by the prophet of the earth...

by the prophet of the earth was written as a kind of ethnobotanical guide to the plants of arizona as used by the pima indians, and is largely a list of plants and how the pima people used them for food, medicine, and other uses. it's a beautiful book, designed by merle armitage in 1949. armitage had a very crisp graphic style, and everything looks a bit like he worked with wood blocks and is a nice hybrid of modernist and folk art tendencies. a book on american indian culture seems totally fitted to his aesthetic, and indeed many of his books are related to the desert. here are some nice bits:

some keys to pima pronunciation:
ai as in aisle: e.g. vaila, dance
ee as in eel: e.g. eebdak, heart
a as in papa: e.g. babat, frog (i like how this word sounds so much like a frog sound)
i as in pit: e.g. itdam, upon
yi approaches a softly aspirated vi: e.g. cofyi, woman

protection against whirlwinds:
lewis told me he has a brother who lives at casa blanca and when he sees a whirlwind approaching, he steps out of his house, crosses his index fingers, and hums. with this method he keeps the whirlwind from entering his house, it just passes by.

flutes:
the fair one's attention is saught... to do this, he takes his flute, an instrument of cane with four holes, and, seating himself beneath a bush near her dwelling, keeps up a plaintive noise for hours. the music is continued day after day, until she acknowledges him.