Week 11 Reading Notes: Pacific Northwest, Part B
Here are my notes for the second part of the Pacific Northwest unit.
1: Cry-Because-He-Had-No-Wife
-a little boy cries all the time; his grandmother asks him why, and he says it's because he doesn't have a wife; his grandparents send him to a girl's house in the east; along the way, he meets a few giants who give him advice; eventually, he gets to her house, distracts her horse and goes inside; they get married and go back to his home, but it turns out he had been gone many years and his grandparents died; they go back to her house; on the way back, a giant tries to take the wife, but the man distracts them with whips
2: Two Thunder Bird Stories
-the golden age: the thunder bird flew down from the sky and created the earth and people; he gives a sacred arrow to a group of people called the Tinne, and it made them live forever, but one day they use it and lose it, so they die like normal people
-origin of the thunder bird: South Wind goes to meet a giantess named Quoots-hooi; he goes fishing and catches a whale; the giant tries to tell South Wind how to cut the whale open but he doesn't listen; when he tries to do it his way, the whale turns into a bird (the thunder bird) and flies away
3: An Indian's Vow to the Thunder Gods
-a woman promises her firstborn child to the thunder gods; when she has the baby, she loves him and doesn't want to give him to the gods, so she keeps him; the next year, she tries to leave him on the mountaintop for the thunder gods but she decides not to at the last minute; one day, he's outside playing when suddenly the thunder rolls; the mother goes outside and finds he's been struck by lighting and died (taken by the thunder gods)
4: Chinook Ghosts
-the Chinook ghosts buy a wife, but she disappears the next day; Blue Jay, her brother, goes to look for her and asks everyone where dead people go so he can find her; he finds her in a lodge; she shows him a pile of bones kept in the closet, and she tells him that the pile of bones is her husband (the ghost); Blue Jay goes fishing with the ghosts and learns more about them; eventually he dies and becomes a ghost too
5: The Memaloose Islands
-a chief and a woman love each other, but one day the chief dies; the woman has a vision one night that tells her to go to the spirit land, so she and her father go and dance with the spirits; she falls asleep there, and when she wakes up she's at the island of the dead; she gets scared and runs back to her village; her father sends her back bc if she stays with the tribe after seeing the spirits it brings evil upon the tribe
6: Origin of the Tribes
-a monster beaver named Wishpoosh lives in a Lake; he kills all the fish and nearby animals; one day, coyote tries to kill him, and they fought so hard that new lakes and rivers were made; after they fight for a long time, coyote turns himself into a branch; Wishpoosh swallows the branch, and coyote changes back to himself and kills Wishpoosh from the inside out; coyote then cuts up Wishpoosh's body and makes the different parts into tribes
7: How the Ermine Got Its Necklace
-two boys go out to hunt; they float down the river on ice until they come upon sled tracks and hear crying in the woods; the find a crying porcupine pulling the sled; they kill it and eat it and continue on; they come to a village and find out that there are no young men in the village; they challenge the women of the village to see who can do more things; one day, when they are all out hunting, one of the boys dares a woman to shoot him (bc he doesn't think she can); she does, and he dies
-the last brother continues traveling; he comes upon an eaglet, and eventually kills it; its parents come along, and he kills them too; he comes across a porcupine and kills it too; he comes across a lynx but he can't kill it, so the lynx decides he wants to eat the brother and makes the brother gather firewood; while the brother is doing that, he comes across an ermine; the ermine tells him to sit on his back and the ermine will carry him home; the man does as the ermine says, so the ermine takes him home
8: Coyote and Grizzly
-one day, grizzly eats a bunch of people; she goes home and starts to feel sick, and almost dies; she sends coyote to come as a medicine man and fix her, but coyote refuses; eventually, coyote goes to grizzly and fixes her; when she feels well enough, she tries to attack coyote and chases him through the forest; eventually, she comes across a bridge, and when it breaks she falls into the water and drowns
9: Coyote and the Dragon
-a dragon lived in a cave in Wallamette Valley; it would terrorize the people all night, but never comes out during the day; one day, coyote decides to shoot arrows into the sun until he has a chain he can use to pull the sun down to earth; he hides the sun in the river, so it seems like night had come; the dragon comes out of its cave, and then coyote breaks the chain, releasing the sunlight; this blinds the dragon so coyote can kill it
10: Coyote in Buffalo Country
-coyote walks along the trail until he gets very hungry; he comes across an eagle who tells him about a country where there's buffalo all the time; coyote keeps going until he gets to buffalo country and finds a tribe there; the chief of the tribe always takes the best parts of the killed buffalo for himself, so coyote decides he wants to be chief; he kills a buffalo, and he offers a piece of it to the chief (but hides a hot coal inside it); this kills the chief, so the tribe makes coyote the chief
-once coyote becomes the chief, all the buffalo run away; coyote goes out to look for meat, and pretends to be dead so he can steal some from a man; coyote meets a wolf, who he tells to do the same thing to get meat; it doesn't work for the wolf, though, and the wolf gets very angry and tries to kill coyote; coyote and wolf both go get their friends and have a big battle; eventually, coyote wins
11: Coyote and the Salmon
-coyote goes to a river and finds people there; the river has lots of salmon, but the people have a really hard time catching any bc a tribe downriver had built a dam to keep the salmon from swimming upriver to them; coyote opens the dam downriver so the salmon can swim up to the people
-how coyote stole fire: coyote goes to the tribe downriver again and sees that they have fire; he recruits some of the other animals so they can steal it; the animals steal hot coals and eventually, it gets stuck in a tree; coyote shows the tribe how to make fire out of the wood
12: Falls of the Willamette
-Tallapus goes to the tribes in the Willamette Valley and teaches them how to fish; he then goes to Rock Island and does the same thing; he builds a trap that will call him when its full of fish; one day, he tries to make a fire but he can't because the trap keeps calling him; he eventually gets angry and yells at the trap, which makes the trap upset; the trap decides to stop catching fish for the people, so the people have to spear the fish
13: Tallapus and the Cedar
-one day, Tallapus is traveling along until he comes upon a cedar tree; he tells the cedar tree to open, and it does; he hops inside the hollow cedar tree and then shuts it, staying inside for a while; he hops in and out of the tree a bunch of times; one time, he jumps inside the cedar tree but the cedar tree doesn't open again when he tells it to, so he gets stuck; he calls all the birds around to come peck the tree and create a hole for him; all the birds come to help but they don't make a hole big enough; Tallapus decides to take himself apart so he can fit through the hole; he puts each body part through the hole one at a time until he's out of the tree and reassembles himself, but he can't find his eyes (because a raven took them)
-Tallapus wanders along until he comes across a squaw; he tricks the squaw into swapping eyes with him and turns it into a snail
BIBLIOGRAPHY
"Myths and Legends of the Pacific Northwest, Especially of Washington and Oregon," by Katharine Berry Judson. Web Source: Untextbook.
1: Cry-Because-He-Had-No-Wife
-a little boy cries all the time; his grandmother asks him why, and he says it's because he doesn't have a wife; his grandparents send him to a girl's house in the east; along the way, he meets a few giants who give him advice; eventually, he gets to her house, distracts her horse and goes inside; they get married and go back to his home, but it turns out he had been gone many years and his grandparents died; they go back to her house; on the way back, a giant tries to take the wife, but the man distracts them with whips
2: Two Thunder Bird Stories
-the golden age: the thunder bird flew down from the sky and created the earth and people; he gives a sacred arrow to a group of people called the Tinne, and it made them live forever, but one day they use it and lose it, so they die like normal people
-origin of the thunder bird: South Wind goes to meet a giantess named Quoots-hooi; he goes fishing and catches a whale; the giant tries to tell South Wind how to cut the whale open but he doesn't listen; when he tries to do it his way, the whale turns into a bird (the thunder bird) and flies away
3: An Indian's Vow to the Thunder Gods
-a woman promises her firstborn child to the thunder gods; when she has the baby, she loves him and doesn't want to give him to the gods, so she keeps him; the next year, she tries to leave him on the mountaintop for the thunder gods but she decides not to at the last minute; one day, he's outside playing when suddenly the thunder rolls; the mother goes outside and finds he's been struck by lighting and died (taken by the thunder gods)
4: Chinook Ghosts
-the Chinook ghosts buy a wife, but she disappears the next day; Blue Jay, her brother, goes to look for her and asks everyone where dead people go so he can find her; he finds her in a lodge; she shows him a pile of bones kept in the closet, and she tells him that the pile of bones is her husband (the ghost); Blue Jay goes fishing with the ghosts and learns more about them; eventually he dies and becomes a ghost too
5: The Memaloose Islands
-a chief and a woman love each other, but one day the chief dies; the woman has a vision one night that tells her to go to the spirit land, so she and her father go and dance with the spirits; she falls asleep there, and when she wakes up she's at the island of the dead; she gets scared and runs back to her village; her father sends her back bc if she stays with the tribe after seeing the spirits it brings evil upon the tribe
6: Origin of the Tribes
-a monster beaver named Wishpoosh lives in a Lake; he kills all the fish and nearby animals; one day, coyote tries to kill him, and they fought so hard that new lakes and rivers were made; after they fight for a long time, coyote turns himself into a branch; Wishpoosh swallows the branch, and coyote changes back to himself and kills Wishpoosh from the inside out; coyote then cuts up Wishpoosh's body and makes the different parts into tribes
7: How the Ermine Got Its Necklace
-two boys go out to hunt; they float down the river on ice until they come upon sled tracks and hear crying in the woods; the find a crying porcupine pulling the sled; they kill it and eat it and continue on; they come to a village and find out that there are no young men in the village; they challenge the women of the village to see who can do more things; one day, when they are all out hunting, one of the boys dares a woman to shoot him (bc he doesn't think she can); she does, and he dies
-the last brother continues traveling; he comes upon an eaglet, and eventually kills it; its parents come along, and he kills them too; he comes across a porcupine and kills it too; he comes across a lynx but he can't kill it, so the lynx decides he wants to eat the brother and makes the brother gather firewood; while the brother is doing that, he comes across an ermine; the ermine tells him to sit on his back and the ermine will carry him home; the man does as the ermine says, so the ermine takes him home
8: Coyote and Grizzly
-one day, grizzly eats a bunch of people; she goes home and starts to feel sick, and almost dies; she sends coyote to come as a medicine man and fix her, but coyote refuses; eventually, coyote goes to grizzly and fixes her; when she feels well enough, she tries to attack coyote and chases him through the forest; eventually, she comes across a bridge, and when it breaks she falls into the water and drowns
9: Coyote and the Dragon
-a dragon lived in a cave in Wallamette Valley; it would terrorize the people all night, but never comes out during the day; one day, coyote decides to shoot arrows into the sun until he has a chain he can use to pull the sun down to earth; he hides the sun in the river, so it seems like night had come; the dragon comes out of its cave, and then coyote breaks the chain, releasing the sunlight; this blinds the dragon so coyote can kill it
10: Coyote in Buffalo Country
-coyote walks along the trail until he gets very hungry; he comes across an eagle who tells him about a country where there's buffalo all the time; coyote keeps going until he gets to buffalo country and finds a tribe there; the chief of the tribe always takes the best parts of the killed buffalo for himself, so coyote decides he wants to be chief; he kills a buffalo, and he offers a piece of it to the chief (but hides a hot coal inside it); this kills the chief, so the tribe makes coyote the chief
-once coyote becomes the chief, all the buffalo run away; coyote goes out to look for meat, and pretends to be dead so he can steal some from a man; coyote meets a wolf, who he tells to do the same thing to get meat; it doesn't work for the wolf, though, and the wolf gets very angry and tries to kill coyote; coyote and wolf both go get their friends and have a big battle; eventually, coyote wins
11: Coyote and the Salmon
-coyote goes to a river and finds people there; the river has lots of salmon, but the people have a really hard time catching any bc a tribe downriver had built a dam to keep the salmon from swimming upriver to them; coyote opens the dam downriver so the salmon can swim up to the people
-how coyote stole fire: coyote goes to the tribe downriver again and sees that they have fire; he recruits some of the other animals so they can steal it; the animals steal hot coals and eventually, it gets stuck in a tree; coyote shows the tribe how to make fire out of the wood
12: Falls of the Willamette
-Tallapus goes to the tribes in the Willamette Valley and teaches them how to fish; he then goes to Rock Island and does the same thing; he builds a trap that will call him when its full of fish; one day, he tries to make a fire but he can't because the trap keeps calling him; he eventually gets angry and yells at the trap, which makes the trap upset; the trap decides to stop catching fish for the people, so the people have to spear the fish
13: Tallapus and the Cedar
-one day, Tallapus is traveling along until he comes upon a cedar tree; he tells the cedar tree to open, and it does; he hops inside the hollow cedar tree and then shuts it, staying inside for a while; he hops in and out of the tree a bunch of times; one time, he jumps inside the cedar tree but the cedar tree doesn't open again when he tells it to, so he gets stuck; he calls all the birds around to come peck the tree and create a hole for him; all the birds come to help but they don't make a hole big enough; Tallapus decides to take himself apart so he can fit through the hole; he puts each body part through the hole one at a time until he's out of the tree and reassembles himself, but he can't find his eyes (because a raven took them)
-Tallapus wanders along until he comes across a squaw; he tricks the squaw into swapping eyes with him and turns it into a snail
Appaloosa horse. Source: Untextbook.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
"Myths and Legends of the Pacific Northwest, Especially of Washington and Oregon," by Katharine Berry Judson. Web Source: Untextbook.
Hi Abbi! I have recently started going through and reading people's notes to help improve my own. I think it is very interesting that you actually go into detail for each story. I think the coolest one I read from your notes was the Coyote and Salmon! I love fluffy animals (even through a coyote isn't the fluffiest or most inviting). Great job!
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