Coyote VS Wishpoosh

                                          Art by: PureMissa
                                          http://puremissa.deviantart.com/art/Moster-Beaver-vs-Coyote-170828129

Coyote and Wishpoosh

See this and other trickster tales and American folklore at:

http://americanfolklore.net/folklore/2010/08/coyote_and_wishpoosh.html

 

Coyote and Wishpoosh

from the Chinook tribe 
retold by
S.E. Schlosser 

Now Wishpoosh the monster beaver lived in the beautiful Lake Cle-el-lum which was full of fish. Every day, the animal people would come to the lake, wanting to catch some fish, but Wishpoosh the giant beaver drove them away with many threats and great splashing. If they refused to leave, Wishpoosh would kill the animal people by dragging them deep into the lake so that they drowned.

Coyote was very upset at Wishpoosh for the way he treated the animal people. Coyote decided that he would kill the monster beaver and so he went to Lake Cle-el-lum with his spear tied to his wrist and started to fish. As soon as Wishpoosh saw this upstart person invading his territory, the giant beaver attacked. Coyote threw the spear and it pierced the beaver. Immediately, Wishpoosh dove to the bottom of the lake, dragging Coyote with him.

Well, Coyote and Wishpoosh wrestled and tugged and fought each other at the bottom of the lake until the sides gave way and all the water rushed out, pouring out over the mountains and through the canyons until it collected in Kittitas Valley and formed another, larger lake. Coyote and Wishpoosh burst forth into the new lake, shouting and wrestling and fighting each other with renewed vigor until the second lake gave way and the water rushed out, joining in with the waters of several rivers to form a massive lake at Toppenish.

Wishpoosh the monster beaver would not give up the fight. He bit and clawed at Coyote and tried to drown him in the massive lake. Coyote fought back fiercely, and at last the massive lake gave way, the water roared down into the meeting place of the Columbia, the Yakima, and the Snake, where it dammed up into a lake so huge none has ever seen its like before or since.

Coyote and Wishpoosh dragged at each other, pulling and tugging and ripping and biting until the dam gave way and a huge wave of water swept down the Columbia River towards the sea. Coyote and Wishpoosh were tumbled over and over again as they were swept down river in the mighty wave of water. Coyote grabbed bushes and rocks and trees, trying to pull himself out of the massive wave. By these efforts was the Columbia Gorge was formed. But Coyote could not pull himself out of the great wave and so he tumbled after Wishpoosh, all the way to the bitter waters at the mouth of the river.

Wishpoosh was furious. He was determined to beat this upstart Coyote who had driven him from his beautiful lake. The giant beaver swept all the salmon before him and ate them in one gulp to increase his strength. Then he swam out to sea with Coyote in pursuit. The monster beaver threw his great arms around a whale and swallowed it whole.

Coyote was frightened by this demonstration of the monster beaver's strength. But he was the most cunning of all the animals, and he came up with a plan. Turning himself into a tree branch, Coyote drifted among the fish until Wishpoosh swallowed him. Returning to his natural form, Coyote took a knife and cut the sinews inside the giant beaver. Wishpoosh gave a great cry and then perished.

Coyote was tired after his long fight with the monster beaver. He called to his friend Muskrat, who helped drag the body of Wishpoosh to shore. Coyote and Muskrat cut up the giant beaver and threw the pieces up over the land, thus creating the tribes of men. The Nez Perce were created from the head of the giant beaver, to make them great in council. The Cayuses were created from the massive arms of Wishpoosh, in order that they might be strong and powerful with the war club and the bow. From the beaver's ribs, Coyote made the Yakimas and from the belly the Chinooks. To make the Klickitats, Coyote used the beaver's legs, so that they would become famous for their skill in running. With the leftover skin and blood, he made the Snake River Indians who thrived on war and blood.

Thus were the tribes created, and Coyote returned up the mighty Columbia River to rest from his efforts. But in his weariness, Coyote did not notice that the coastal tribes had been created without mouths. The god Ecahni happened along just then and fixed the problem by assembling all of the coastal tribes and cutting mouths for them. Some he made too large and some he made crooked, just as a joke. This is why the mouths of the coastal tribes are not quite perfect.

Adventure Fail

So, with a lack of anything useful on Trickster Tales on the internet, I decided to hit the streets and choke some information out of the locals. I wanted something tangible to document. I searched on Wikipedia, a very reliable source, for Native American landmarks in Pennsylvania. Two landmarks showed up, an old Indian school in Carlisle called the Carlisle Industrial School for Indians, and Meadowcraft Rock shelter an archeological site. These locations were too far from my driving radius. However, I did remember a store in Skippack, that was a Native American shop and maybe I could talk to someone helpful or find some trinkets to write about that would relate to my blog on trickster tales.

I jumped into my car, which reeked like Wawa hoagie, and sped over to Dream Catcher a shop located in Skippack Village that specializes in Native American paraphernalia. I got there and the door was locked. Their website said they opened at 10 am it was 12pm. As I was about to pull off in my car another car showed up. It was the shopkeeper, and I told her I was here to take some pictures for a class project. She opened the door and didn’t seem interested the least in my plight as she went to her computer and telephone. There was a plaque on the wall about her taking over the shop from the original owner. The article described her as a spiritualist. I figured then she couldn’t offer me any real insight. I saw some Sioux wedding vases, the Sioux at least had something to do with the trickster tale Ikto Conquers Iya, and so I snapped a few pictures. I saw some coyote statues, and the coyote was a recurring character in the Trickster Tales, so I photographed that too. Feeling Bad, I purchased a coyote magnet to remind me of this epic fail, a trickster Tale in itself. . Not much else to see, and considering the shopkeeper was on the phone, I decided to leave.

Across the way was another Native American store called, Southwest Trading Post. I entered the store and saw some books. The man asked me what I was looking for and I told him, “Anything about Trickster Tales or the Sioux.” He said something along the lines of, “They weren’t interested in fake stories.” Take that anyway you want, but according to my text the tale Ikto conquers Iya, the World Eater it was a Sioux tale. I didn’t want to be a bother, and just looked about the store, he seemed to busy himself, on the phone about moccasin orders. There was nothing really of interest to photograph. Maybe I just caught these people at the wrong time. Those moccasins in South West Trader did look pretty comfy though

Pennsylvania was inhabited by Native Americans a long time ago, but the colonist ran them out eventually, and the lack of any historical sites or Native culture is a testament of that. My venture to get some info or good photographs was a bust, but at least I tried. .  I guess I would have gotten better information on Native Americans by talking to a twenty something Caucasian girl, at a night club, who claims she’s half Native American, in order to make herself appear more exotic.

DreamCatcher, Skippack Village, Pa

Wedding Vase, A Sioux custom

The Coyote is a  reoccuring character in the Native American Trickster Tales

SouthWest Trading Post, Skippack Village, Pa

I bought this Coyote magnet for 2.50

Now, I have this magnet to remind me of my failed adventure everytime I open my freezer for some ice cream

Passage from, Ikto Conquers Iya, the Eater

"Now, if Iya had not been destroyed in just that, he would undoubtedly still be eating people up, White people and all. Iya was killed and that is why the entire country is now so full of people that it is impossible to find any open space anymore."

Analysis of the Passage

     The trickster tale Ikto Conquers Iya, the Eater ,is a Native American story. At first read the tale gives a silly impression with supernatural beings and light comedy, but upon further analysis there are deeper messages within the text. The tale can be interpreted as having multiple messages of overpopulation, excessive human expansion and war. We find this message expressed in the following passage from Ikto Conquers Iya, the Eater:

Now, if Iya had not been destroyed in just that, he would undoubtedly still be eating people up, White people and all. Iya was killed and that is why the entire country is now so full of people that it is impossible to find any open space anymore (Norton 86).

            First, there’s a message of overpopulation as the tale discusses why there are so many people in the country. It’s hard to understand why Native American’s would be concerned about overpopulation, but because Europeans were expanding into their land this may have given them some concern. Native Americans underestimated the population size of Europe, and when Native Americans came back from Europe to report to their tribes, they must have thought how crowded the world was. When Pocahontas, an Indian chieftain’s daughter, went to England one of her chaperones, Tomocom, was given the task to count the English population by cutting notches on a stick.

To count the population of England on a stick shows the misconception Native Americans had of the size European populous.

                        Also, the tale tells of War. The world eater, Iya, is conquered by a tribe of Indians sneaking up on him and charging him. Iya represents the outside forces that are the European settlers. In the tale Ikto asks the tribes to come together to expel Iya. This plea for unification relates to the idea Indians had, that if all the Indian tribes came together they could overrun the intrusive European colonies with force. This representations of Europeans as world eaters, relates to the colonist use of warfare and their taking of Indian land.  In the passage Iya is defeated, and then a massive amount of Indians come running from Iya’s mouth, this event represents that if the Indians defeated the Europeans that they would flourish in number. There’s also a reference to the world eater would eventually eat up the white people as well. This prediction foretells that if the Indians were conquered by the world eater (white people) that  the whiter race would turn on themselves. That part of the passage gives the tale a prophetic tone. The Revolutionary War and the American Civil War are two examples of the Indians being defeated and White people turning on themselves through warfare.

At first glance this trickster tale seems very cartoonish and no driven plot by Western standards. The trickster tale, Ikto Conquers Iya, the Eater, is full of allusions about Indian and European relations, and deserves close analysis in order to see through its light humor. The tale itself is actually prophetic in that it warns of overpopulation, rapid human expansion, and wars as a result of human expansion. The tale can actually be considered a prophecy.

    Works Cited

Baym, Nina. "Sioux." The Norton Anthology of American Literature. New York: W.W. Norton, 2007. 86. Print.

"Tomocomo, Visited London 1616." Official Jamestown Settlement & Yorktown Victory Center Visitor's Site. Web. 28 Sept. 2011. <http://www.historyisfun.org/chronicles/tomocomo_more.html>.