Legendary lore is generally interesting. It reveals the mental qualities of
the people who make and believe it, and also shows how the child mind of
the race acts. For the aboriginal makers of legends are the child minds of
the race in active operation. There are many legends attaching to this
great Canyon. One is told by Major Powell in his "Explorations" as follows:
Legend of the River's Birth. "Long ago, there was a great and wise chief,
who mourned the death of his wife and would not be comforted until
Ta-vwoats, one of the Indian gods, came to him and told him she was in a
happier land, and offered to take him there, that he might see for himself,
if, upon his return, he would cease to mourn. The great chief promised.
Then Ta-vwoats made a trail through the mountains that intervene between
that beautiful land, the balmy region in the great west, and this, the
desert home of the poor Numa.
"This trail was the canyon gorge of the Colorado. Through it he led him;
and, when they had returned, the deity exacted from the chief a promise
that he would tell no one of the joys of that land, lest, through
discontent with the circumstances of this world, they should desire to go
to heaven. Then he rolled a river into the gorge, a broad, raging stream,
that should engulf any that might attempt to enter thereby.
"More than once I have been warned by the Indians not to enter this canyon.
They considered it disobedience to the gods, and contempt for their
authority, and believed it would surely bring upon one their wrath."
Hopi Legend of Tiyo, their Cultus-Hero, and the Canyon. One of the most
interesting legends of the Hopi cultus-hero, Tiyo, relates to the Grand
Canyon of the Colorado River, and is told by Dr. J. Walter Fewkes, the
eminent authority on the ethnology of the Hopis. It is a long story, but
the chief portions of the narrative are as follows:
Origin of Antelope and Snake Clans. "Far down in the lowest depths of the
Grand Canyon of the Colorado River (Pi-sis-bai-ya), at the place where we
used to gather salt, is the Shipapu, or orifice where we emerged from the
underworld. The Zunis, Kohoninos, Paiutes, white men, and all people came
up from 'the below' at that place. Some of our people traveled to the
North, but the cold drove them back, and after many days they returned.
The mothers, carrying their children on their backs, went out to gather
seeds for food, and they plucked the prickly pears and gave it to their
children to still their cries, and these have ever since been called the
Prickly Pear People.
"'Morning Dove' flew overhead, spying out the springs and calling us to
come, and those who followed him, and built their houses at the waters he
found, are still called after him the Hu-wi-nya-muh, or Morning Dove
People. All that region belonged to the Puma, Antelope, Deer and other Horn
people, and To-hi-a (puma) led my people, the Tohi-nyn-muh, to To-ko-na-bi
(Navaho Mountain), and the Sand people and the Horn people also dwelt in
the same region.
"We built many houses at To-ko-na-bi, and lived there many days, but the
springs were small, the clouds were thin, rain came seldom, and our corn
was weak. The Ki-mon-wi (village chief) of the To-hi-nyn-muh had two sons
and two daughters, and his eldest son was known by the name of Tiyo (the
youth). He seemed to be always melancholy and thoughtful, and was wont to
haunt the edge of the cliffs. All day he would sit there, gazing down into
the deep gorge (of the Grand Canyon), and wondering where the ever-flowing
water went, and where it finally found rest. He often discussed this
question with his father, saying, 'It must flow down some great pit, into
the underworld, for after all these years the gorge below never fills up,
and none of the water ever flows back again.' His father would say, 'Maybe
it flows so far away that many old men's lives would be too short to mark
its return.' Tiyo said, 'I am constrained to go and solve this mystery, and
I can rest no more till I make the venture.' His family besought him with
tears to forego his project, but nothing could shake his determination, and
he won them to give their sorrowful consent.
"The father said, 'It is impossible for you to follow the river on foot,
hence you must look for a hollow cottonwood-tree, and I will help you make
a wi-na-ci-buh (timber box) in which you may float upon the water.' Tiyo
found a dry cottonwood-tree, which they felled, and cut off as long as his
body, and it was as large around as they both could encompass with their
outstretched arms. They gouged and burned out all of the inside, leaving
only a thin shell of dry wood like a large drum; small branches and twigs
were fitted in the ends to close them, and the interstices were pitched
with pinion gum. All this work was done with the stone axe and the live
ember.
"The father then announced that in four days Tiyo should set forth, and
during that time the mother and her two daughters prepared kwip-do-si (a
kind of corn meal made from corn which has been dried and then ground. A
thin gruel is made of it) for food, and the father made prayer emblems and
pahos. On the morning of the fifth day the father brought the emblems to
Tiyo and laid them on a white cotton mantle, but before he wrapped them up,
he explained their significance. He also gave him a wand to be used in
guiding his box-boat, after which Tiyo crept into the box, received from
his mother and sisters the food, and then his father closed the end of the
box, gave it a push with his foot, and it floated away, bobbing up and
down.
"In one of its ends there was a small circular aperture, through which he
thrust his wand, and pushed away from the rocks which were encountered. The
spray splashed through the opening, and this he caught in his basin when he
wished to drink or to mix his kwip-do-si, and he was also provided with a
plug to close the hole when he neared the roaring waters. He floated over
smooth waters and swift-rushing torrents, plunged down cataracts, and for
many days spun through wild whirlpools, where black rocks protruded their
heads like angry bears.
"When the box finally stopped Tiyo drew the plug, and looking out saw on
one side a muddy bank, and on the other nothing but water; so he pushed out
the end, and taking his paho mantle in his hand passed to the dry land. He
had gone but a little way when he heard the sound of 'hist! hist!' coming
from the ground, and when this had been repeated four times, he descried a
small round hole near his feet, and this was the house of Spider-Woman.*
'Um-pi-tuh,' said the voice ('you have arrived,'--the ordinary Hopi
greeting). 'My heart is glad; I have long been expecting you; come down
into my house.' 'How can I,' said Tiyo, 'when it will scarce admit the
point of my toe?' She said, 'Try,' and when he laid his foot upon the hole,
it widened out larger than his body, and he passed down into a roomy kiva."
* Spider-Woman is an important figure in Hopi mythology. She it is who
weaves the clouds so that rain may come. Hence in many Hopi ceremonies,
where rain is prayed for, she is especially propitiated.
The legend then goes on to describe how Tiyo is taken and guided by the
Spider-Woman to various places, where he learned all about the ceremonies
that the Hopis now perform at their Snake Dance to produce rain. He met the
Sun and the Great Snake (Go-to-ya), and Mu-i-yin-wuh (a divinity of the
underworld who makes all the germs of life), and each taught him something
he needed to learn. Finally, after many wonderful adventures, he was lifted
out of the underworld as he sat in a ho-a-pah, a kind of wicker pannier,
with two beautiful maidens of the snake kiva, by Spider-Woman, who carried
him over the country and deposited him at his home. He married one of the
maidens and thus founded the Snake Clan, and his brother married the other
and founded the Snake-Antelope Clan. These two clans each year perform the
ceremonies that produce rain in the desert land, where still live the
descendants of Tiyo and his brother.
Wallapai Legend of the Canyon. The Wallapais say that it was one of their
cultus-heroes, Pack-i-tha-a-wi, who made the Grand Canyon. There had been a
big flood, and the earth was covered with water. No one could stir but
Pack-i-tha-a-wi, and he went forth carrying a big knife he had prepared of
flint, and a large, heavy, wooden club. He struck the knife deep into the
water-covered ground and then smote it deeper and deeper with his club. He
moved it back and forth as he struck it further into the earth, until the
canyon was formed through which all the water rushed out into the Sea of
the Sunset. Then, as the sun shone, the ground became hard and solid, as we
find it to-day.
The Havasupai Legend of the Canyon. The Havasupais also have a legend
connected with the making of the Grand Canyon, and the reader will observe
with interest the points of the story that are similar to points in the
Hopi story just given. This story was told to me by O-dig-i-ni-ni-na, one
of the old men story-tellers of the Havasupais.
"The two gods of the universe are Tochopa and Hokomata. Tochopa he heap
good. Hokomata he heap bad--hanatopogi--all same white man's devil. Him
Hokomata make big row with Tochopa, and he say he drown the world.
"Tochopa was full of sadness at the news. He had one daughter whom he
devotedly loved, and from her he had hoped would descend the whole human
race for whom the world had been made. If Hokomata persisted in his wicked
determination, she must be saved at all hazard. So, working day and night,
he speedily prepared the trunk of a pinion tree by hollowing it out from
one end. In this hollow tree he placed food and other necessaries, and also
made a lookout window. Then he brought his daughter, and telling her she
must go into this tree and there be sealed up, he took a sad farewell of
her, closed up the end of the tree, and then sat down to await the
destruction of the world. It was not long before the floods began to
descend. Not rain, but cataracts, rivers, deluges came, making more noise
than a thousand Hackataias (Colorado Rivers) and covering all the earth
with water. The pinion log floated, and in safety lay Pu-keh-eh, while the
waters surged higher and higher, and covered the tops of Hue-han-a-patch-a
(the San Francisco range), Hue-ga-woo-la (Williams Mountain), and all the
other mountains of the world.
"But the waters of heaven could not always be pouring down, and soon after
they had ceased, the flood upon the earth found a way to rush to the sea.
And as it dashed down, it cut through the rocks of the plateaus, and made
the deep Chic-a-mi-mi (canyon) of the Colorado River Hackataia. Soon all
the water was gone.
"Then Pukeheh found the log no longer floating, and she peeped out of the
window Tochopa had placed in her boat, and, though it was misty and almost
dark she could see in the dim distance the great mountains of the San
Francisco range. And near by was the Canyon of the Little Colorado, and to
the west and north was Hackataia, and to the west was the Canyon of the
Havasu.
"The flood had lasted so long that she was grown to be a woman, and, seeing
the water gone, she came out and began to make pottery and baskets, as her
father had long ago taught her. But she was a woman. And what is a woman
without a child in her arms or nursing at her breasts? How she longed to be
a mother! But where was a father for her child? Alas! there was not a man
in the whole universe?
"Day after day, longing for maternity filled her heart, until one morning--
glorious morning for Pukeheh and the Havasu race--the darkness began to
disappear, and in the far-away east soft and new brightness appeared. It
was the triumphant Sun, coming to conquer the long night and bring light
into the world. Nearer and nearer he came, and, at last, as he peeped over
the far-away mesa summits, Pukeheh arose and thanked Tochopa, for here, at
last, was a father for her child. She conceived, and in the fullness of
time bore a son, whom she delighted in and called In-ya-a, the son of the
Sun.
"But as the days rolled on, she again felt the longings for maternity. By
this time she had wandered far to the west and had entered the beautiful
Canyon of the Havasu, where deep down between the rocks were several grand
and glorious waterfalls, and one of these, Wa-ha-hath-peek-ha-ha, she
determined should be the father of her second child.
"When it was born it was a girl, and to this day all the girls of the
Havasu are proud to be called 'Daughters of the water.'
"When these two children grew up they married, and thus became the
progenitors of the human race. First the Havasupais were born, then the
Apaches, then the Wallapais, then the Hopis, then the Paiutes, then the
Navahos.
"And Tochopa told them all where they should live, and you find them there
to this day."