Early mention of house building occurs in the creation myths: First-man and First-woman are discovered in the first or lowest underworld, living in a hut which was the prototype of the hogán. There were curious beings located at the cardinal points in that first world, and these also lived in huts of the same style, but constructed of different materials. In the east was Tiéholtsodi, who afterward appears as a water monster, but who then lived in the House of Clouds, and I¢ní‘ (Thunder) guarded his doorway. In the south was Teal‘ (Frog) in a house of blue fog, and Tiel‘íŋ, who is afterward a water monster, lay at that doorway. Ácihi Estsán (Salt-woman) was in the west, and her house was of the substance of a mirage; the youth Çó‘nenĭli (Water-sprinkler) danced before her door. In the north Çqaltláqale[1] made a house of green duckweed, and Sĭstél‘ (Tortoise) lay at that door.
[Footnote 1: Recorded by Dr Matthews as the Blue Heron.]
Some versions of the myth hold that First-man’s hut was made of wood just like the modern hogán, but it was covered with gorgeous rainbows and bright sunbeams instead of bark and earth. At that time the firmament had not been made, but these first beings possessed the elements for its production. Rainbows and sunbeams consisted of layers or films of material, textile or at least pliable in nature, and were carried about like a bundle of blankets. Two sheets of each of these materials were laid across the hut alternately, first the rainbows from north to south, then the sunbeams from east to west. According to this account the other four houses at the cardinal points were similarly made of wood, the different substances mentioned being used merely for covering. Other traditions hold that the houses were made entirely of the substances mentioned and that no wood was used in their construction because at that time no wood or other vegetal material had been produced.
After mankind had ascended through the three underworlds by means of the magic reed to the present or fourth world, Qastcéyalçi, the God of Dawn, the benevolent nature god of the south and east, imparted to each group of mankind an appropriate architecture--to the tribes of the plains, skin lodges; to the Pueblos, stone houses; and to the Navaho, huts of wood and earth and summer shelters. Curiously enough, nowhere in Navaho tradition is any mention or suggestion made of the use by them of skin lodges.