There was a man who, while playing the hoop game and the game of seven wooden dice, lost all his property, including a very good house. He also lost the beads that belonged to his niece. Because of this his brothers resolved to kill him. A necklace of mixed beads was hanging in the center of the house. The niece told her uncle he might wager that also. “All right, niece,” he replied, and took the white shell, the turquoise, the abalone, the coral, the jet; he took five of them off one by one. He also provided himself with specular iron ore, pollen of larkspur and of cat-tails. With these he walked away to the corn pits which were full. From these he took one ear each of the five colors. He patted these together until they were small. “Well, little mother,” he said to his niece, “they speak of killing me. It may be you and I will see each other again. Goodbye.”

Then he put a tree into the water with himself (inside of it). He floated in the tree down where the stream enters the Colorado River. He got out of the tree there and walked along the shore. He felt lonesome there. He planted the corn he had brought with him in the form of a cross, putting the seed in, one by one. Each stalk had two ears projecting opposite each other. There were twelve stalks with two ears each.

He stayed there four years and then started to return to his home. After many days he got back, arriving early in the morning at his home which was called te’ineisk’it. He went to the corn storage pits, but they were entirely empty. He put four ears in them and blew on them four times. After that he went where his niece was sitting. They were having a famine. “Prepare food for me, my little mother,” he said to her. “There is none,” she replied. “Four days after you left, the corn was all gone. I do not know how it happened.”

She sat there crying. “I cannot cook food for you, my uncle.” “Go and get something,” he said again. “Do not say that, uncle, there is none, none.” When they had spoken to each other four times she went to the pits. When she got there the pits were full. “Thanks, uncle,” she called as she ran back with the corn. The girl then ran to the men and told them her uncle had come and that the corn pits were full again.

“Welcome,” they said, when they came in and they then embraced him. “You are the only one, younger brother. In the future we will not speak evil of you. Something has happened to the game animals. We hunt in vain.”

Wondering what had happened, the returned brother hunted for days in vain. One day when he was hunting he went to the top of a mountain. Below a cliff he saw a deer standing. He ran around and crept up where the deer had been, but it had vanished. He examined the ground, but the soil had not been disturbed. The next day he climbed the mountain again and there the deer stood again. This time he walked directly toward it trying to keep it in sight; but where it had been standing there was nothing but some deer dung. A little distance from where he stood there had been a spruce tree, but when he turned his head away and then looked in that direction again a god stood there. “What is it, grandchild?” he asked. “A deer which was standing right there has vanished,” he replied. “Have you white shell, grandson?” “I have them all, grandfather.” “My grandson has everything. We will do it,” the god said. [They went up to the god’s house.}

He found the door fronts were darkness, daylight, the moon, and the sun. Inside, shadow gods were sitting on either side, facing each other. “Well, go on, my grandson,” the first god said. He took steps on the right side of the house four times, blowing as he did so, and four footprints appeared. He discovered that the first god had pets which he kept far in the interior. He heard from inside someone say, “Ho, I smell earth people. The polite master has brought in a human being.” “Do not say that; he has everything,” the god said. Back of the fire a male deer was lying. On him lay a feathered arrow with a red shaft. It had just been pulled out.

The man took a seat in the center. He put down one each of white shell, turquoise, coral, abalone, jet, specular iron ore, blue pollen, cat-tail pollen, and then covered them with a blanket. He stepped over these four times and they became a great heap. The god was sorrowful and said, “I do not think we can give you a fair equivalent.”

He found out afterward that he stayed there in the house of the game animals four days. The shadow gods distributed the precious objects. They gave each of those present fifteen pieces, then thirteen, then nine, then seven, then five, then three, and all had been given out.

“This is the way deer should be skinned. Break the legs here at the wrist joint, but let them hang by the tendons. Leave the skin on the nose and lips. Draw the skin carefully from under the eyes. Do not cut through the bladder. Turn the hide back to the hips. If you do this way you will always kill game. Put the head toward the center, but do not let the eyes bum or the teeth. You must not cook it by burying it in the ashes. Game animals must not be thrown away. Sickness will result if you do not observe these things. If the teeth are burned the hunter’s teeth will hurt. You earth people will have a cure for it, grandson,” the god told him.

He had everything prepared. “What did you come for, grandson?” Small Whirlwind told him that on that side were images of the game animals standing side by side. On the east side was the paunch of an animal in which were deer songs. The man pointed to these. The god looked down and said, “All right, grandson. It was for these you came.”

Being xactc’eyahi I came up.
To the abode of the deer I came up.
To the door post of darkness I came up.
To the door post of daylight I came up.
To the door post of moon I came up.
To the door post of sun I came up.
To the place where xactc’eyahi with xactc’ejin sat facing each other, I came up.
To where the black bow and the feathered arrows with red shaft lie across each other, I came up.
Over there they lie across each other, red with the mouth blood of a male deer.
Over there the deer I killed likes me.
He sang only one deer song.

They were here when I was hunting them in vain he thought to himself. “Shoot them in the brush,” he told him. This is where they are.

I being xactc’eyalti.
On the trail to the top of Black Mountain,
On the trail among the flowers,
Male deer are there,
The pollen of herbs I will put in its mouth,
The male deer steps along in the dew of the vegetation.
I kill him but he likes me.

He returned home. He shot into the brush and a deer rolled over with the arrow in him. He shot into another kind of brush and a fawn rolled over with the arrow in him. He shot into another kind of brush and a yearling rolled over with the arrow.

“I have done something important,” he thought to himself as he ran back. They found he had killed them all. That is why when they get away we track them.

There are very many game songs. If one does not know them he does not hunt. We are afraid about these things because they are pets of the gods.

Taken from American Museum of Natural History, Anthropological Papers, Volume
IV, Part I, page 161-164.

Most Inuit groups have a myth of the northern lights as the spirits of the dead playing ball with a walrus head or skull. The Inuits of Nunivak Island had the opposite idea, of walrus spirits playing with a human skull

Folklore is from Legends of the Northern Lights, by Dorothy Jean Ray, The ALASKA SPORTSMAN, April 1958, reprinted in AURORA BOREALIS The Amazing Northern Lights, by S.I. Akasofu, Alaska Geographic, Volume 6, Number 2, 1979

Tradition of the Na’k!wax*da?xu.

Gâ’sag*ila was a chief who had many carvings. He came from the south. He put them up when he reached the north country. He went to Gwa’wê in the country of the Na’k!wax*da?xu, and there he staid. There he made a winter-dance, and his son became a cannibal, whose names were Q!â’sElîdzas, Ha?mêk*!â’lag*ilîs, Ts!â’xôstâla. This son’s son was K*!ô’gwikîlagEmê?, whose son was Q!u’mqwax*â’lasEmê?.

Kwakiutl Tales, by Franz Boas; (Columbia University Contributions to Anthropology, Volume II) New York: Columbia University Press; [1910] and is now in the public domain.

GAmnâ’tck!î killed a seal, skinned it, and threw the skin and meat to his wife to wash. While she was washing them in the sea she saw some killer whales coming landward. By and by the meat she was washing drifted out from her and she waded after it. She went out until the water reached her hips. Then she suddenly felt some one pull her and she disappeared under water. It was the killer-whale people who thus took her into their canoe.

After that GAmnâ’tck!î felt very badly and thought to himself, “How can I get my wife back? How can I look for her under the water?” He could not sleep all night, and early in the morning he thought, “I wonder if I couldn’t raise this water so as to go under it.” In the morning, therefore, before he had eaten he took his red and black paints, went down to the water, raised the edge of it just as if he were raising a blanket, and walked under. He walked on farther and farther. It was just like walking on land.

By and by he came to a village full of very pale people who went about with their heads down. He found out that they were the red cod people. He wanted to make friends of them, so, thinking that they looked very white, he painted them all red–men, women, and children. That is how these fishes got their color. After that he asked them if they had seen his wife, but they said that they had seen no one, so he went on. Presently he came to another village and asked the people there the same question to which he received the very same answer. Those were the halibut people. In each village they gave him something to eat.

After he had ‘left the halibut people GAmnâ’tck!î traveled for several days before he came to another town. By and by, however, he perceived smoke far ahead of him, and, going toward it, he saw that it was from a fort. Inside of this fort was a large house which he immediately entered, but the people there did not seem to care to see strangers and would not talk to him. These were also very pale people, so to please them he took out his black paint and painted all of them with it. Then they felt well disposed toward him and were willing to talk. “Can you tell me what clan has my wife?” he said. At first they said that they did not know, but afterward one replied, “There is a strange woman in that town across there.” Then this person pointed the village out, and GAmnâ’tck!î felt pleased to know where his wife was. The people he had come among were the sharks, and those whose village they showed him were the killer whales.

Then the shark chief said, “Every time we have had a fight we have beaten them.” The shark people also said to him, “The killer-whale chief has a slave. Every morning the slave goes out after water. Go to the creek and tell him what to do when he comes in. Tell him to bring the water in and hand it to the chief over the fire. As he does so he must drop it, and, while the house is full of steam, pick up your wife and run out with her. The chief has married her. Then come over here with her. They will run after you, but, if you can get away, come right across.” The shark people had always been jealous of the killer whales because they had this woman.

While the shark people were telling him what to do, a strange, bony-looking person kept jumping up from behind the boxes. He wondered what made him act so queerly and began to feel uneasy about it, but, when the bony person saw him looking at him in a strange manner, he said, “Why! don’t you know me. I am that halibut hook (nAxu) that the sharks once took away from you. My name is Lgudjî’ (the name of an island).”

Just after that the man started for the killer-whale town and sat down by the creek. When the slave came out after water, he asked him to help him, saying, “I hear that my wife is with this chief.” “Yes,” the slave answered, “if she were a man, they would have kept her for a slave like myself. Since she is a woman, the chief has married her, and she is living very well. I will help you as much as I can. She wants to return to you. Now watch and I will do what you tell me to do. I will spill this water on the fire.”

After that he took GAmnâ’tck!î to the door and showed him where his wife sat. Then the slave walked in with the water while he stood outside watching. He watched his wife through a crack and saw that she appeared very much cast down. As soon as the fire was put out and the house filled with steam he ran in, seized his wife, and started off with her.

Then, when the slave thought that he had gotten a long distance away, he shouted, “Some one has taken the woman away.” The chief looked around, and sure enough his wife was gone. Going outside, they saw that this man had almost reached the shark fort, and they saw him enter it.

As soon as he got there, the shark people began to dress themselves for war. They were noisy and acted as though they were very hungry, so that GAmnâ’tck!î became frightened. The halibut hook came to him, however, and told him not to be frightened, because the killer whales were coming over. All at once the fort began moving up and down. Whenever the killer whales tried to enter, the fort killed them by moving up and down and cutting off their heads. The slaughter was so great that the few survivors were frightened and went back. Two or three days later the killer whales came again with like result.

After this the shark people said to GAmnâ’tck!î, “You better not start out I right away. Stay here a while with us. They might be lying in wait for you. Since we have fought for you so much, it is better that you should get to your home safely.” GAmnâ’tck!î did so, and some time later they said, “Go straight along by the way you came, and you will find your way out easily.” He did this and reached his home in safety.

Footnotes:

Evidently a version of the Tsimshian Story of Gunxnaxsîmgyêt

Abstract:

Gamnâ’tck!Î:

The hero obtains the favor of the red-cod people by painting them red and of the shark people by painting them black.

Tlingit Myths and Texts, by John R. Swanton; Smithsonian Institution; Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 39; Washington, Government Printing Office; [1909] and is now in the public domain.

Ga?na? was a Seneca war chief. He called a council and said, “We must go to the Cherokee and see if we can’t agree to be friendly together and live in peace hereafter.” The people consented, and the chief said, “We must go to water first before we start.” So they went, a great party of warriors, far away into the deep forest by the river side. There were no women with them. For ten days they drank medicine every morning to make them vomit and washed and bathed in the river each day.

Then the chief said, “Now we must get the eagle feathers.” They went to the top of a high hill and dug a trench there the length of a man’s body, and put a man into it, with boughs over the top so that he could not be seen, and above that they put the whole body of a deer. Then the people went off out of sight, and said the words to invite Shada?ge’a, the great eagle that lives in the clouds, to come down.

The man under the brushwood heard a noise, and a common eagle came and ate a little and flew away again. Soon it came back, ate a little more, and flew off in another direction. It told the other birds and they came, but the man seared them away, because he did not want common birds to eat the meat. After a while he heard a great noise coming through the air, and he knew it was Shada?ge’a, the bird be wanted. Shada?ge’a is very cautious, and looked around in every direction for some time before he began to eat the meat. As soon as he was eating the man put his hand up cautiously and caught hold of the bird’s tail and hold on to it. Shada?ge’a rose up and flew away, and the man had pulled out one feather. They had to trap a good many eagles in this way, and it was two years before they could get enough feathers to make a full tail, and were ready to start for the Cherokee country.

They were many days on the road, and when they got to the first Cherokee town they found there was a stockade around it so that no enemy could enter. They waited until the gate was open, and then two Seneca dancers went forward, carrying the eagle feathers and shouting the signal yell. When the Cherokee beard the noise they came out and saw the two men singing and dancing, and the chief said, “These men must have come upon some errand.” The Seneca messengers came up and said, “Call a council; we have come to talk on important business.” All turned and went toward the townhouse, the rest of the Seneca following the two who were dancing. The townhouse was crowded, and the Seneca sang and danced until they were tired before they stopped. The Cherokee did not dance.

After the dance the Seneca chief said, “Now I will tell you why we have come so far through the forest to see you. We have thought among ourselves that it is time to stop fighting. Your people and ours are always on the lookout to kill each other, and we think it is time for this to stop. Here is a belt of wampum to show that I speak the truth. If your people are willing to be friendly, take it,” and he held up the belt. The Cherokee chief stepped forward and said, “I will hold it in my hand, and to-morrow we will tell you what we decide.” He then turned and said to the people, “Go home and bring food.” They went and brought so much food that it made a great pile across the house, and all of both tribes ate together, but could not finish it.

Next day they ate together again, and when all were done the Cherokee chief said to the ‘Seneca, “We have decided to be friendly and to bury our weapons, these knives and hatchets, so that no man may take them up again.” The Seneca chief replied, “We are glad you have accepted our offer, and now we have all thrown our weapons in a pile together, and the white wampum hangs between us, and the belt shall be as long as a man and hang down to the ground.”

Then the Cherokee chief said to his people, “Now is the time for any of you that wishes to adopt a relative from among the Seneca to do so.” So some Cherokee women went and picked out one man and said, “You shall be our uncle,” and some more took another for their brother, and so on until only Ga?na?, the chief, was left, but the Cherokee chief said, “No one must take Ga?na?, for a young man is here to claim him as his father.” Then the young man came up to Ga? na? and said, “Father, I am glad to see you. Father, we will go home,” and he led Ga?na? to his own mother’s house, the house where Ga?na? had spent the first night. The young man was really his son, and when Ga?na? came to the house he recognized the woman as his wife who had been carried off long ago by the Cherokee.

While they were there a messenger came from the Seoqgwageono tribe, that lived near the great salt water in the east, to challenge the Cherokee to a ball play. He was dressed in skins which were so long that they touched the ground. He said that his people were already on the way and would arrive in a certain number of days. They came on the appointed day and the next morning began to make the bets with the Cherokee. The Seneca were still there. The strangers bet two very heavy and costly robes, besides other things. They began to play, and the Cherokee lost the game. Then the Seneca said, “We will try this time.” Both sides bet heavily again, and the game began, but after a little running the Seneca carried the ball to their goal and made a point. Before long they made all the points and won the game. Then the bets were doubled, and the Seneca won again. When they won a third game also the Seoqgwageono said, “Let us try a race,” and the Seneca agreed.

The course was level, and the open space was very wide. The Cherokee selected the Seneca runner, and it was agreed that they would run the first race without betting and then make their bets on the second race. They ran the first race, and when they reached the post the Seneca runner was just the measure of his body behind the other. His people asked him if he had done his best, but he said, “No; I have not,” so they made their bets, and the second race–the real race– began. When they got to the middle the Seneca runner said to the other, “Do your best now, for I am going to do mine,” and as he said it he pulled out and left the other far behind and won the race. Then the Seoqgwageono said, “There is one more race yet–the long race,” and they got ready for it, but the Cherokee chief said to his own men, “We have won everything from these people. I think it will be best to let them have one race, for if they lose all, they may make trouble.” They selected a Cherokee to run, and he was beaten, and the Seoqgwageono went home.

In a few days they sent a messenger to challenge the Cherokee to meet them halfway for a battle. When the Cherokee heard this they said to the Seneca, “There are so few of you here that we don’t want to have you killed. It is better for you to go home.” So the Seneca went back to their own country.

Three years later they came again to visit the Cherokee, who told them that the Seoqgwageono had won the battle, and that the chief of the enemy had said afterward, “I should like to fight the Seneca, for I am a double man.” Before long the enemy heard that the Seneca were there and sent them a challenge to come and fight. The Seneca said, “We must try to satisfy them,” so with Cherokee guides they set out for the country of the Seoqgwageono. They went on until they came to an opening in the woods within one day’s journey of the first village. Then they stopped and got ready to send two messengers to notify the enemy, but the Cherokee said, “You must send them so as to arrive about sundown.” They did this, and when the messengers arrived near the town they saw all the people out playing ball.

The two Seneca went around on the other side, and began throwing sumac darts as they approached, so that the others would think they were some of their own men at play. In this way they got near enough to kill a man who was standing alone. They scalped him, and then raising the scalp yell they rushed off through the Woods, saying to each other as they ran, “Be strong–Be strong.” Soon they saw the Seoqgwageono coming on horses, but managed to reach a dry creek and to bide under the bank, so that the enemy passed on without seeing them.

The next morning they came out and started on, but the enemy was still on the watch, and before long the two men saw the dust of the, horses behind them. The others came up until they were almost upon them and began to shoot arrows at them, but by this time the two Seneca were near the opening where their own friends were hiding, drawn up on each side of the pass. As the pursuers dashed in the two lines of the Seneca closed in and every man of the Seoqgwageono was either killed or taken.

The Seneca went back to the Cherokee country and after about a month they returned to their own homes. Afterward the Cherokee told them, “We hear the Seoqgwageono think you dangerous people. They themselves are conjurers and can tell what other people are going to do, but they cannot tell what the Seneca are going to do. The Seneca medicine is stronger.”

Arranged from Curtin, Seneca manuscript.

Myths of the Cherokee by James Mooney. From the Nineteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology 1897-98, Part I. [1900] and is now in the public domain.