Tag Archives: Myths

Shuutlits (Forest Fires) and the Willanch Monster

Posted on October 1, 2019 by shichils

This was first posted October 13 2015. I’ve edited a little from the original. For millennia, coastal Oregon Indian people often set fires to manage the landscape to encourage the growth of desired plants– annually in camas and tarweed (Madia) fields, and … Continue reading →

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A Nursery tale in Hanis?

Posted on May 28, 2019 by shichils

Annie Peterson told to Jacobs this very short (only 10 lines long) ‘story’ that he recorded on page 9 of notebook 99. It doesn’t seem to be a part of a longer story, just an odd stand alone story. So … Continue reading →

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A Trickster fragment

Posted on March 26, 2019 by shichils

When Melville Jacobs worked with Annie Peterson in 1933 and 1934, he got a long saga of five generations of tricksters (which was printed in his “Coos Myth Texts” printed by University of Washington Press in 1940). She also told … Continue reading →

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“Stealing of Fire and Water”

Posted on April 23, 2018 by shichils

Many tribes in the west have stories about how the First People had to acquire fire from a person or village of persons who held the only fire. Often, but not always, the hero is Coyote or another Trickster. There … Continue reading →

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Five Shadows: a story of dread, murder, cannibalism and a hero-child

Posted on September 27, 2017 by shichils

Linguist Leo Frachtenberg came to Oregon just over a century ago, and worked with speakers of Hanis (Jim Buchanan, Frank Drew, Tom Hollis), Lower Umpqua/Siuslaw (Louisa and William Smith) and Alsea (William Smith). One of the stories he got was … Continue reading →

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Stars

Posted on August 16, 2017 by shichils

    Sorry I have been so busy this summer I haven’t had time or energy to research posts here. Hopefully I can start writing at least semi-regularly again soon. In the meantime, here is a slightly-modified reprint of an … Continue reading →

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Hero Grandmothers

Posted on May 10, 2017 by shichils

I have been working on collecting examples of the Coos (Hanis and Milluk both) suffix -sha. This suffix is unusual in that it is the only one I know of that attaches to one and ONLY one word – huumik’, … Continue reading →

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