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A Field Guide to Southwest Jewelry · by Mateo James

Kewa (Santo Domingo) Pueblo: Heishi Tradition and Southwest Bead-Making

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Kewa Pueblo—also known historically as Santo Domingo, the name most often seen in older scholarship and collector references—is the established center of the heishi tradition in the American Southwest. The Kewa people were making and trading shell and turquoise beads long before Navajo silver arrived in the region, and their role as the principal bead-makers and traders of the Southwest is documented in the earliest accounts. Silversmithing came to Kewa later, around 1893, adopted from contact with a white jeweler in Santa Fe.

Mateo's Field Notes

Bedinger documents the pre-silver tradition clearly: "Their traditional craft is making shell and turquoise beads. The mines of Los Cerrillos are not far away, and the Santo Domingos have used them for many years, indeed claiming them as their property. Long before the Navajos started to work silver, the Santo Domingos were well established as the chief source of the lovely shell and turquoise necklaces worn and prized by Navajos and Pueblos alike" (Bedinger 1973:171). A Santo Domingo origin myth, recorded by White (1935:27), explains that before the Kewa people and two companion groups parted ways after emerging from the underworld, the Kewa promised to make beads for the others—a charter for the bead-making role that continues today.

Bedinger also documents Kewa's role as the Southwest's primary trade distributors: "They are the greatest native 'retail distributors' of the Southwest. They travel among the Navajos, bartering beads for rugs, livestock, and silver; keeping the best ornaments for themselves, they exchange the rest in other pueblos for local products or sell them to dealers in Santa Fe and Albuquerque. They gather at every festival" (Bedinger 1973:171).

The term "heishi" derives from the Keresan word for shell and refers specifically to the disc-bead form—tiny, flat discs drilled and ground smooth, strung as necklaces—made at Kewa from shell, turquoise, jet, coral, and other materials. The Indian-Southwest Jewelry (1868-era volume) documents "heishe" as a recognized form in period use (ISJ-1868, p. approx. 1409).

Silversmithing entered Kewa around 1893. Adair (1944, p. 186) gives this date, identifying Ralph Atencio as the first Kewa smith, who learned from a white jeweler in Santa Fe. Atencio still used the original blowpipe and charcoal method of melting silver when Adair found him. He had taught his son, also named Ralph—"the best craftsman in the village"—and five other men, each of whom paid the elder Atencio twenty-five dollars for instruction. Francisco Teyano, whom Adair called "the leading silversmith in the village," earned $500 per year by 1939 (Bedinger 1973:172).

The Depression-era Thunderbird jewelry associated with Santo Domingo—bold graphic forms made from recycled materials including Edison phonograph records (black), battery casings, and other industrial materials—extended the Kewa tradition of working with whatever materials were available. The heishi tradition itself has no strict material restriction: shell heishi, turquoise heishi, and jet heishi are all documented forms, the term describing the process and form rather than the material.

Collector's Handbook

  • Authentic heishi is drilled and ground, not molded. Each bead is individually drilled through its center and then ground flat and smooth on an abrasive surface. The labor is extraordinary: a single strand of fine heishi may represent days of work. Mass-produced imitations are cast or molded and lack the subtle surface variation of hand-ground beads.
  • Shell heishi shows natural grain variation. Genuine shell heishi retains faint traces of the shell's layering structure, visible under close inspection. Plastic or resin imitations are uniform throughout.
  • Kewa silverwork patterned after Navajo forms is the historical norm. Early Kewa silversmiths followed Navajo design vocabulary. Contemporary Kewa smiths work across styles. Artist attribution and hallmark documentation—Hougart (2022) lists registered Kewa marks—are the authentication tools for specific pieces.

Signature Techniques

Heishi bead-making is the defining Kewa contribution to Southwest jewelry—see our Shell, Heishi, and Mother-of-Pearl guide for construction detail. Kewa silversmiths also produce stampwork pieces and inlay work. The Coriz and Lovato family lineages documented in our directory represent the strongest contemporary Kewa silversmithing documentation available.

Kewa Silversmiths in Our Directory

12 Kewa artists are documented in the T.Skies Co-Op Silversmith Directory:

Charlyn Reano · Cordell Pajarito · Ed Lovato · Jeremy Rosetta · Jose Benevidez · Julian Lovato · Kevin Coriz · Leo Coriz · Lorenzo Coriz · Nelson Garcia · Ray Lovato · Roderick Tenorio

See the full A–Z directory for all Kewa profiles, and the Mary Coriz Lovato Co-Op bio for an account of the Coriz-Lovato lineage.

Primary Sources

  • Bedinger, Margery. Indian Silver: Navajo and Pueblo Jewelers. University of New Mexico Press, 1973. Pp. 171–172.
  • Adair, John. The Navajo and Pueblo Silversmiths. University of Oklahoma Press, 1944. P. 186.
  • Indian-Southwest Jewelry (1868-era volume). P. approx. 1409 (heishe reference).
  • Hougart, Bille. Native American and Southwestern Silver Hallmarks, 5th ed. (2022).

Related Entries

Navajo / Diné Silversmithing · Cochiti Pueblo Silversmithing · Shell, Heishi, and Mother-of-Pearl · Jaclas and Heishe · Field Guide Hub