowned worldwide.