ABSTRACT
For a people depending entirely upon agriculture and sheep herding for their subsistence, the physical environment is not an easy one. The high New Mexican plateau is excessively arid, and a good part of the country is desert or unsuitable for agriculture and grazing. The Zuni are primarily agriculturists and have been so since early prehistoric times. Besides the fields of corn, wheat, and alfalfa that are scattered over the reservation, and the melon patches and peach orchards, the Zuni cultivate small vegetable gardens just at the edge of the village by the river. Sheep herding is a foreign complex introduced at an early time by the Spanish, and the attitudes surrounding sheep economy are at present alien to basic Zuni economic concepts. The individual in Zuni is fitted into an intricate and closely knit social organization. Strikingly characteristic of all social relations in Zuni is the relative lack of emphasis upon wealth.
