A Brief Guide to Native American Myths and Legends (40 page)

The caribou-eating, warlike Chipewyan of the tundra and boreal forest were the dominant regional tribe, who extended their
influence in historical times by being both middleman and provider in the fur trade. The Chipewyan held that animals, spirits and other animate beings lived in a non-earthly realm of inkoze simultaneously with their physical existence. Pre-birth and post-life humans were part of inkoze; knowledge of this other world could be obtained during physical life, however, by dreams and visions. Powerful animals, meanwhile, sacrificed their physical being for the use of the people. This model of sacrifice proved sufficiently similar to the Christian concept of God’s sacrifice through His Son to allow a smooth integration of Christianity into the religion of the Chipewyan. Today, most Chipewyan are simultaneously animists and Christians.

¹
This myth would appear to explain the fancied resemblance between smoke and the shadowy or vaporous substance of which spirits or ghosts are supposed to be composed.

²
See page 256.

³
See the author’s
Myths of Mexico and Peru
p. 220.

⁴
The Native Races of the Pacific States
, vol. iii.

ADEE/IDO:
Thunderbird (Pacific Northwest)

AIRSEKUI/ARESKOUI:
The Great Spirit (Huron)

AKYCHA:
Spirit of the Sun (Eskimo)

AMOTKEN:
The creator, an old man dwelling in heaven, and father of the people (Selish)

ANGPETU WI:
The spirit of the Sun (Sioux)

ANINGAN:
The Moon (Eskimo)

ATAENTSIC:
The Sky Woman, granddaughter of the Chief-Sky-Rulers (Iroquois)

ATIUS TIRAWA:
The creator and supreme deity (Pawnee)

AWAHOKSHU:
The Abode of the Spirit Power (Pawnee)

AWONAWILONA:
The Sun-Father, and also, like
Wakonda
, the all-pervader (Zuñi)

BEAR:
Master of animals, chief of the underworld, and a culture hero. Particularly revered by the Algonquins, and the Ute, who believe they are closely related to the animal, which features prominently in Ute myths

BRIGHT STAR:
‘Mother-of-all-Things’, a personification of Venus (Skidi Pawnee)

CORN MAIDENS:
The most important deities of the people of the Southwest pueblos, who accompanied the first humans when they emerged from the underworld (Hopi/Zuñi)

COYOTE:
The prototypical trickster, found throughout most Native American cultures. Exists in animal and human form, always male, and sometime a beneficent culture hero

DAGANOWEDA:
Hiawatha (Iroquois)

DEOHAKO:
The Sister Spirits of Corn, Beans and Squash (Iroquois)

DELGETH:
Flesh-eating antelope (Navajo)

DZONOKWA:
The Cannibal Woman (Northwest)

GEYAGUGA:
The Moon god (Cherokee)

GITCHE MANITOU:
The All-Father (Iroquois)

GLUSCAP/GLOOSCAP:
Variously creator, trickster, transformer and culture hero (Algonquian, Wabanki)

GREAT HARE:
A demi-urge, creator, transformer, trickster and culture hero. Sometimes personified as Rabbit (Algonquian)

HAHAI-WUGTI:
The Spider Woman (Hopi)

HA-WEN-NHYU:
The Great Spirit (Iroquois)

HASTSHEHOGAN:
Along with Hastneyalti, the principal
yei
or benevolent deity (Navajo)

HASTSEYALTI:
With
Hastshehogan
, one of the two main
yei
, and a creator of man (Navajo)

IATIKU:
One of the Sisters who created man, the other being
Nautsiti
(Acoma)

IKOTIMI/ICTNICKE:
Spider, a trickster (Sioux)

ISAKAWUATE:
Old Man Coyote, the trickster (Crow)

ISHTINIKE:
Trickster-culture hero (Ponca)

ISTEPAHPAH:
A devouring monster (Creek)

KETCHIMANETOWA:
The Great Spirit (Fox)

KEMUSH/KUMUSH:
‘The-Old-Man-of-The-Ancients’ who, at the bidding of
Morning Star
, created the Earth from the ashes of the Aurora Borealis (Klamath/Modoc)

KOMOKUMS:
Trickster-transformer (Modoc)

LUDJKATAKO:
The Giant Turtle (Creek)

MALSUM:
Brother to
Gluscap
, a destroyer (Algonquian)

MANABOZHO:
A variant of
Nanabozho
(Northeast)

MATCHI MANITOU:
The personification of the ‘medicine-spirit’ (Chippewa)

MENAHKA:
The Great Spirit (Mandan)

MICHABO:
The Great Hare (Algonquian)

MORNING STAR:
After the Sun the most important of the celestial divinities among the Plains tribes, being a personification of Venus (Skidi Pawnee, Blackfoot and others)

NAHURAK:
Generic name given to the animal spirits who lived in five houses, namely Pahuk, Nakiskat, Tsurapako, Kitsawitsak and Pahua

NANANBOJO/NANABOOJOO:
The
Great Hare
(Potawatomi)

NANABOZHO:
The Great Rabbit (Northeast)

NANOOK/NANUQ/NANUE:
The Bear, Ursa Major and the Pleiades star group (Eskimo)

NA’PI:
The creator, the ‘Old Man’ (Blackfoot)

NEGAKFOK:
The spirit of the cold (Eskimo)

NESARU:
The Power Above (Arikara)

NAUTSITI:
With Iatiku, one of the Sister co-creators of man (Acoma)

NOKOMIS/NOOGUMEE:
Earth goddess and the mother of
Great Hare
(Menominee/Micmac)

ONATAH:
The spirit of corn (Iroquois)

PAH:
The spirit of the Moon, set in the west by
Tiráwa
to shine at night (Skidi Pawnee)

PALULUKON:
The Great Serpent (Hopi)

PASIKOLA:
The Rabbit, the trickster (Creek)

QAMAITS:
The Supreme Being of the Bella Coola of the Pacific Northwest, who almost uniquely in the North America held the major deity to be feminine

RAVEN:
The Trickster in various North American Indian cultures, especially in the North-west. Also known as
Yetl
and Hoya

SEDIT:
Coyote, the trickster (Wintun)

SEDNA:
The Great Sea Mother (Eskimo)

SEQINEK:
The spirit of the Sun (Eskimo)

SHAKURU:
The spirit of the Sun (Pawnee)

SISIUTL:
A water spirit, characterized as a monstrous serpent (Kwakitl)

SPIDER-WOMAN:
An underworld being who, in the mythology of the tribes of the Southwest, various creates human life or equips
humans with the necessary skills for survival, such as weaving (Hopi, Navajo, Keresan)

TAWESKARE/TAWISKARO:
The evil Creator-Twin (Huron)

THUNDERBIRD:
A mythical bird who is the creator of storms and messenger of the gods

TIRAWA:
The Great Spirit (Pawnee and Delaware)

TORNAQ:
A guardian spirit (Eskimo)

TORNGASOAU:
The immortal, supreme being (Eskimo)

TRICKSTER:
Creator, joker and culture hero, commonly characterized as Coyote, Raven, Crow, Hare or Rabbit. Frequently buffoonish, devious and sexually predatory

TSENTSA:
The good creator-twin (Huron)

UKTENI:
A magical water snake (Natchez)

WAKONDA/WATANA TANKA:
The Power Above, the Great Spirit, the Great Mystery (Osage/Sioux/Omaha)

WAXCPINI:
The trickster (Cree)

WINDINGO:
Giant cannibals (Ojibwa)

YETL:
The Raven, a trickster (Pacific Northwest)

Tribes
Polar Eskimo, Greenland Eskimo, Igulik Eskimo, Southampton Eskimo, Labrador Eskimo, Netsilik Eskimo, Mackenzie Eskimo, Alaskan Eskimo, Caribou Eskimo, Baffin Island Eskimo, Aleut, Ingalik, Inupiaq

Major Languages
Eskimo – Aleut

Major myth types
Tricksters, sea goddess, shamans

Tribes
Chipewyan, Koyukon, Dogrib, Beaver, Kutchin, Abitbi, Carrier, Cree, Han, Slave, Tutchone, Yellowknife, Naskapi, Kalapuya, Notka

Major Languages
Athapascan

Major myth types
Trickster, Earth Diver, transformer

Tribes
Tlingit, Haida, Kwakiutl, Chinook Haida, Hupa, Karok, Nootka, Alsea, Bella Coola, Chilcotin, Cowlitz, Gitksan, Haisla, Heiltsuk, Salish, Quileute, Tsimshian, and Yurok.

Major Languages
Salishan, Na-Dene

Major myth types
Transformer, trickster, stories based on lineage, heroic myths, Bear myths

Tribes
Hupa, Pomo, Yurok, Chumash, Maidu, Miwok, Modoc, Ohlone, Patwin, Pomo, Salinan, Wintun, Costanoa, Dieguno, Serrano, Shasta, Yurok, Yokuts, and Yuki.

Major Languages
Penutian

Major myth types
Origin myths, animal myths, tricksters and transformers

Tribes
Apache, Pueblo, Navajo, Coahuiltec, Jemez, Mojave, Yuma, Tanoan Pueblos, Papago

Major Languages
Uto-Aztecan-Tanoan

Major myth types
Emergence myths, migration myth, trickster

Tribes
Shoshoni, Paiute, Nez Percé, Spokane, Bannock, Ute, Skitwash, Yakama, Chemehuevi, Goshute, Washo

Major Languages
Uto-Aztecan

Major myth types
Trickster, hero and heroine, transformer, dying gods

Tribes
Sioux, Blackfoot, Assiniboin, Crow, Omaha, Cheyenne, Arapaho, Kiowa, Comanche, Arikara, Caddo, Gros Ventre, Kansa, Lipan, Mandan, Missouri, Nez Percé, Plains Cree, Pawnee, Osage

Major Languages
Siouan, Caddoan, Na-Dene

Major myth types
Culture hero, trickster, stories and legends featuring buffalo

Tribes
Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, Seminole, Biloxi, Natchez, Alabama, Calusa, Quapaw, Timucua, Yuchi

Major Languages
Muskogean

Major myth types
Culture hero, emergence myths, trickster and tales featuring councils of animals.

Tribes
Micmac, Abenaki, Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca, Conestoga, Conoy, Delaware, Powhatan, Montauk, Pequod, Narraganset, Wampanoag, Massachuset, Mohican, Huron, Ottawa, Menominee, Sauk & Fox, Winnebago, Potawatomi, Miami, Illinois, Shawnee, Erie, Tuscarora, Minga, Maliseet, Ojibwa, Tobacco

Major Languages
Algonquian-Titawan-Kutenai, Iroquois-Caddoan

Major myth types
Trickster stories, culture hero

Stephen E Ambrose,
Crazy Horse and Custer, The Parallel Lives of Two American Warriors
, 1975

Virginia I Armstrong
(ed.),
I Have Spoken: American History through the Voices of the Indians
, 1971

Dawn E Bastian and Judy K Mitchell,
Handbook of Native American Mythology
, 2004

John Bierhorst,
The Mythology of North America
, 2001

Black Elk,
Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux
, 2000

Franz Boas
(ed.),
Indian Myths and Legends from the North Pacific Coast of America
, 2002

Dee Brown,
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West
, 1970

Cottie Burland,
North American Indian Mythology
, 1965

George Catlin,
Life Among the Indians
, 1875

Duane Champagne
(ed.),
The Native North American Almanac: A Reference Work on Native North Americans in the United States and Canada
, 2001

Ella C Clark,
Indian legends of the Pacific Northwest
, 1953

Jeremiah Curtin,
Creative Myths of Primitive America
, 1899

——,
Seneca Indian Myths
, 1922

Natalie Curtis,
The Indians Book
, 1907

Angie Debo,
A History of the Indians of the United States
, 1971

Ella C. Deloria
(comp.),
Dakota Texts
, 1932

Vine Deloria, Jr,
Red Earth, White Lies: Native Americans and the Myth of Scientific Fact
, 1988

Mike Dixon-Kennedy,
Native American Myth and Legend
, 1996

D M Dooling
(ed.),
The Sons of the Wind: The Sacred Stories of the Lakota
, 1984

George A Dorsey,
The Pawnee Mythology
, 1906

George A Dorsey and Alfred L Kroeber,
Traditions of the Arapaho
, 1903

Mourning Dove,
Coyote Stories
, 1933