Description
The Stone Cutter and the Navajo Maiden, Tse Yitsidi doo Ch'ikeeh Bitsedaashjee is a bilingual children's picture book that explains the importance of the Navajo metate or grinding stone. A young Navajo girl lives with her father after the death of her mother and takes over the roll of grinding the corn to make flour. One day she trips and falls while carrying the metate or grinding stone and it shatters. To the Navajo, this grinding stone is an important tool for processing corn into flour for breadmaking. This special stone has been handed down from the girl's mother and is considered a precious family metate. The girl is alarmed and sets off to look for someone who can mend the stone. She walks to the home of an elderly Moccasin Maker thinking he may help her. Unfortunately he cannot but gives her a leather pouch to carry the pieces of the grinding stone and suggests she visit the Potter. On the she travels until she unexpectedly meets the Potter. The older woman assists the girl and gives her cool water and stew. She explains that clay cannot mend the stone and takes the girl to visit the Stone Cutter. The Stone Cutter explains that a broken metate cannot be repaired but he presents the girl with a new grinding stone. The girl is thankful and offers the Stone Cutter a gift but he declines. On her way back home the girl carefully places the broken pieces of her family heirloom in a safe place on the mountain side. Before she reaches home the girl's father finds his daughter and they return home with the new grinding stone. The author provides a brief note about the significance of the grinding stone and its sacredness for the Navajo. Detailed colour illustrations carry the story along and add warmth to this Navajo and English picture book.