White Corn Maiden

    Article

    The White Corn Maiden is one of the younger Corn Maiden sisters of Zuni tradition, representing the direction of the east and the white color of the milk one drinks at dawn. When the Corn Maidens came from the underworld, they had no corn. Two witches dwelling under a pine bough pavilion inquired about this and gave each sister a differently-colored ear of corn to coax into growth.

    Photo Credit

     
    "Rising of the Corn Maiden" by Tammy Belson, Ashiwi, 1987 (25/8453), National Museum of American Indian Archive Center, Smithsonian Institution

    Term Type
    References

     
    Young, M. Jane.
         1987    "Women, reproduction, and religion in western Puebloan society." Journal of
             American Folklore 100, no. 398: 436-445.