By ROBERT DRYJA
Los Alamos

The sheepherders in the Valles Caldera carved a variety images on aspen trees in addition to carving letters.

One type of image involved stars. The five-pointed star can be found as shown in Picture 1. The carving of stars can become more complex. Picture 2 shows a star with eight points and curves. It is a more artistic compared to the five straight lines of the traditional star.

Picture 3 gives a hint going back to Spanish colonialism and religious intolerance. The Spanish king in 1492 required all Spanish people to be Catholic or face the Inquisition. 

People of the Jewish faith had a choice: forced conversion, leave Spain or become crypto Jews. “Crypto” meant that they maintained some aspects of their Jewish heritage but without public display. A number of crypto Jews left Spain for Mexico to escape the Inquisition, but the Inquisition then came to Mexico.

Further migration occurred to what eventually became New Mexico. This transition is spread over centuries in which an organized religion fades, but parts remain in family traditions.

Did the sheepherder who carved two kinds of stars in Picture 3 only want to make artistic variations of star or was something in addition being expressed? Is the six pointed star also representing the Star of David of Jewish traditions? 

Was he making a carving of something passed down from generation to generation and did he have some knowledge of its symbolism?

Carvings of the Star of David are found in particular aspen groves rather than spread randomly throughout the Valles Caldera. This suggests a single sheepherder from one family was making these carvings. What was in his family history that made him interested in making this kind of carving?

Picture 1A: A five pointed star. Courtesy photo

Picture 1B: A five pointed star. Courtesy photo

Picture 2: Possibly a more complex carvings of a star. Courtesy photo

Picture 3A: Six and five pointed stars. Courtesy photo

Picture 3B: Six and five pointed stars. Courtesy photo

Picture 4: A Star of David with dots spaced along two horizontal lines. Courtesy photo

Pictures 5 and 6 show another kind of carving that is found in the same aspen grove as the Star of David. These pictures can be considered to show a cattle brand: the number four inside an oval. However, cattle were not introduced into the Valles Caldera until after sheepherding ended in the 1940’s.

A review of registered cattle brands for 1899 through 1906 lists brands that include the number four or an oval, but separate from one another, not arranged inside one another. The current registry does show one brand similar to pictures 5 or 6. However the style of the number 4 is different. It is closed at the top rather than open as seen in the pictures.

Rather than a cattle brand, a sheepherder may have been carving two letters from the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet. Paleo-Hebrew letters are similar to the cattle brand in pictures 5 and 6. The oval may represent the letter  (avin) and the four may represent the letter (nun). Could a sheepherder have been carving images passed down in his family, reflecting some Jewish heritage from centuries past? Is some historic Jewish heritage being reflected in an aspen grove?

Picture 5: Is this a cattle brand or Paleo-Hebrew letters? Or both? Courtesy photo

Picture 6: Is this a cattle brand or Paleo-Hebrew letters? Or both? Courtesy photo