Ward, Herbert. A Bakongo Girl. Bronze sculpture, 1901, Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History.
Nzambi, the goddess who dwelt upon earth, had a beautiful daughter. Nzambi vowed that no earthly being should marry her daughter unless he first brought the heavenly fire from Nzambi Mpungu, who dwelt in the heavens above the blue roof.[1] Now, the daughter was very beautiful and the people marveled saying, “How shall we secure this treasure, and who on such conditions will ever marry her?”
Then the spider said, “I will win Nzambi’s daughter if you will help me.” And they all answered, “We will gladly help you if you will reward us.” The spider than began to travel upward until he reached the blue roof of heaven. He then dropped down again to the earth, leaving a strong silken thread firmly hanging from the roof to the earth below. He now called the tortoise, the woodpecker, the rat and the sand-fly and bade them climb up the thread to the roof.[2] They did so. Then the wood pecker pecked a hole through the blue roof and they all entered the realm of Nzambi Mpungu, the god of the heavens.
Nzambi Mpungu received them courteously and asked them what they wanted. They answered him saying, “Oh, Nzambi Mpungu, of the heavens above, great father of all the world, we have come to fetch some of your terrible fire for Nzambi, who rules upon earth.”
“Wait here, then,” said Mpungu, “while I go to my people and tell them of the message you bring.”
But the sand-fly, unseen, accompanied Mpungu and heard all that he said. The Mpungu returned to the visitors and said, “My friends, how can I know that you have really come from the ruler of the earth and that you are not imposters?”
“Put us to some test,” they said, “that we may prove our sincerity to you.”
“I will,” said Mpungu. “Go down to your earth and bring me a bundle of bamboos that I may make myself a shed.”
And the tortoise went down and soon returned with the bamboos.
Then Mpungu said to the rat, “Get thee beneath this bundle of bamboos and I will set fire to it; then if you escape, I shall surely know that Nzambi sent you.”
The rat did as he was bidden. Mpungu set fire to the bamboos, and lo, when they were entirely consumed, the rat came forth from amidst the ashes unharmed.
“You are, indeed,” said Mpungu, “what you represent yourselves to be. I will go and consult my people again.”
The sand-fly was again sent after Mpungu and bidden to keep well out of sight, to hear all that was said, and, if possible, to find out where the fire, that is the lightning, was kept. He soon came back and related all that he had heard and seen.
Then Mpungu returned to them and said, “Yes, I will give you the fire you ask for if you will tell me where it is kept.”
And the spider said, “Give me then, O, Nzambi Mpungu, one of the five cases that you keep in the fowl house.”
“Truly,” said Mpungu. “You have answered me correctly, O spider. Take therefore, this case and give it to Nzambi, who rules upon earth.”
The tortoise carried it down to the earth and the spider presented the fire from heaven to Nzambi and Nzambi gave the spider her beautiful daughter in marriage.
But the woodpecker grumbled and said, “Surely the woman is mine, for it was I who pecked the hole through the blue roof, without which the others could never have entered the kingdom of Nzambi Mpungu.”
“Yes,” said the rat, “but see how I risked my life among the burning bamboos. The girl, I think, should be mine.”
“Nay, O, Nzambi,” said the sand-fly, “the girl should certainly be mine, for without my help the others would never have found out where the fire was kept.”
Then Nzambi said, “Nay, the spider undertook to bring me the fire and has brought it. The girl by right is his, but as you will make her life miserable if I allow her to live with the spider and as I cannot give her to all of you, I will give her to none, but instead I will give each of you her market value.”
Nzambi then paid each of them fifty bolts of cloth and a cask of gin, but the daughter ever after remained unmarried and waited on her mother.
“HOW THE SPIDER WON AND LOST NZAMBI’S DAUGHTER.” THE CRISIS’ VOL. 10, NO. 6 (OCTOBER 1915): 301-02.
[1] This story sems to come directly from Kongo mythology. The Kingdom of Kongo was a large kingdom in western central Africa. In Kongo lore, Nzambi Mpungu is the father god who lives in the heavens and protects the secret of fire. Upon creating the earth, Nzambi Mpungu sends Nzambi there, who becomes princess of the earth. Eventually, Nzambi Mpungo comes down to earth and marries Nzambi, his own creation.
[2] Sand flies are small golden, brownish, or gray flies. The females feed on blood. These insects transmit several diseases like the pappataci fever virus, kala azar, Oriental sore, espundia, and bartonellosis.
Contexts
Starting in 1912, the October issues of The Crisis, the official magazine of the NAACP, were dedicated to children. A typical edition of these children’s numbers would contain a special editorial piece and two or three literary works specifically for children, while still including the serious pieces about contemporary issues with a focus on race that The Crisis was known for. These October numbers were sprinkled with children’s photographs sent in by the readers.
In his first editorial for the Children’s number in 1912, W. E. B. Du Bois wrote that “there is a sense in which all numbers and all words of a magazine of ideas myst point to the child—to that vast immortality and wide sweep and infinite possibility which the child represents.”
The success of The Crisis’ children’s number led to the standalone The Brownies’ Book, a monthly magazine for African American children that circulated from January 1920 to December 1921 under the editorship of Du Bois, Augustus Granville Dill, and Jessie Fauset.
Definitions from Oxford English Dictionary:
bolt: A roll of woven fabric: generally of a definite length; being, in various cases, 30 yards, 28 ells, or 40 feet.
Resources for Further Study
Under the title “How the Spider Won and Lost Nzambi’s Daughter,” the editors from The Crisis added the following text: “A Negro Folk Tale After Dennet; from the collection by M. N. Work.” Dennet refers to Richard Edward Dennett (1857-1921), a Chilean-born English trader who later in his life wrote influential sociological and anthropological research on West African cultures. His book Notes on the Folklore of the Fjort(1898) contains more than 30 traditional stories from the French Congo. M.N. (Monroe Nathan) Work (1866-1945) was an African-American sociologist who founded the Department of Records and Research at the Booker T. Washington’s Tuskegee Institute.
Robert Henri. Eva Green. Oil on canvas, 1907, Wichita Art Museum, Roland O. Murdock Collection. Public Domain.
Little Annabelle was lying on the lawn, a volume of Grimm before her. Annabelle was nine years of age, the daughter of a colored lawyer, and the prettiest dark child in the village.[1] She had long played in the fairyland of knowledge, and was far advanced for one of her years. A vivid imagination was her chief endowment, and her story creatures often became real flesh-and-blood creatures.
“I wonder,” she said to herself that afternoon, “if there is any such thing as a colored fairy? Surely there must be, but in this book they’re all white.”
Closing the book, her eyes rested upon the landscape that rolled itself out lazily before her. The stalks in the cornfield bent and swayed, their tassels bowing to the breeze, until Annabelle could have easily sworn that those were Indian fairies. And beyond lay the woods, dark and mossy and cool, and there many a something mysterious could have sprung into being, for in the recess was a silvery pool where the children played barefooted. A summer mist like a thin veil hung over the scene, and the breeze whispered tales of far-away lands.
Hist! Something stirred in the hazel bush near her. Can I describe little Annabelle’s amazement at finding in the bush a palace and a tall and dark-faced fairy before it?
“I am Amunophis, the Lily of Ethiopia,” said the strange creature. “And I come to the children of the Seventh Veil.”[2]
She was black and regal, and her voice was soft and low and gentle like the Niger on a summer evening.[3] Her dress was the wing of the sacred beetle, and whenever the wind stirred it played the dreamiest of music.[4] Her feet were bound with golden sandals, and on her head was a crown of lotus leaves.
“And you’re a fairy?” gasped Annabelle.
“Yes, I am a fairy, just as you wished me to be. I live in the tall grass many, many miles away, where a beautiful river called the Niger sleeps.” And stretching herself beside Annabelle, on the lawn, the fairy began to whisper:
“I have lived there for over five thousand years. In the long ago a city rested there, and from that spot black men and women ruled the world. Great ships laden with spice and oil and wheat would come to its port, and would leave with wines and weapons of war and fine linens. Proud and great were the black kings of this land, their palaces were built of gold, and I was the Guardian of the City. But one night when I was visiting an Indian grove the barbarians from the North came down and destroyed our shrines and palaces and took our people up to Egypt. Oh, it was desolate, and I shed many tears, for I missed the busy hum of the market and the merry voices of the children.
“But come with me, little Annabelle, I will show you all this, the rich past of the Ethiopian.”
She bade the little girl take hold of her hand and close her eyes, and wish herself in the wood behind the cornfield. Annabelle obeyed, and ere they knew it they were sitting beside the clear water in the pond.
“You should see the Niger,” said the fairy. “It is still beautiful, but not as happy as in the old days. The white man’s foot has been cooled by its water, and the white man’s blossom is choking out the native flower.” And she dropped a tear so beautiful the costliest pearl would seem worthless beside it.
“Ah! I did not come to weep,” she continued, “but to show you the past.”
So in a voice sweet and sad she sang an old African lullaby and dropped into the water a lotus leaf.[5] A strange mist formed, and when it had disappeared she bade the little girl to look into the pool. Creeping up Annabelle peered into the glassy surface, and beheld a series of vividly colored pictures.
Brass Plaque: King Esigie Shielded by Attendants. Brass, 1500/1599 [made in Benin City], The British Museum. Public Domain.
First she saw dark blacksmiths hammering in the primeval forests and giving fire and iron to all the world. Then she saw the gold of old Ghana and the bronzes of Benin.[6][7] Then the black Ethiopians poured down upon Egypt and the lands and cities bowed and flamed. Next she saw a great city with pyramids and stately temples. It was night, and a crimson moon was in the sky.[8] Red wine was flowing freely, and beautiful dusky maidens were dancing in a grove of palms. Old and young were intoxicated with the joy of living, and a sense of superiority could be easily traced in their faces and attitude. Presently red flame hissed everywhere, and the magnificence of remote ages soon crumbled into ash and dust. Persian soldiers ran to and fro conquering the band of defenders and severing the woman and children. Then came the Mohammedans and kingdom on kingdom arose, and with the splendor came ever more slavery.[9]
The next picture was that of a group of fugitive slaves, forming the nucleus of three tribes, hurrying back to the wilderness of their fathers.
In houses built as protection against the heat the blacks dwelt, communing with the beauty of water and sky and open air. It was just between twilight and evening and their minstrels were chanting impromptu hymns to their gods of nature. And as she listened closely, Annabelle thought she caught traces of the sorrow songs in the weird pathetic strains of the African music mongers.[10] From the East the warriors of the tribe came, bringing prisoners, whom they sold to white strangers from the West.
“It is the beginning,” whispered the fairy, as a large Dutch vessel sailed westward.[11] Twenty boys and girls bound with strong ropes were given to a miserable existence in the hatchway of the boat. Their captors were strange creatures, pale and yellow haired, who were destined to sell them as slaves in a country cold and wild, where the palm trees and the cocoanut never grew and men spoke a language without music. A light, airy creature, like an ancient goddess, few before the craft guiding it in its course.
Stowage ofthe British Slave Ship “Brookes” Under the Regulated Slave Trade Act of 1788. Etching, Library of Congress rare Book and Special Collections Division. Public Domain.
“That is I,” said the fairy. “In that picture I am bringing your ancestors to America. It was my hope that in the new civilization I could build a race that would be strong enough to redeem their brothers. They have gone through great tribulations and trials, and have mingled with the blood of the fairer race; yet though not entirely Ethiopian they have not lost their identity. Prejudice is a furnace through which molten gold is poured. Heaven be merciful unto all races! There is one more picture –the greatest of all, but –farewell, little one, I am going.”
“Going?” cried Annabelle. “Going? I want to see the last picture—and when will you return, fairy?”
“When the race has been redeemed. When the brotherhood of man has come into the world; and there is no longer a white civilization or a black civilization, but the civilization of all men. I belong to the world council of the fairies, and we are all colors and kinds. Why should not men be as charitable unto one another? When that glorious time comes I shall walk among you and be one of you, performing my deeds of magic and playing with the children of every nation, race and tribe. Then, Annabelle, you shall see the last picture—and the best.”
Slowly she disappeared like a summer mist, leaving Annabelle amazed.
Malmström, August. Dancing Fairies. Oil on canvas, 1866, Nationalmuseum, Sweden. Public Domain.
JOHNSON, FENTON. “THE BLACK FAIRY,” THE CRISIS 6, NO. 6 (OCTOBER 1913): 292-94.
[1] The establishment of black colleges and graduate schools during the Reconstruction Era (1865-1877) allowed the emergence of a new class of black professionals. The Howard School of Law, established on January 4, 1869, was the first black law school in America. Macon Bolling Allen (1816-1894), however, is believed to be the first African American licensed lawyer. He received his certification on July 3, 1844.
[2] The following excerpt from W. E. B. Dubois’s 1903 landmark The Souls of Black Folk, in which he partially outlines the influential concept of double-consciousness, may contextualize Fenton Johnson’s allusion to the Seventh Veil:
“After the Egyptian and Indian, the Greek and Roman, the Teuton and Mongolian, the Negro is a sort of seventh son, born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world,”a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself thought the revelation of the other world.”
[3] With a length of 2,600 miles, the Niger River is the main river of Western Africa and the third longest African river after the Nile and the Congo.
Sun God Depicted as a Scarab with Human Head and Arms. Limestone, 25th Dynasty (Ethiopians), Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Germany. Public Domain.
[4] The sacred beetle refers to the Egyptian scarab, a dung beetle that for the ancient Egyptians symbolized renewal and rebirth. This beetle was also associated with Khepri, a divine manifestation of the early morning sun.
[5] Tigit Shibabaw‘s interpretation of Eshururu, an Ethiopian lullaby in Ahmaric, an Ethiopian Semitic language. “Eshururu” means “hush little baby don’t you cry.”
[6] As of today, Ghana remains a leading producer of gold in Ghana and is the seventh gold producer in the world. Unregulated small-scale gold mining in this country are a current environmental concern due to its devastating effect on the landscape.
[7] The “Benin Bronzes” are brass-and-bronze sculptures whose creation dates back to the 16th century. In 1897, British soldiers looted hundreds of these objects from the Benin Royal Palace after a military expedition that effectively ended the independent Kingdom of Benin. The same year, the British Museum displayed a set of “Benin Bronzes” that together with later acquisitions from private collections still remains in the museum’s collection. In October 2021, the British Museum received a request from Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Information and Culture for the return of Nigerian antiquities. Representatives from the Benin Royal Palace have also asked publicly for the restitution of these looted art objects.
[8] “Crimson moon” and “blood moon” are non-scientific terms for a total lunar eclipse, during which the moon takes on a reddish color.
[9] Mohamedans are followers of Muhammad, the Islamic prophet. In the XVI century, Islamic forces led by Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazi invaded Ethiopia.
[10] Sorrow Songs (or spirituals) belong to the musical tradition of black slaves during the antebellum South.
[11] Between 1596 and 1839, the Dutch, active participants in the transatlantic slave trades, transported half a million Africans westward across the Atlantic.
Contexts
Starting in 1912, the October issues of The Crisis, the official magazine of the NAACP, were dedicated to children. A typical edition of these children’s numbers would contain a special editorial piece and two or three literary works specifically for children, while still including the serious pieces about contemporary issues with a focus on race that The Crisis was known for. These October numbers were sprinkled with children’s photographs sent in by the readers.
In his first editorial for the Children’s number in 1912, W. E. B. Du Bois wrote that “there is a sense in which all numbers and all words of a magazine of ideas myst point to the child—to that vast immortality and wide sweep and infinite possibility which the child represents.”
The success of The Crisis’ children’s number led to the standalone The Brownies’ Book, a monthly magazine for African American children that circulated from January 1920 to December 1921 under the editorship of Du Bois, Augustus Granville Dill, and Jessie Fauset.
Fenton’s Johnson’s “The Black Fairy” also appeared in The Upward Path: A Reader for Colored Children in 1920.
Definitions from Oxford English Dictionary:
crimson: Of a deep red colour somewhat inclining towards purple.
hist: Used to enjoin silence, attract attention, or call on a person to listen.
Resources for Further Study
Ethiopianism, a literary-religious tradition that emerged during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, emphasized the classical values of African nations and their extensive histories before European colonization. In the United States, Ethiopianism “found expression in slave narratives, exhortations of slave preachers, and songs and folklore of southern black culture, as well as the sermons and political tracts of the urban elite.”
A brief history of fairies, courtesy of the World History Encyclopedia collective.
An article onfairies‘ folklore scholarship, with copious references and suggestions for further reading.
By Stella Le Flore Carter (Cherokee-Chickasaw), age 9
Annotations by Karen L. Kilcup
Sunset at Washita National Wildlife Refuge, OK. Public domain.
My Aunt Lizzie lives at the head of the beautiful Washita canyon. [1] She is almost a full-blood Chickasaw, and has all the ways of a full-blood Indian. She tells many beautiful stories about her people, as she calls the Chickasaws. [2] She calls these tales legends and traditions, but Papa says they are pipe stories. Among others she told me what she calls the legend of Horn Lake, which I will tell you as she told it to me. [3]
Many years ago, when your Great Grandfather wore the breech clout and hunting shirt, a clan of my people lived in a beautiful valley, near the line of Mississippi and Tennessee.
The Chief of this clan had a beautiful daughter, named Climbing Panther. [4] She was known among all the Chickasaws for her pretty face and perfect form. One day the young men of the tribe cut down a large bee tree for they wanted the honey. [5] The trunk of the tree was found to be hollow and full of water, and a fish was seen coming to the surface for air. Climbing Panther wanted to get the fish, but the old Medicine Man fussed at her, and told her not to do it. But she took the fish home to her father’s wigwam[,] cooked it and ate it. She became very thirsty and they brought her water, but she could not get enough. At last she went to the spring and drank the water as fast as it ran from the spring. Before leaving camp she told her father that she was sick, and to call his people together and have a big Pashofa, or Medicine Dance. [6]
Her father called the people together that night, and when they were forming lines for the Tikbahoka, [7] the men on one side and the women on the other, they heard an awful roaring noise. A big snake as big as a horse appeared between the two lines. It had long horns and on its head was the face of Climbing Panther. Then they all knew that Climbing Panther had turned to a snake.
The lightning flashed and the Heavens gave a mighty roar. The body of the snake burst open, the ground sank and everything was covered with water except the long horns of the snake. This is the way Horn Lake was made. And the great horns of the snake can be seen sticking above the water today. And it was all caused by Climbing Panther’s disobedience.
STELLA LE FLORE CARTER, “LEGEND OF HORN LAKE,” TWIN TERRITORIES 5, NO. 5 (MAY 1903): 182-83.
Attack on Peace Chief Black Kettle’s village near the Washita River by the Seventh U.S. Cavalry let by Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer, November 27, 1868. Harper’s Weekly 12 (December 1868): 804. Public domain.
[1] The Washita River, which meanders across many miles in southwest Oklahoma, figures tragically in Native American history. See Contexts and Resources for Further Study, below.
[2] The Chickasaw people were among the groups called the “Five Civilized Tribes” that the U.S. Government removed to Indian Territory (now part of Oklahoma) on the Trail of Tears. See Resources for Further Study, below.
[3] Horn Lake does not appear in any contemporary or historical maps of Oklahoma. The location the story references is almost certainly in the traditional homeland of the Chickasaws. Crossing the Tennessee-Mississippi border, Horn Lake appears on a 1932 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers topographic map, as well as on contemporary Google maps. Thanks to Jessica Cory for locating this information.
[4] The name Climbing Panther may suggest that the chief’s daughter belonged to the Panther Clan, traditionally regarded as hunters.
[5] As its name suggests, a bee tree contains a colony of honeybees. Those we regularly reference today are not native to North America but were brought here from Europe in the seventeenth century. Before this time, American Indians “enjoyed a different kind of honey prior to the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors. The Mayans and Aztecs ate honey from a bee, Melipona beecheii, that used hollowed-out logs as hives.” See Carson in Resources for Further Study, below.
[6] “Pashofa” is a traditional Chickasaw dish composed of pashofa corn and pork. The Chickasaw Nation website, which contains recipes, comments that it “was, and still is, served at large gatherings of Chickasaws, for celebrations and ceremonies.”
[7] The author may have transcribed this word imprecisely, for a search reveals no results. The context suggests that it references the Medicine Dance mentioned in the previous paragraph.
Contexts
Stella Carter’s story exemplifies a notable genre of Native American literature, the traditional tale that explains the origin of a natural feature. The story’s key emphasis, however, lies in what the narrator calls “Climbing Panther’s disobedience”: in rejecting her elders’ wisdom and prioritizing her individual desires, she endangers the entire tribe.
Carter’s narrative does not mention the 1868 Washita Massacre, but her aunt would almost certainly have known about this attack in which U.S. soldiers led by Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer decimated the village of Peace Chief Black Kettle and killed the chief. Four years earlier, the horrific Sand Creek Massacre by U.S. soldiers in Colorado had killed many women and children, but Black Kettle attempted to maintain peaceful relations with the federal government. The websites of the National Park Service (NPS) and the Washita Battlefield National Historic Site in Oklahoma provide some historical background, although readers should be wary of non-Native accounts. The NPS description acknowledges that “Black Kettle, a respected Cheyenne leader, had sought peace and protection from the US Army and had signed the Little Arkansas Treaty in 1865 and the Medicine Lodge Treaty in 1867.” For eyewitness Cheyenne accounts, see Hardoff, below.
Resources for Further Study
Brown, Dee. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West. 1970; rpt. New York: Henry Holt, 2007. See 167-68, 243.
“Carter, Charles David, 1868-1929.” Biographical Dictionary of the United States Congress.
Hardoff, Richard G., ed. Washita Memories: Eyewitness Views of Custer’s Attack on Black Kettle’s Village. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2006. Notable because it contains accounts by Cheyenne Indians who witnessed the massacre.
Hatch, Thom. Black Kettle: The Cheyenne Chief Who Sought Peace But Found War. Hoboken: John Wiley, 2004. See Chapters 8, 9, and 12.
“History.” Office of the Governor. The Chickasaw Nation. This site encompasses Chickasaw history from the pre-settler period to the present.
Boatman, Christine. “Lessons Learned in Teaching Native American History.” Edutopia. George Lucas Educational Foundation, September 18, 2019. “A white teacher shares resources and things she’s learned: Be humble, find the gaps in your knowledge, and listen to Native voices.”
“Chickasaw Nation Curriculum.” The essential guide for teaching primary and secondary grades about the Chickasaw Nation.
“Teacher’s Guide. American Indian History and Heritage.” EDSITEment! National Endowment for the Humanities. “Transforming teaching and learning about Native Americans.” Native Knowledge 360° Education Initiative. National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian. The site offers educators and others free webinars, including many hosted by Native Americans, aimed to correct problematic narratives about Native Americans; it maintains an archive of previous sessions.
Contemporary Connections
For a Native American perspective on the events of November 1868, see Winter Rabbit (Métis). “Washita Massacre of November 27, 1868: 151st Anniversary.” Daily Kos, November 27, 2019.
Lawrence W. Ladd. The Creation. Watercolor on paper, 1880, Smithsonian American Art Museum and its Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C.
The Beginning of Newness
Before the beginning of the New-making, the All-father Father alone had being. Through ages there was nothing else except black darkness.
In the beginning of the New-making, the All-father Father thought outward in space, and mists were created and up-lifted. Thus through his knowledge he made himself the Sun who was thus created and is the great Father. The dark spaces brightened with light. The cloud mists thickened and became water.
From his flesh, the Sun-father created the Seed-stuff of worlds, and he himself rested upon the waters.And these two, the Four-fold-containing Earth-mother and the All-covering Sky-father, the surpassing beings, with power of changing their forms even as smoke changes in the wind, were the father and mother of the soul beings.
Then as man and woman spoke these two together. “Behold!” said Earth-mother, as a great terraced bowl appeared at hand, and within it water, “This shall be the home of my tiny children. On the rim of each world-country in which they wander, terraced mountains shall stand, making in one region many mountains by which one country shall be known from another.”
Then she spat on the water and struck it and stirred it with her fingers. Foam gathered about the terraced rim, mounting higher and higher. Then with her warm breath she blew across the terraces. White flecks of foam broke away and floated over the water. But the cold breath of Sky-father shattered the foam and it fell downward in fine mist and spray.
Then Earth-mother spoke: “Even so shall white clouds float up from the great waters at the borders of the world, and clustering about the mountain terraces of the horizon, shall be broken and hardened by thy cold. Then will they shed downward, in rain-spray, the water of life, even into the hollow places of my lap. For in my lap shall nestle our children, man-kind and creature-kind, for warmth in thy coldness.”
So even now the trees on high mountains near the clouds and Sky-father, crouch low toward Earth mother for warmth and protection. Warm is Earth-mother, cold our Sky-father.
Then Sky-father said, “Even so. Yet I, too, will be helpful to our children.” Then he spread his hand out with the palm downward and into all the wrinkles of his hand he set the semblance of shining yellow corn-grains; in the dark of the early world-dawn they gleamed like sparks of fire.
“See,” he said, pointing to the seven grains between his thumb and four fingers, “our children shall be guided by these when the Sun-father is not near and thy terraces are as darkness itself. Then shall our children be guided by lights.” So Sky-father created the stars. Then he said, “And even as these grains gleam up from the water, so shall seed grain like them spring up from the earth when touched by water, to nourish our children.” And thus they created the seed-corn. And in many other ways they devised for their children, the soul-beings.
William Henry Holmes. The Enchanted Mesa. Watercolor and opaque watercolor on paper, 1927, Smithsonian American Art Museum and its Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C.
But the first children, in a cave of the earth, were unfinished. The cave was of sooty blackness, black as a chimney at night time, and foul. Loud became their murmurings and lamentations, until many sought to escape, growing wiser and more man-like.
But the earth was not then as we now see it. Then Sun-father sent down two sons (sons also of the Foam-cap), the Beloved Twain, Twin Brothers of Light, yet Elder and Younger, the Right and the Left, like to question and answer in deciding and doing. To them the Sun-father imparted his own wisdom. He gave them the great cloud-bow, and for arrows the thunderbolts of the four quarters. For buckler, they had the fog-making shield, spun and woven of the floating clouds and spray. The shield supports its bearer, as clouds are supported by the wind, yet hides its bearer also. And he gave to them the fathership and control of men and of all creatures. Then the Beloved Twain, with their great cloud-bow lifted the Sky-father into the vault of the skies, that the earth might become warm and fitter for men and creatures. Then along the sun-seeking trail, they sped to the mountains westward. With magic knives they spread open the depths of the mountain and uncovered the cave in which dwelt the unfinished men and creatures. So they dwelt with men, learning to know them, and seeking to lead them out.
Now there were growing things in the depths, like grasses and vines. So the Beloved Twain breathed on the stems, growing tall toward the light as grass is wont to do, making them stronger, and twisting them upward until they formed a great ladder by which men and creatures ascended to a second cave.
Up the ladder into the second cave-world, men and the beings crowded, following closely the Two Little but Mighty Ones. Yet many fell back and were lost in the darkness. They peopled the under-world from which they escaped in after time, amid terrible earth shakings.
In this second cave it was as dark as the night of a stormy season, but larger of space and higher. Here again men and the beings increased, and their complainings grew loud. So the Twain again increased the growth of the ladder, and again led men upward, not all at once, but in six bands, to become the fathers of the six kinds of men, the yellow, the tawny gray, the red, the white, the black, and the mingled. And this time also many were lost or left behind.
Now the third great cave was larger and lighter, like a valley in starlight. And again they increased in number. And again the Two led them out into a fourth cave. Here it was light like dawning, and men began to perceive and to learn variously, according to their natures, wherefore the Twain taught them first to seek the Sun-father.
Then as the last cave became filled and men learned to understand, the Two led them forth again into the great upper world, which is the World of Knowing Seeing.
The Men of the Early Times
Eight years was but four days and four nights when the world was new. While such days and nights continued, men were led out, in the night-shine of the World of Seeing. For even when they saw the great star, they thought it the Sun-father himself, it so burned their eye-balls.
Men and creatures were more alike then than now. Our fathers were black, like the caves they came from; their skins were cold and scaly like those of mud creatures; their eyes were goggled like an owl’s; their ears were like those of cave bats; their feet were webbed like those of walkers in wet and soft places; they had tails, long or short, as they were old or young. Men crouched when they walked, or crawled along the ground like lizards. They feared to walk straight, but crouched as before time they had in their cave worlds, that they might not stumble or fall in the uncertain light.
Anasazi sandal, yucca, 10th century AD. Bata Shoe Museum, Toronto, ON, Canada.
When the morning star arose, they blinked excessively when they beheld its brightness and cried out that now surely the Father was coming. But it was only the elder of the Bright Ones, heralding with his shield of flame the approach of the Sun-father. And when, low down in the east, the Sun-father himself appeared, though shrouded in the mist of the world-waters, they were blinded and heated by his light and glory. They fell down wallowing and covered their eyes with their hands and arms, yet ever as they looked toward the light, they struggled toward the Sun as moths and other night creatures seek the light of a camp fire. Thus they became used to the light. But when they rose and walked straight, no longer bending, and looked upon each other, they sought to clothe themselves with girdles and garments of bark and rushes. And when by walking only upon their hinder feet they were bruised by stone and sand, they plaited sandals of yucca fibre.
The Search for the Middle and the Hardening of the World
As it was with the first men and creatures, so it was with the world. It was young and unripe. Earthquakes shook the world and rent it. Demons and monsters of the under-world fled forth. Creatures became fierce, beasts of prey, and others turned timid, becoming their quarry. Wretchedness and hunger abounded and black magic. Fear was everywhere among them, so the people, in dread of their precious possessions, became wanderers, living on the seeds of grass, eaters of dead and slain things. Yet, guided by the Beloved Twain, they sought in the light and under the pathway of the Sun, the Middle of the world, over which alone they could find the earth at rest (1). (Ed. note 1: The earth was flat and round, like a plate.)
When the tremblings grew still for a time, the people paused at the First of Sitting Places. Yet they were still poor and defenceless and unskilled, and the world still moist and unstable. Demons and monsters fled from the earth in times of shaking, and threatened wanderers.
Then the Two took counsel of each other. The Elder said the earth must be made more stable for men and the valleys where their children rested. If they sent down their fire bolts of thunder, aimed to all the four regions, the earth would heave up and down, fire would, belch over the world and burn it, floods of hot water would sweep over it, smoke would blacken the daylight, but the earth would at last be safer for men.
So the Beloved Twain let fly the thunderbolts.
Frederic Edwin Church. Storm over Hudson Valley. Brush and oil on canvas, 1867, Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, New York, NY.
The mountains shook and trembled, the plains cracked and crackled under the floods and fires, and the hollow places, the only refuge of men and creatures, grew black and awful. At last thick rain fell, putting out the fires. Then water flooded the world, cutting deep trails through the mountains, and burying or uncovering the bodies of things and beings. Where they huddled together and were blasted thus, their blood gushed forth and flowed deeply, here in rivers, there in floods, for gigantic were they. But the blood was charred and blistered and blackened by the fires into the black rocks of the lower mesas (2). (Ed. note 2: Lava) There were vast plains of dust, ashes, and cinders, reddened like the mud of the hearth place. Yet many places behind and between the mountain terraces were unharmed by the fires, and even then green grew the trees and grasses and even flowers bloomed. Then the earth became more stable, and drier, and its lone places less fearsome since monsters of prey were changed to rock.
But ever and again the earth trembled and the people were troubled.
“Let us again seek the Middle,” they said. So they travelled far eastward to their second stopping place, the Place of Bare Mountains.
Again the world rumbled, and they travelled into a country to a place called Where-tree-boles-stand-in-the-midst-of-waters. There they remained long, saying, “This is the Middle.” They built homes there. At times they met people who had gone before, and thus they learned war. And many strange things happened there, as told in speeches of the ancient talk.
Then when the earth groaned again, the Twain bade them go forth, and they murmured. Many refused and perished miserably in their own homes, as do rats in falling trees, or flies in forbidden food.
But the greater number went forward until they came to Steam-mist-in-the-midst-of-waters. And they saw the smoke of men’s hearth fires and many houses scattered over the hills before them. When they came nearer, they challenged the people rudely, demanding who they were and why there, for in their last standing-place they had had touch of war.
“We are the People of the Seed,” said the men of the hearth-fires, “born elder brothers of ye, and led of the gods.”
“No,” said our fathers, “we are led of the gods and we are the Seed People…”
Ira D. Gerald Cassidy. Old Man of Zuni, High Priest (Cacique). Oil on canvas, 1924, Smithsonian American Art Museum and its Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C.
Long lived the people in the town on the sunrise slope of the mountains of Kahluelawan, until the earth began to groan warningly again. Loath were they to leave the place of the Kaka and the lake of their dead. But the rumbling grew louder and the Twain Beloved called, and all together they journeyed eastward, seeking once more the Place of the Middle. But they grumbled amongst themselves, so when they came to a place of great promise, they said, “Let us stay here. Perhaps it may be the Place of the Middle.”
So they built houses there, larger and stronger than ever before, and more perfect, for they were strong in numbers and wiser, though yet unperfected as men. They called the place “The Place of Sacred Stealing.”
Long they dwelt there, happily, but growing wiser and stronger, so that, with their tails and dressed in the skins of animals, they saw they were rude and ugly.
In chase or in war, they were at a disadvantage, for they met older nations of men with whom they fought. No longer they feared the gods and monsters, but only their own kind. So therefore the gods called a council.
“Changed shall ye be, oh our children,” cried the Twain. “Ye shall walk straight in the pathways, clothed in garments, and without tails, that ye may sit more straight in council, and without webs to your feet, or talons on your hands.”
So the people were arranged in procession like dancers. And the Twain with their weapons and fires of lightning shored off the forelocks hanging down over their faces, severed the talons, and slitted the webbed fingers and toes. Sore was the wounding and loud cried the foolish, when lastly the people were arranged in procession for the razing of their tails.
But those who stood at the end of the line, shrinking farther and farther, fled in their terror, climbing trees and high places, with loud chatter. Wandering far, sleeping ever in tree tops, in the far-away Summerland, they are sometimes seen of far-walkers, long of tail and long handed, like wizened men-children.
But the people grew in strength, and became more perfect, and more than ever went to war. They grew vain. They had reached the Place of the Middle. They said, “Let us not wearily wander forth again even though the earth tremble and the Twain bid us forth.”
And even as they spoke, the mountain trembled and shook, though far-sounding.
But as the people changed, changed also were the Twain, small and misshapen, hard-favored and unyielding of will, strong of spirit, evil and bad. They taught the people to war, and led them far to the eastward.
At last the people neared, in the midst of the plains to the eastward, great towns built in the heights. Great were the fields and possessions of this people, for they knew how to command and carry the waters, bringing new soil. And this, too, without hail or rain. So our ancients, hungry with long wandering for new food, were the more greedy and often gave battle.
It was here that the Ancient Woman of the Elder People, who carried her heart in her rattle and was deathless of wounds in the body, led the enemy, crying out shrilly. So it fell out ill for our fathers. For, moreover, thunder raged and confused their warriors, rain descended and blinded them, stretching their bow strings of sinew and quenching the flight of their arrows as the flight of bees is quenched by the sprinkling plume of the honey-hunter. But they devised bow strings of yucca and the Two Little Ones sought counsel of the Sun-father who revealed the life-secret of the Ancient Woman and the magic powers over the under-fires of the dwellers of the mountains, so that our enemy in the mountain town was overmastered. And because our people found in that great town some hidden deep in the cellars, and pulled them out as rats are pulled from a hollow cedar, and found them blackened by the fumes of their war magic, yet wiser than the common people, they spared them and received them into their next of kin of the Black Corn….
But the tremblings and warnings still sounded, and the people searched for the stable Middle.
Now they called a great council of men and the beasts, birds, and insects of all kinds. After a long council it was said,
“Where is Water-skate? He has six legs, all very long. Perhaps he can feel with them to the uttermost of the six regions, and point out the very Middle.”
Illustration for “Water-Skate Finding the Center” from Living the Sky: The Cosmos of the American Indian by R. A. Williamson, p. 66.
So Water-skate was summoned. But lo! It was the Sun-father in his likeness which appeared. And he lifted himself to the zenith and extended his fingerfeet to all the six regions, so that they touched the north, the great waters; the west, and the south, and the east, the great waters; and to the northeast the waters above, and to the southwest the waters below. But to the north his finger foot grew cold, so he drew it in. Then gradually he settled down upon the earth and said, “Where my heart rests, mark a spot, and build a town of the Mid-most, for there shall be the Mid-most Place of the Earth-mother.”
And his heart rested over the middle of the plain and valley of Zuni. And when he drew in his finger-legs, lo! there were the trail-roads leading out and in like stays of a spider’s nest, into and from the mid-most place he had covered.
Here because of their good fortune in finding the stable Middle, the priest father called the town the Abiding-place-of-happy-fortune.
various authors. “The Beginning of Newness,” “The men of the early times,” “The Search for the Middle and the Hardening of the World.” InMYTHS AND LEGENDS OF CALIFORNIA AND THE OLD SOUTHWEST, Ed. Katharine Berry Judson. Chicago: A.C. MCCLURG & CO., 1912.
[1] These three stories constitute a history of the Earth and the Zuni people from the beginning of creation to the foundation of their pueblo.
Contexts
Creation myths, or cosmogonies, are one of the few universals. Although the how, why, where, and when of creation varies from culture to culture, they all account for the existence of the world around them. Some cultures attribute the creation of the world to one or more divine beings; others say it emanates from a source. In the case of the Zuni Creation Cycle, the story places their pueblo in the geographical Middle of the World, where the gods wish them to be.
Resources for Further Study
Zunian Lullaby is another example of Zuni oral tradition.
It befell in times past that the gods, being angry with the inhabitants of Thebes[2], sent into their land a very troublesome beast which men called the Sphinx.[3] Now this beast had the face and breast of a fair woman, but the feet and claws of a lion; and it was wont to ask a riddle of such as encountered it, and such as answered not aright it would tear and devour.
When it had laid waste the land many days, there chanced to come to Thebes one Œdipus, who had fled from the city of Corinth that he might escape the doom which the gods had spoken against him. And the men of the place told him of the Sphinx, how she cruelly devoured the people, and that he who should deliver them from her should have the kingdom. So Œdipus, being very bold, and also ready of wit, went forth to meet the monster. And when she saw him she spake, saying:
“Read me this riddle right, or die: What liveth there beneath the sky, Four-footed creature that doth choose Now three feet and now twain to use, And still more feebly o’er the plain Walketh with three feet than with twain?”
And Œdipus made reply:
“‘Tis man, who in life’s early day Four-footed crawleth on his way; When time hath made his strength complete, Upright his form and twain his feet; When age hath bound him to the ground A third foot in his staff is found.”
And when the Sphinx found that her riddle was answered she cast herself from a high rock and perished.
As a reward Œdipus received the great kingdom of Thebes and the hand of the widowed queen Jocasta in marriage. Four children were born to them—two sons, Eteocles and Polynices, and two daughters, Antigone[4] and Ismené.
Now the gods had decreed that Œdipus should murder his own father and marry his own mother, and by a curious chance this was precisely what he had done. As a baby he had been left to die lest he should live to fulfil the doom, but had been rescued by an old shepherd and brought up at the court of Corinth[5]. Fleeing from there that he might not murder him whom he believed to be his father, he had come to Thebes, and on the way had met Laius, his true father, the king, and killed him.
While he remained ignorant of the facts Œdipus was very happy and reigned in great power and glory; but when pestilence fell upon the land and he discovered the truth of the almost forgotten oracle[6], he was very miserable, and in the madness of grief put out his own eyes.
[1] This story is from Sophocles’ play “Œdipus Rex”, the first of three plays about Œdipus.
[2] Thebes (Thiva) is a city in modern-day Boeotia, central Greece. It is central in many Greek myths, including Heracles and Dionysus.
[3] Egyptian sphinxes feature male human heads and wingless bodies, while Greek sphinxes feature female heads and wings (OED).
[4] Antigone lends her name to the title of the final play in the Œdipus cycle.
[5] Famous as the recipient of Biblical letters from the Apostle Paul, Corinth is a city in south-central Greece on the Isthmus of Corinth.
[6] Oracles are instruments, agencies, or mediums which act as the mouthpiece for a god. The world also refers to the places that house such people or things, or pronouncements of them (OED).
Contexts
The Œdipus Cycle, also known as The Theban Plays, consists of three plays by Sophocles: “Œdipus Rex” (“Œdipus Tyranus” in the original Greek), “Œdipus at Colonus”, and “Antigone”. “Œdipus and the Sphinx” is from the first and most famous of the three and has been used to promote the virtues of cleverness and bravery.
The rest of the play was famously used by psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud in his work, in which the Œdipal complex is used to describe the mother as the source of all sexual desire in a boy and the father as the source of all his rivalry. This problematic description has stood the test of time as one of the most misunderstood and misused theories of psychoanalysis.
Resources for Further Study
“Oedipus the King” from History Today gives further details about the play and its 5th-century performances.
“Œdipus and the Sphinx”, “Œdipus Rex”, and “Antigone”, the final play of the Œdipus Cycle, are all common readings at different levels of education.
The short story of Œdipus’ encounter with the sphinx is fantastic fun for children who are learning wordplay and riddles. This 2nd grade lesson plan in an excellent example of what can be done with this portion of the Œdipus saga.
The themes of incest and murder and the level of violence in the stories “Œdipus Rex” and “Antigone” make them suitable only for higher-grade or college level students. However, with scaffolding and mature students, these works can lead to excellent discussions of free-will & fate, guilt, and power.
Contemporary Connections
The Book of Virtues (1993) and The Children’s Book of Virtues (1995) by Former Education Secretary William J. Bennet both contain versions of this story. Stories from the books above were also animated in the television series Adventures from the Book of Virtues (1996-98, 2000, 2009). “Oedipus and the Sphinx” by Andrei Cornea is a brief, somewhat modernized, sequel to this story (World Literature Today, vol. 84, no. 5, Sept. 2010, p. 37).
“The Crackle, or Crow-Blackbird” by Ernest Thompson Seton, 1893. The drawing is held in the Cooper Hewitt gallery at the Smithsonian Design Museum.
The crows were once beautiful birds, loved and admired by all the fowls of the air.
The crows at that time dressed in the most gorgeous colors, and their heads were decorated with red feathers that glistened like fire when the sun reflected upon it. The crows had many servants, who attended upon them. The woodpecker was the head servant, and his helpers were the sapsuckers, yellow hammers, and the linnets. They faithfully performed their duty of combing the beautiful heads of the crows, and would now and then pluck a feather from the crow’s head and stick it in their own, at the same time making the excuse that they were pulling at a snarled feather, or picking nits from his head.
So one day the crows got very angry at losing their beautiful feathers from their heads and when the servants heard of this they immediately formed a plot against the crows.
So one morning, as the servants were attending upon the crows, they overpowered them and plucked all of their red feathers from their heads and rolled them in a heap of charcoal, thus coloring them black to this very day. Any one can see for himself, the crows are not on friendly terms with their former servants, for they still possess the red heads that the crows once had. [3]
George, Louis. “Tradition of the crows.” The Red Man, 2 no. 10 (June 1910): 42.
[1] In the original document (and on additional Carlisle School paperwork), Louis’ name is spelled “Lewis.” However, on the school application, apparently filled out by this mother, Jennie Martin, it is spelled “Louis.” Following what was likely his mother’s chosen name, I’ve used “Louis” here.
[3] While it is likely that the Klamath have traditional stories involving crows or ravens, as many tribes do, I was unable to find this particular story replicated elsewhere.
Contexts
The Carlisle School, located in Pennsylvania, was the most well-known of the residential schools for Native Americans in the US, which existed from 1860 until the late 20th century. It was founded by Henry Pratt, infamous for his views on the necessity of Native American cultural destruction. Native children were forced to attend the school, where they were given new names, forbidden to speak their languages, and frequently abused and even killed. Because the Carlisle School published this Native student’s story, we should recognize how power and censorship shape such texts.
Resources for Further Study
Becky Little explains a bit of the history behind the residential school system in the U.S., and looks specifically at the Carlisle School in particular.
Mary Annette Pember (Red Cliff Band of Wisconsin Ojibwe) writes of her mother’s experience as a student at Saint Mary’s Catholic Indian Boarding School, exploring the intergenerational trauma, disconnection, and other long-lasting impacts that such schools caused.
Pedagogy
When teaching about the history of Native American boarding schools, it’s important to couch these forced “educations” within the larger context of attempted genocide and settler colonialism, as well as to explore the often traumatic outcomes for Native Americans for which these institutions are responsible.
The Stanford History Education Group has some wonderful curriculums for teachers and students that provide historical context and information regarding the Carlisle Indian Industrial School.
While Canada has formerly apologized to its Indigenous citizens for the impact that the residential schools had on the affected populations (though Indigenous Canadian peoples still face systemic and individual discrimination and many scholars, such as Dian Million and Audra Simpson, have explained the complexities of reconcilliation), the United States has refused to offer any sort of apology or reconciliation to its Native peoples.
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