California Indian Folklore

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Text originally published in 1936 under the same title.

© Borodino Books 2017, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.

Publisher’s Note

Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

CALIFORNIA INDIAN FOLKLORE

AS TOLD TO

FRANK F. LATTA

BY

Wah-nom’-kot, Tawp’-naw, I’-chow, , Pah’-mit,

Ah-ka-dih’-nim, Wah-hum’-chah, Po’-hut, Ya-a’-lut,

To-haw’-she, Nih’-lah-poo, Lee’-mee, Chah-am’-suh,

Las’-yeh, Pay’-mi, and To-too’-yah

A Collection of California Indian Folklore Tales which were told during the long Winter evenings long before the White People came to California

ILLUSTRATED

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 3

ILLUSTRATIONS 4

FOREWORD 6

HOW THE INDIAN WORDS ARE PRONOUNCED 9

CREATION STORIES 11

HOW THE WUK-CHUM’-NEE WORLD WAS MADE 11

THE YOWL-MAY’-NEE WORLD 15

THE TOO-LAHM’-NEE WORLD 18

THE PAHT’-WIN WORLD 25

FIRE STEALING STORIES 28

THE YOWL-MAY’-NEES OBTAIN FIRE 28

THE WUK-CHUM’-NEES OBTAIN FIRE 31

THE DUM-NAHS OBTAIN FIRE 34

THE YAUH’-DAHN-CHEES OBTAIN FIRE 37

ORIGIN STORIES 40

THE SIERRAS ARE MADE 40

LIM’-IK AND AHL’-WUT WAKE THE MOUNTAINS 43

AHNG’-USH-IN 46

WHY TRO’-KHUD MADE THE RAINBOW 49

HOW YOKUTS BASKETRY DESIGNS BEGAN 53

THE GREAT FAMINE 57

MYTHICAL GAMES 63

E’-SHA NUM’-UK, THE HIDING GAME 63

HIH’-SUH NA’-ES 67

STORIES OF YOSEMITE 70

HOW EL CAPITAN GREW 70

THE STORY OF THE TWO FAWNS 73

THE ORPHEUS OF YOSEMITE 77

THE GIANT OF AH-WAH’-NEE 80

THE STORY OF HALF DOME 83

THE LOST ARROW 86

STORIES OF THE HEAVENS 90

KI’-YOO RIDES WITH THE SUN 90

KOTCH-PIH’-LAH, THE PLEIADES 93

HOW AH-HA’-LEE STOLE THE SUN 97

WA’-MIH-LOW 101

MYTHICAL HERO STORIES 103

MIH-KIT’-TEE AND GRANDMOTHER LIM’-IK 103

MIH-KIT’-TEE AND COO-CHOON’, THE CROW 111

MIH-KIT’-TEE AND KI’-YOO GO TO WAW’-CUN-NAW 121

CREATION OF MAN 125

THE BIRD AND ANIMAL PEOPLE LEAVE 125

THE INDIANS COME 133

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 138

ILLUSTRATIONS{*}

Wah-nom’-kot Playing Hoo-cho’-ish

Lee-way’-nit and Hawt’-toy

Tawp’-naw

Wah-hum’-chah

Too-lahm-nee-oo’

Pah’-mit

Nih’-lah-poo

Las’-yeh, Chah-am’-suh and Toi-eh’-yets

Wow’-cawt and Yah-nis’-tah

Hoey’, the Deer

Kreyenhagen Hills and Kettleman Plains

Paw-kawk’-witch, the Hog Wallows

Troke-lin’-see, Eagle’s Home

Wah-nom’-kot and Ahng’-ush-in

Mo-ho’-o, the Bear

Indian Baskets (Photo by Dorman)

Wah-nom’-kot and Puh’-wus, the Mortar

Chee-tee’-tik Now’-suh, the Sliding Rock

Yoi-mut

El Capitan (Photo by Boy sen)

To-too’-yuh, Foamiyig Water (Photo by Wright)

Cave of Orpheus

Jerky-Covered Rock

Half Dome (Photo by Boysen)

Lee’-mee, Yosemite Indian Chief (Photo by Boysen)

Kern River and Kern River Bluffs (Photo by Dorman)

Village of I-ah’-pin

Pay’-mi

Stone Indian Women of Wa’-mih-low

I’-chow and Wah-nom’-kot

Yo-yoo’-sil, the Racetrack

Waw’-cun-naw

Ti-up’-in-ish

End of the Trail

FOREWORD

OO-DUM’-TUNG, THE STORY TELLERS

WHEN a long story was told, it was interrupted just when the children were most interested. Grandfather would stop and say, "Now, we will put them all in the bag; put in Mih-kit’-tee; put in Coo-choon’ and Ki’-yoo and everyone. We will tie the bag and open it again tomorrow night." Then he would make the motions of tying the bag. The children would have to go to bed without hearing the end.

*****

THE PICTURE: Wah-nom’-kot, one of the Story Tellers, playing the ancient woman’s game of Hoo-cho’-ish. The counters are halves of walnut shells. The tray is of native grasses and shows the wild goose design.

OO-DUM’-TUNG, THE STORY TELLERS

DURING the long evenings, before the white people came to California, the old Indians sat around their campfires and told stories to the young people.

These are some of the old-time stories told in those old, old days. There were then many thousands of Indians in what is now the great state of California.

These simple stories help us better to understand and appreciate the primitive people who lived here when Shuh’-quoy, the Elk, and Suey’-yohl, the Antelope, roamed our state. They also interest us in our own California, much of it as beautiful as anything in the world. By reading these stories you will learn many of the Indian names for the native birds and animals and for the natural wonders of California.

Many old California Indians have told us these stories so that their grandchildren and great-grandchildren may read them long after the old people have gone to the Happy Hunting Grounds.

The old Indian story says that at first there were only birds and animals on the earth. They lived like people. In those days Ki’-yoo, the Coyote, did not run and catch the squirrels. He hunted them with bow and arrow. None of the birds, except Bald Eagle and his son, Black Eagle, could fly. They walked and ran on the ground like people.

When the old-time bird and animal people created Mi’-eh, the Indians, they took new forms and went away to the mountains to live as we see them today. They then gave up their old villages to the Indians.

In the old days before Mi’-eh, the Indians came, the old-time bird and animal people could always come back to life after they were killed. You must remember this when you read the Yokuts story of E’-sha Num’-uk, the Indian hide-and-go-seek game, and about the Great Famine. It was Ki’-yoo, the Coyote, so the Yokuts say, who wanted everyone to die so they could not come back to life. For that reason the Yokuts do not like Ki’-yoo very well.

The preparation of these simple stories has not been easy. It has taken many years of work among the few remaining Indians to obtain the legends. The labor of preparing them as they are presented here has occupied many weeks more. The preparation is not perfect. But they are really the old-time stories as told by the Indians themselves. Nothing has been added to them. Much has really been lost.

The old Indian story tellers, called Oo-dum’-tung by the Wuk-chum’-nee Yokuts, were masters of the story-telling art. The entire theme was enacted as it was told. Only after close study can the trained elocutionist expect to put into the stories the little niceties of expression and inflection, along with the imitations of various bird and animal sounds and actions that accompanied them in the old days as they were told around California campfires by the dusky-visaged Indians.

F. F. LATTA.

Shafter, California

February Ninth

Nineteen Thirty-Six

HOW THE INDIAN WORDS ARE PRONOUNCED

Origin of Indian Words

MANY Indian words sound like the thing they represent. The Yokuts word for deer is Hoey’. It is sounded sharply, like the snort of a startled deer. The Choi-nim’-nee Yokuts word for squirrel is Seeth’-kil and is sounded like the bark of a squirrel. Their word for hawk is Soo-hoop’ and was obtained in the same way that we obtained our word swoop, an imitation of the sound made by the hawk in diving after prey.

Many other Indian words, and English words too, had the same beginning.

*****

THE PICTURE: Lee-way’-nit and Hawt’-toy, grandchildren of Wah-nom’-kot and I’-chow, wearing the kind of clothing used long ago by the Indians. Their parents were both Yokuts Indians who lived on the Kaweah River near Visalia in Tulare County.

HOW THE INDIAN WORDS ARE PRONOUNCED

IN PREPARING these stories it has been difficult to write the Indian names in a simple way and still bring about their accurate pronounciation by the reader. Indian words are separated very distinctly into syllables. For that reason, hyphens are used between syllables within the name. A space is left between words. The syllable accented is marked by the usual sign.

The following brief explanation will perhaps be of aid regarding pronounciation: A, e, i, or o, written as separate syllables or as syllable endings, have the long sound. Within syllables they are short. Some difficult sounds have been represented by combinations of letters: Long u by oo, short e by eh, broad a by aw, short a by ah, etc. It is hoped that the pronounciation of these combinations will be self-explanatory.

CREATION STORIES

HOW THE WUK-CHUM’-NEE WORLD WAS MADE

THE Yokuts Indians once occupied the great San Joaquin Valley of California. There were many tribes of these people. Yokuts is a word from their language. It means people.

Each Yokuts tribe told a story of how their world was created. Almost the same story was told in every part of the San Joaquin Valley. Near Pacheco Pass and along the West side of the San Joaquin River in Merced County, the Indians had a similar story.

This is the story told for countless ages by the Wuk-chum’-nee Yokuts. They lived along the Kaweah River from about Sequoia National Park Headquarters at Ash Mountain down to the edge of the San Joaquin Valley below Woodlake. They are the only remaining organized tribe of Yokuts Indians.

*****

THE PICTURE: Tawp’-naw, who told the old, old story of how the Wuk-chum’-nee world was made. He is holding a bow and arrows such as were used long ago by the California Indians. Tawp’-naw was born on the Kaweah River at the old village of Coach-nah’-meu where Terminus Beach is now located.

The Indian words in this story are from the Wuk-chum’-nee Yokuts dialect, once spoken along the Kaweah River in Eastern Tulare County. An explanation of each word is given below:

Cho-koo’-ko: Teal Duck.

Coi’-wus: The Ceremonial Mortar.

E-wa’-it: Wolf.

Mi’-eh: Indians.

Ki’-yoo: Coyote.

Mo-ho’-o: Black Bear.

Oo-pe-a’-e: Dove, who is the Win-at’-un, or Messenger, of the old-time bird and animal people.

Ow’-ih-chuh: Fox.

Saw-wah’-kit: Turtle, who dived to the bottom of the water and brought up the mud from which the world was made.

Sho-no’-yoo: Wuk-chum’-nee beginning village at Lemon Cove in Eastern Tulare County.

Taht’-cha: Mud Hen.

Ti-up’-in-ish: Wuk-chum’-nee Hill at Lemon Cove in Eastern Tulare County on road to Sequoia National Park.

Tong’-ud: Wild Cat.

Troi’-uk: Seed of the Shepherd’s Purse plant.

Tro’-khud: Bald Eagle, the Yokuts creator.

Wahk’: Pelican.

Wee-hay’-sit: Mountain Lion, one of