MAIDU CREATION MYTH - A Free Story

When this world was filled with water, Earth-Maker floated upon it, kept floating about. Nowhere in the world could he see even a tiny bit of earth. No persons of any kind flew about. He went about in this world, the world itself being invisible, transparent like the sky.

He was troubled. "I wonder how, I wonder where, I wonder in what place, in what country, we shall find a world!" he said. "You are a very strong man, to be thinking of this world," said Coyote. "I am guessing in what direction the world is, then to that distant land let us float!" said Earth-Maker.

In this world they kept floating along, kept floating along, hungry, having nothing to eat. "You will die of hunger," said Coyote. Then he thought. "No, I cannot think of anything," he said. "Well," said Earth-Maker, "the world is large, a great world. If somewhere I find a tiny world, I can fix it up."

Then he sang, "Where, little world, art thou?" It is said he sang, kept singing, sang all the time. "Enough!" he said, and stopped singing. "Well! I don't know many songs (?)," he said. Then Coyote sang again, kept singing, asking, for the world, singing, "Where, O world, art thou."' He sang, kept singing; then "Enough!" he said, "I am tired. You try again."

So Earth-Maker sang. "Where are you, my great mountains, my world mountains?" he said. He sang, and all the time kept saying, "Where are you?" He stopped singing. "Enough!" he said. "You try also." Coyote tried, kept singing. "My foggy mountains, where one goes about," he said. "Well, We shall see nothing at all. I guess there never was a world anywhere," said he. "I think if we find a little world, I can fix it very well," said Earth-Maker.

As they floated along, they saw something like a bird's nest. "Well! That is very small," said Earth-Maker. "It is small. If it were larger, I could fix it. But it is too small," he said. "I wonder how I can stretch it a little!" He kept saying, "What is the best way! How shall I make it larger!" So saying, he prepared it. He extended a rope to the east, to the south he extended a rope, to the west, to the northwest, and to the north he extended ropes.

When all were stretched, he said, "Well, sing, you who were the finder of this earth, this mud! 'In the long, long, ago, Robin-Man made the world, stuck earth together, making this world.' Thus mortal men shall say of you, in myth-telling." Then Robin sang, and his world-making song sounded sweet. After the ropes were all stretched, he kept singing; then, after a time, he ceased.

Then Earth-Maker spoke to Coyote also. "Do you sing too," he said. So he sang, singing, "My world, where one travels by the valley-edge; my world of many foggy mountains; my world where one goes zigzagging hither and thither; range after range," he said, "I sing of the country I shall travel in. In such a world I shall wander," he said.

Then Earth-Maker sang--sang of the world he had made, kept singing, until by and by he ceased. "Now," he said, "it would be well if the world were a little larger. Let us stretch it!"--"Stop!" said Coyote. I speak wisely. This world ought to be painted with something, so that it may look pretty. What do ye two think?"

Then Robin-Man said, "I am one who knows nothing. Ye two are clever men, making this world, talking it over; if ye find anything evil, ye will make it good."--"Very well," said Coyote, "I will paint it with blood. There shall be blood in the world; and people shall be born there, having blood. There shall be birds born who shall have blood. Everything--deer, all kinds of game, all sorts of men without any exception--all things shall have blood that are to be created in this world. And in another place, making it red, there shall be red rocks. It will be as if blood were mixed up with the world, and thus the world will be beautiful," he said. "What do you think about it?"--"Your words are good," he said, "I know nothing." So Robin-Man went off. As he went, he said, "I shall be a person who travels only in this way," and he flew away.

Earth-Maker spoke: "You had better lie down here on your face."--"All right!" said Coyote, and, kneeling down, he lay on his face. Then Earth-Maker stretched the world with his foot. Stretching it once, he extended it towards the east, extended it on that side; then to the south, then to the west, he stretched it; then to the northwest and to the north he stretched it. Having extended it only a little ways, he said, "All right!"

Coyote stood up and looked around. "Well, I think it would be better if this world were just large enough to go around it." By and by Earth-Maker said, "You had better kneel down again, and lie flat on your belly. Do not look up. You must not!"--"Very well," said Coyote, "I will not look up." He lay down; and Earth-Maker, stretching the earth with his foot eastward, stretched it as far as it would go. He extended it fully toward the south, toward the west, toward the northwest, toward the north. "All right!" said he.

Coyote stood up, and, having risen, started to walk hither eastward. Earth-Maker, when he was left alone, stood for a time, then, departing, he went toward the south. In the direction of the sunset he went far around, going over to the northwest, going around to the north, going all the way around to the east. And having gone around, having returned to the spot where he had first turned off, he prepared things.

He made two white men; then he made others, white, but a little different. As he made them, he counted them. He kept on making them--made one black, then another almost black. Two of each only he made. Then he counted all the countries, and, as he counted, assigned them, gave them to the countries. "You are a country having this name, you shall have this people," he said. "This sort of people, naming you, shall own the country. These people shall grow, shall keep on growing through many winters, through many dawns. They shall continue to grow until, their appointed winters being past, their dawns being over, this people having finished growing, shall be born," he said. "Very many winters will have passed before they shall be born. And they shall have children, girls and boys; and these children, growing up, shall have children in their turn," he said. When several winters have passed, there will be very many people."

Then again, to another sort of people, he gave another country, saying, "This people, I leave you in this country, and ye shall be the owners of this land. Ye shall be a people with a name." And they also were a different sort of people, a people with a name; and their country also was named, it is said. "Your country also shall have a name," he said. "Ye too shall have a name, and your children shall fill the land, and every single child shall have a name," he said. "There, growing steadily, many winters, many days, shall pass before ye are fully grown. Then ye shall possess this country," he said.

Thereafter he spoke to another, again he gave a different kind of country to a different kind of people. He said, "Ye shall be a different-speaking and a different-looking people. Ye also shall possess a country," he said.

"Your children, if they weary of this land, going from this country to one with another name, to a country that is good to live in, shall remain there. There every country shall be full of people, who will continue to be born," he said. And then he divided the world among many. To one he gave one sort, to another he gave another. Ye shall all have different names," he said. Finally he finished giving, he distributed all.

Then after a while, continuing on his way, he came hither, kept travelling; and after arriving in the middle of the world, he made other people. "Ye shall be mortal men like this," he said; and, having made two, he left them. "Ye here, growing steadily, when so many winters shall have passed, very many winters, many days, ye shall be fully grown," he said. "Then ye shall be mortal men, ye shall be born full-grown. This country shall have a name. Beyond these mountains there shall be another country, which also shall have a name. Ye shall not be born soon," he said. Then he named everything, and, having left the people here in the middle of the world, he went away.

Continuing on his way, he went to all countries that were of the proper sort; and when he had gone as far as mortal men were to live, he stopped. Then there again he created two--two more, it is said, he laid down, and again two more. He kept counting them; and when he had counted them all, he spoke. "Ye shall remain here," he said, "and your country shall have a name. Although living in a small country, in one that is not large, it shall be sufficient for you. This I leave; and growing continually, so many winters passing, very many winters passing, many days passing, ye shall be fully grown. And then ye, being fully grown, shall be born," he said. "Then your food will grow,--different sorts of food, all kinds of food; and ye, being born with sufficient intelligence, will survive," he said. Then he pushed them down under a gopher-hill.

He spoke again. "Ye, too, shall possess a small country. 'Come, now! leave this country!' (this ye must not say to others, wishing to take their land.) Ye shall be people who will not drive others away, driving them off to another country. Ye shall be different, ye shall name your country. Ye also shall be a differently named people. There, growing continually, many days being passed, many winters having passed, ye shall be born, when your birthday has passed," he said. "Living there and having children, when other winters are passed, they will become a little larger, and will keep on thus, growing all the time, until, when enough winters shall have passed, always becoming more numerous, ye shall have enough people. Your children, all without exception, shall have names.

This country also, in the same way is named; all countries shall have names, just as yourselves. If ye are going to look at the country over there, then, when ye go, (ye shall say) 'I am going to that place,' naming it; then all people will understand where ye are going," he said.

Then, counting the people on this side (in this direction), he left them; and, speaking to those on this side, he said, "Ye also shall be mortal men. So many winters passing over, (?) ye shall be born. All the time growing, each winter ye shall grow a little, a very little. Again, when the winter is over, continually growing, when many winters are passed, ye will have finished growing; then ye shall be born, full-grown. There ye also shall have a country, and your country shall be one bearing a name, and ye too shall be named," he said. "Ye shall have children; and when your children have grown larger, then, looking all over this country, ye must tell them about it, teach them about it, naming the country and places, showing them and naming them to your children. 'That is such and such a place, and that is such and such a mountain.' So, when ye have caused them to learn this, teaching them, they shall understand even as ye do yourselves."

Then, placing them between his thumb and finger, he snapped them away.

And when he had given countries thus to all that he had counted out, there was one pair left. "Ye also, ye shall be a, people speaking differently. There will be a little too many of you for you to have the same sort of a country also. So ye shall have that kind of a country, a great country," he said. "Now, wherever I have passed along, there shall never be a lack of anything," he said, and made motions in all directions. "The country where I have been shall be one where nothing is ever lacking. I have finished talking to you, and I say to you that ye shall remain where ye are to be born. Ye are the last people; and while, ye are to remain where ye are created, I shall return, and stay there. When this world becomes bad, I will make it over again; and after I make it, ye shall be born," he said. Long ago Coyote suspected this, they say.

"This world will shake," he said. "This world is spread out flat, the world is not stable. After this world is all made, by and by, after a long time, I will pull this rope a little, then the world shall be firm. I, pulling on my rope, shall make it shake. And now," he said, "there shall be songs, they shall not be lacking, ye shall have them." And he sang, and kept on singing until he ceased singing. "Ye mortal men shall have this song," he said, and then he sang another; and singing many different songs, he walked along, kept walking until he reached the middle of the world; and there, sitting down over across from it, he remained.

But, in making the world, Robin-Man sang that which was pleasant to hear. He, they say, was the first created person,--a man whose song passed across the valleys, a man who found the world, a man who in the olden time sang very beautifully-sounding songs. And Earth-Maker, going along, and having passed by the middle of the world, made a house for himself, and remained there. That is as far as he went. That is all, they say.

From "Maidu Folklore, Myths and Legends"

https://store.streetlib.com/en/anon-e-mouse/maidu-folklore-myths-and-legends-18-legends-of-the-maidu-people

THE DECIMATION AND RECOVERY OF A NATIVE AMERICAN TRIBE

The MAIDU are an American Indian people of northern California. They reside in the central Sierra Nevada, in the watershed area of the Feather and American rivers. They also reside in Humbug Valley. In the Maiduan languages, Maidu means "man."

 

Estimates for the pre-contact populations of Maidu (including the Konkow and Nisenan) was, in 1770, estimated to be 9,000. Sherburne F. Cook later raised this figure slightly, to 9,500.

After the arrival of the Europeans, Kroeber reported the population of the Maidu in 1910 as low as 1,100. The 1930 census counted only 93, following decimation by infectious diseases and social disruption with many moving away from their tribal lands. As of 1995, the Maidu population had recovered to an estimated 3,500 – still down 63% on their original number.

 

In approximately 1910, folklorist Roland B. Dixon spent time amongst them collecting and recording their folklore, myths and legends resulting in this volume of MAIDU FOLKLORE, MYTHS AND LEGENDS.

 

Herein you will find stories like:

The Maidu Creation Myth,

Coyote And Muskrat,

Coyote, The Mountain-Tossing People, And The Wind-Man,

Thunder-Boy And Lizard-Man,

Thunder And Mosquito, And The Theft Of Fire – plus many more.

 

That these myths and legends have survived is even more remarkable considering what the tribe has gone through. The 1995 population census indicates that the tribe is still in recovery.

 

For more information https://store.streetlib.com/en/anon-e-mouse/maidu-folklore-myths-and-legends-18-legends-of-the-maidu-people

HOW THEY BROKE AWAY TO GO TO THE ROOTABAGA COUNTRY

From Rootabaga Stories by Carl Sandburg

Gimme the Ax lived in a house where everything is the same as it always was.

“The chimney sits on top of the house and lets the smoke out,” said Gimme the Ax. “The doorknobs open the doors. The windows are always either open or shut. We are always either upstairs or downstairs in this house. Everything is the same as it always was.”

So he decided to let his children name themselves.

“The first words they speak as soon as they learn to make words shall be their names,” he said. “They shall name themselves.”

When the first boy came to the house of Gimme the Ax, he was named Please Gimme. When the first girl came she was named Ax Me No Questions.

And both of the children had the shadows of valleys by night in their eyes and the lights of early morning, when the sun is coming up, on their foreheads.

And the hair on top of their heads was a dark wild grass. And they loved to turn the doorknobs, open the doors, and run out to have the wind comb their hair and touch their eyes and put its six soft fingers on their foreheads.

And then because no more boys came and no more girls came, Gimme the Ax said to himself, “My first boy is my last and my last girl is my first and they picked their names themselves.”

Please Gimme grew up and his ears got longer. Ax Me No Questions grew up and her ears got longer. And they kept on living in the house where everything is the same as it always was. They learned to say just as their father said, “The chimney sits on top of the house and lets the smoke out, the doorknobs open the doors, the windows are always either open or shut, we are always either upstairs or downstairs—everything is the same as it always was.”

After a while they began asking each other in the cool of the evening after they had eggs for breakfast in the morning, “Who’s who? How much? And what’s the answer?”

“It is too much to be too long anywhere,” said the tough old man, Gimme the Ax.

And Please Gimme and Ax Me No Questions, the tough son and the tough daughter of Gimme the Ax, answered their father, “It is too much to be too long anywhere.”

So they sold everything they had, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, everything except their ragbags and a few extras.

When their neighbors saw them selling everything they had, the different neighbors said, “They are going to Kansas, to Kokomo, to Canada, to Kankakee, to Kalamazoo, to Kamchatka, to the Chattahoochee.”

One little sniffer with his eyes half shut and a mitten on his nose, laughed in his hat five ways and said, “They are going to the moon and when they get there they will find everything is the same as it always was.”

All the spot cash money he got for selling everything, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, Gimme the Ax put in a ragbag and slung on his back like a rag picker going home.

Then he took Please Gimme, his oldest and youngest and only son, and Ax Me No Questions, his oldest and youngest and only daughter, and went to the railroad station.

The ticket agent was sitting at the window selling railroad tickets the same as always. 

He opened the ragbag and took out all the spot cash money

“Do you wish a ticket to go away and come back or do you wish a ticket to go away and never come back?” the ticket agent asked wiping sleep out of his eyes.

“We wish a ticket to ride where the railroad tracks run off into the sky and never come back—send us far as the railroad rails go and then forty ways farther yet,” was the reply of Gimme the Ax.

“So far? So early? So soon?” asked the ticket agent wiping more sleep out his eyes. “Then I will give you a new ticket. It blew in. It is a long slick yellow leather slab ticket with a blue spanch across it.”

Gimme the Ax thanked the ticket agent once, thanked the ticket agent twice, and then instead of thanking the ticket agent three times he opened the ragbag and took out all the spot cash money he got for selling everything, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, and paid the spot cash money to the ticket agent.

Before he put it in his pocket he looked once, twice, three times at the long yellow leather slab ticket with a blue spanch across it.

Then with Please Gimme and Ax Me No Questions he got on the railroad train, showed the conductor his ticket and they started to ride to where the railroad tracks run off into the blue sky and then forty ways farther yet.

The train ran on and on. It came to the place where the railroad tracks run off into the blue sky. And it ran on and on chick chick-a-chick chick-a-chick chick-a-chick.

Sometimes the engineer hooted and tooted the whistle. Sometimes the fireman rang the bell. Sometimes the open-and-shut of the steam hog’s nose choked and spit pfisty-pfoost, pfisty-pfoost, pfisty-pfoost. But no matter what happened to the whistle and the bell and the steam hog, the train ran on and on to where the railroad tracks run off into the blue sky. And then it ran on and on more and more.

Sometimes Gimme the Ax looked in his pocket, put his fingers in and took out the long slick yellow leather slab ticket with a blue spanch across it.

“Not even the Kings of Egypt with all their climbing camels, and all their speedy, spotted, lucky lizards, ever had a ride like this,” he said to his children.

Then something happened. They met another train running on the same track. One train was going one way. The other was going the other way. They met. They passed each other.

“What was it—what happened?” the children asked their father.

“One train went over, the other train went under,” he answered. “This is the Over and Under country. Nobody gets out of the way of anybody else. They either go over or under.”

Next they came to the country of the balloon pickers. Hanging down from the sky strung on strings so fine the eye could not see them at first, was the balloon crop of that summer. The sky was thick with balloons. Red, blue, yellow balloons, white, purple and orange balloons—peach, watermelon and potato balloons—rye loaf and wheat loaf balloons—link sausage and pork chop balloons—they floated and filled the sky.

The balloon pickers were walking on high stilts picking balloons. Each picker had his own stilts, long or short. For picking balloons near the ground he had short stilts. If he wanted to pick far and high he walked on a far and high pair of stilts.

Baby pickers on baby stilts were picking baby balloons. When they fell off the stilts the handful of balloons they were holding kept them in the air till they got their feet into the stilts again.

“Who is that away up there in the sky climbing like a bird in the morning?” Ax Me No Questions asked her father.

“He was singing too happy,” replied the father. “The songs came out of his neck and made him so light the balloons pulled him off his stilts.”

“Will he ever come down again back to his own people?”

“Yes, his heart will get heavy when his songs are all gone. Then he will drop down to his stilts again.”

The train was running on and on. The engineer hooted and tooted the whistle when he felt like it. The fireman rang the bell when he felt that way. And sometimes the open-and-shut of the steam hog had to go pfisty-pfoost, pfisty-pfoost.

“Next is the country where the circus clowns come from,” said Gimme the Ax to his son and daughter. “Keep your eyes open.”

They did keep their eyes open. They saw cities with ovens, long and short ovens, fat stubby ovens, lean lank ovens, all for baking either long or short clowns, or fat and stubby or lean and lank clowns.

After each clown was baked in the oven it was taken out into the sunshine and put up to stand like a big white doll with a red mouth leaning against the fence.

Two men came along to each baked clown standing still like a doll. One man threw a bucket of white fire over it. The second man pumped a wind pump with a living red wind through the red mouth.

The clown rubbed his eyes, opened his mouth, twisted his neck, wiggled his ears, wriggled his toes, jumped away from the fence and began turning handsprings, cartwheels, somersaults and flipflops in the sawdust ring near the fence.

“The next we come to is the Rootabaga Country where the big city is the Village of Liver-and-Onions,” said Gimme the Ax, looking again in his pocket to be sure he had the long slick yellow leather slab ticket with a blue spanch across it.

The train ran on and on till it stopped running straight and began running in zigzags like one letter Z put next to another Z and the next and the next.

The tracks and the rails and the ties and the spikes under the train all stopped being straight and changed to zigzags like one letter Z and another letter Z put next after the other.

“It seems like we go half way and then back up,” said Ax Me No Questions.

“Look out of the window and see if the pigs have bibs on,” said Gimme the Ax. “If the pigs are wearing bibs then this is the Rootabaga country.”

And they looked out of the zigzagging windows of the zigzagging cars and the first pigs they saw had bibs on. And the next pigs and the next pigs they saw all had bibs on.

The checker pigs had checker bibs on, the striped pigs had striped bibs on. And the polka dot pigs had polka dot bibs on.

“Who fixes it for the pigs to have bibs on?” Please Gimme asked his father.

“The fathers and mothers fix it,” answered Gimme the Ax. “The checker pigs have checker fathers and mothers. The striped pigs have striped fathers and mothers. And the polka dot pigs have polka dot fathers and mothers.”

And the train went zigzagging on and on running on the tracks and the rails and the spikes and the ties which were all zigzag like the letter Z and the letter Z.

And after a while the train zigzagged on into the Village of Liver-and-Onions, known as the biggest city in the big, big Rootabaga country.

And so if you are going to the Rootabaga country you will know when you get there because the railroad tracks change from straight to zigzag, the pigs have bibs on and it is the fathers and mothers who fix it.

And if you start to go to that country remember first you must sell everything you have, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, put the spot cash money in a ragbag and go to the railroad station and ask the ticket agent for a long slick yellow leather slab ticket with a blue spanch across it.

And you mustn’t be surprised if the ticket agent wipes sleep from his eyes and asks, “So far? So early? So soon?” 

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From Rootabaga Stories by Carl Sandburg

ISBN: 9788835814825

URL/DownLoad Link: https://bit.ly/2SaM749

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