Myths of the Cherokees. jj^MEs m:ooney. Reprinted from the Journal of American Folk-Lore, No. 2, July-Sept., 1888. CAMBRIDGE : 1888. ■;tT-vr ■-***■ Digitized by tlie Internet Arcliive in 2011 witli funding from University of Nortli Carolina at Chapel Hil http://www.archive.org/details/mythsofcherokeesOOmoori THE JOURNAL OF AMERICAN FOLK-LORE. Vol. I.— JULY-SEPTEMBER, 1888. — No. II. MYTHS OF THE CHEROKEES. The Cherokees are undoubtedly the most important tribe in the United States, as well as one of the most interesting, being exceeded in point of numbers only by the Sioux, and possibly also by the Chippewas, while in regard to wealth, intelligence, and general adap- tability to civilization they are far ahead of any other of our tribes. Their original home was the beautiful mountain region of the South- ern Alleghanies, in North and South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, and Alabama, with their settlements chiefly upon the head-waters of the Savannah and the Tennessee. They first came into collision with the advancing white population in 1760, and from that time their history is a constant record of wars and land cessions until the final treaty of New Echota in 1835, when the body of the tribe aban- doned their homes and removed to the Indian Territory, where they are now known as the " Cherokee Nation," and number about sev- enteen thousand, besides several thousand adopted Indians, whites, and negroes. By the terms of the treaty a few hundred were allowed to remain behind, on individual grants, while a much larger number managed to elude the clutches of the soldiers in the general round- up, and fled to the mountains. Through the efforts of William H. Thomas, an influential trader among them, most of these were after- ward concentrated on adjacent tracts in Western North Carolina. They are now known as the " Eastern Band of Cherokees," and number in all about two thousand, of whom twelve hundred are set- tled on a reservation in Swain and Jackson counties ; three hundred are at Cheowah, some thirty miles farther west ; while the remainder are scattered mixed-bloods, retaining but few of the Indian charac- teristics. Excepting these last, very few know enough English to converse intelligently. Remaining in their native mountains, away from railroads and progressive white civilization, they retain many customs and traditions which have been lost by those who removed to the West. They still keep up their old dances and ball-plays, — although these have sadly degenerated, — their medicine-men, con- 98 Journal of American FolkrLore. / juring, songs, and legends. The Cherokee syllabary, invented by one of the tribe about sixty years ago, has enabled them to preserve in a written form much which in other tribes depends upon oral tra- dition, and soon disappears before the pressure of civilization. The fact that many of these legends are connected with mountains, streams, and water-falls with which they have been familiar from childhood also goes a long way toward keeping the stories fresh in memory. The following stories are specimens of a number collected, together with other material, for the Bureau of Ethnolog)^, in the summer of 1887. The first is one of the best known of the Cherokee myths of a sacred character, and in the old times any one who heard it, with all the explanation, was obliged to "go to water" after the recital; that is, to bathe in the running stream at daybreak, before eating, while the medicine-man went through his mystic ceremonies on the bank. I heard the story in its entirety from two of the best story-tellers, one of whom is a medicine-man, and the other is supposed to be skilled in all their hunting secrets. Neither of them speak English. In addition, so many beliefs and customs turn upon this story of Kanati that I probably heard each of the prin- cipal incidents at least half a dozen times. There is a sequel to the story, which goes on to tell how, after the departure of Kanati and his sons, the people were nearly starving because they could find no game, until they sent for the boys, who came and taught them the songs and ceremonies with which to call up the deer. These songs are also among my notes. They taught the people no bear-songs, because the bear was still a man. The heroes of this story are in some way connected with the thunder, and are some- times confounded with the Thunder Boys, who defeated a celebrated gambler known as U°tsaiyi' or "Brass," but, until more information is at hand, I prefer to treat them as distinct characters. In the Cherokee words the vowels have the Latin sound, as in the alphabet of the Bureau of Ethnology : tl is pronounced as in but, a as in law, «" and 7/" nasal, and d and g almost like t and k. KAN.\TI AND SELU : THE ORIGIN OF CORN AND GAME. When I was a boy, this is what the old men told me they had heard when they were boys. Long ages ago, soon after the world was made, a hunter and his wife lived at Looking-glass Mountain,^ with their only child, a little ' Called by the Cherokees Tsuwa'teldu'°I or Tsuwa't^Ida, in Transylvania County, North Carolina, near Brevard. The peculiar appearance of this moun- tain, with its precipitous face seamed by vertical strata of various colors, has caused a number of strange ideas and stories to centre about the location. Myths of the Cherokees. 99 boy. The father's name was Kanati, "The Lucky Hunter," and his wife was called Selu, "Corn." No matter when Kanati went into the woods, he never failed to bring back a load of game, which his wife cut up and prepared, washing the blood from the meat in the river near the house. The little boy used to play down by the river every day, and one morning the old people thought they heard laughing and talking in the bushes, as though there were two children there. When the boy came home at night, his parents asked who had been playing with him all day. " He comes out of the water," said the boy, " and he calls himself my elder brother. He says his mother was cruel to him, and threw him into the river." Then they knew that the strange boy had sprung from the blood of the game which Selu had washed off at the river's edge. Every day, when the little boy went out to play, the other would join him ; but, as he always went back into the water, the old people never had a chance to see him. At last, one evening, Kanati said to his son, "To-morrow, when the other boy comes to play with you, get him to wrestle with you, and when you have your arms around him hold on to him and call for us." The boy promised to do as he was told ; so the ne.xt day, as soon as his playmate appeared, he challenged him to a wrestling-match. The other agreed at once, but as soon as they had their arms around each other Kanati's boy began to scream for his father. The old folks at once came running down, and when the wild boy saw them he struggled to free himself, and cried out, " Let me go ! You threw me away ! " But his brother held on until his parents reached the spot, when they seized the wild boy and took him home with them. They kept him in the house until they had tamed him, but he was always wild and artful in his disposition, and was the leader of his brother in every mischief. Before long the old people discovered that he was one of those per- sons endowed with magic powers {addivehi), and they called him Inage UtdsiViH , "He who grew up Wild." Whenever Kanati went into the mountains he always brought back a fat buck or doe, or may be a couple of turkeys. One day the wild boy said to his brother, " I wonder where our father gets all that game ; let 's follow him next time, and find out." A few days afterward, Kanati took a bow and some feathers in bis hand, and started off. The boys waited a little while, and then started after him, keeping out of sight, until they saw their father go into a swamp where there were a great many of the reeds (wdtike) that hunters use to make arrow-shafts. Then the wild boy changed him- self into a puff of bird's down (a/si'/i7), which the wind took up and carried until it alighted upon Kanati's shoulder just as he entered the swamp, but Kanati knew nothing about it. The hunter then cut loo Journal of American Folk-Lore. reeds, fitted the feathers to them, and made some arrows, and the wild boy — in his other shape — thought, "I wonder what those things are for." When Kanati had his arrows finished, he came out of the swamp and went on again. The wind blew the down from his shoulder ; it fell in the woods, when the wild boy took his right shape again, and went back and told his brother what he had seen. Keeping out of sight of their father, they followed him up the mountain until he stopped at a certain place and lifted up a large rock. At once a buck came running out, which Kanati shot, and then, lifting it upon his back, he started home again. " Oho ! " said the boys, " he keeps all the deer shut up in that hole, and whenever he wants venison he just lets one out, and kills it with those things he made in the swamp." They hurried and reached home before their father, who had the heavy deer to carry, so that he did not know they had followed him. A few days after, the boys went back to the swamp, cut some reeds and made seven arrows, and then started up the mountain to where their father kept the game. When they got to the place they lifted up the rock, and a deer came running out. Just as they drew back to shoot it, another came out, and then another, and another, until the boys got confused and forgot what they were about. In those days all the deer had their tails hanging down, like other animals, but, as a buck was running past, the wild boy struck its tail with his arrow so that it stood straight out behind. This pleased the boys, and when the next one ran by, the other brother struck his tail so that it pointed upward. The boys thought this was good sport, and when the next one ran past, the wild boy struck his tail so that it stood straight up, and his brother struck the next one so hard with his arrow that the deer's tail was curled over his back. The boys thought this was very pretty, and ever since the deer has carried his tail over his back. The deer continued to pass until the last one had come out of the hole and escaped into the forest. Then followed droves of raccoons, rabbits, and all the other four-footed animals. Last came great flocks of turkeys, pigeons, and partridges that darkened the air like a cloud, and made such a noise with their wings that Kanati, sitting at home, heard the sound like distant thunder on the mountains, and said to himself, " My bad boys have got into trouble. I must go and see what they are doing." So Kanati went up the mountain, and when he came to the place where he kept the game he found the two boys standing by the rock, and all the birds and animals were gone. He was furious, but, without saying a word, he went down into the cave and kicked the covers off four jars in one corner, when out swarmed bed-bugs, fleas. Myths of tJie Cherokces. loi lice, and gnats {kdluydsti, tsu'ktV, timV dasi'- 'ml), and got all over the boys. They screamed with pain and terror, and tried to beat off the insects ; but the thousands of insects crawled over them, and bit and btung them, until both dropped down nearly dead from exhaus- tion. Kanati stood looking on until he thought they had been pun- ished enough, when he brushed off the vermin, and proceeded to give the boys a lecture. "Now, you rascals," said he, "you have always had plenty to eat, and never had to work for it. Whenever you were hungry, all I had to do was to come up here and get a deer or a tur- key, and bring it home for your mother to cook. But now you have let out all the animals, and after this, when you want a deer to eat, you will have to hunt all over the woods for it, and then may be not find one. Go home now to your mother, while I see if I can find something to eat for supper." When the boys reached home again they were very tired and hun- gry, and asked their mother for something to eat. " There is no meat," said Selu, " but wait a little while, and I will get you some- thing." So she took a basket and started out to the provision-house {tV'wdtd'li). This provision-house was built upon poles high up from the ground, to keep it out of the reach of animals, and had a ladder to climb up by, and one door, but no other opening. Every day, when Selu got ready to cook the dinner, she would go out to the pro- vision-house with a basket, and bring it back full of corn and beans. The boys had never been inside the provision-house, and wondered where all the corn and beans could come from, as the house was not a very large one ; so, as soon as Selu went out of the door, the wild boy said to his brother, " Let's go and see what she does." They ran around and climbed up at the back of the provision-house, and pulled out a piece of clay from between the logs, so that they could look in. There they saw Selu standing in the middle of the room, with the basket in front of her on the floor. Leaning over the bas- ket, she rubbed her stomach — so — and the basket was half-full of corn. Then she rubbed under her arm-pits — so — and the basket was full to the top with beans. ^ The brothers looked at each other, and said, " This will never do ; our mother is a witch. If we eat any of that it will poison us. We must kill her." When the boys came back into the house, Selu knew their thoughts before they spoke." " So you are going to kill me ! " said Selu. "Yes," said the boys; "you are a witch." "Well," said their mother, "when you have killed me, clear a large piece of ground in front of the house, and drag my body seven times around the circle. ' This rubbing the body to procure provisions appears also in another Chero- kee story, " The Bear Man." ^ This mind-readin