Rivers in Literature Dr. T. v1

One day, the Thunder People found trout in their spring. At first, the people were afraid of them, but driven by hunger, the people ate them, except for three children who were warned by their grandmother not to eat them. The next morning, all but those three children had been transformed into deer. The children went to a very high mountain. Rain came and flooded all but the mountaintop.

The children asked an old man what he could do; he said he didn't know, but he dug all night while the children slept. In the morning, he woke the children. The flood was gone, and the world was beautiful. [Roheim, pp. 153-154] Everyone but Gopher was killed in a flood. He climbed to the top of Mt. Kanaktai, and just as the water was about to wash him off, it receded. He had no fire, so he dug into the mountain until he found fire inside, thus bringing fire again to the world. [Roheim, p. 154] Coyote lived with two little boys whom he had got by deceit from one of the Wood-duck sisters. Everybody abused the boys, so Coyote decided to set the world on fire. He dug a tunnel at the east end of the world, filled it with fir bark, and lit it. With his two children in a sack, he called for rescue from the sky. Spider descended and took Coyote back up through the gates of the sky. When they came back, everything was roasted. Coyote drank too much water and got sick. Kusku the medicine man jumped on his belly, and water flowed out and covered the land.

[Roheim, p. 154] Salinan (California): The old woman of the sea, jealous of Eagle's power, came with her basket in which she carried the sea. She continually poured out water until it covered the land, almost to the top of Santa Lucia Peak where the animals gathered. Eagle borrowed Puma's whiskers, made a lariat from them, and lassoed the basket. The sea stopped rising, and the old woman died. Eagle told Dove to fetch up some mud, and he made the world from it. Eagle shaped the first people, a woman and two men, from elder-wood. After sweating in a sweat-house, he blew on them and gave them life. Then they had a great fiesta. [Sproul, p. 236] Yuma (western Arizona, southern California): Komashtam'ho caused a great rain and started to flood out the large dangerous animals, but he was persuaded that people needed some of the animals for food.

He evaporated the waters with a great fire, turning the land to desert in the process. [Erdoes & Ortiz, p. 81] Havasupai (lower Colorado River): Two brothers fueded, and Hokomata angrily sent a deluge which destroyed the world. Before it came, though, Tochopa sealed his daughter Pukeheh in a hollow log. She emerged when the flood subsided. She bore a son, fathered by the sun, and a daughter, fathered by a waterfall; these two repopulated the world.

Havasupai women are called "Daughters of the Water". [Alexander, 1916, p. 180] Ashochimi (California): A great flood covered the earth and drowned every living creature except the coyote. He collected tail-feathers of owls, hawks, eagles, and buzzards and traveled with them all over the earth. Wherever a wigwam had stood before the