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First Nations and Native American stories that could be about Cascadia megathrust earthquakes
compiled by Ruth Ludwin, University of Washington, Dept. of Earth and Space Sciences 		PNSN Logo
Yurok Material
From: A.L. Kroeber, 1976, Yurok Myths

B 5. EARTHQUAKE AND THUNDER P. 174, Told by Tskerkr of Espeu

B1. THE DANCE AT ESPEU P. 163, Told by Tskerkr of Espeu

    There were four woge at Espeu. Then the oldest was ashamed because they did not make the Jumping Dance. So he began to try to make it. He went back on the hill to make a boat, at Sepola-usahs. When he finished his boat, he took it down to the salt water. Then he started to go across the ocean with his brothers. He arrived at the other side of the ocean at the end of the sky. There he stopped. The sky was coming down and hitting the water and rising again. There were four of them in the boat. Then when they saw the sky rise, they began to paddle. Then the one at the stern was almost caught as the sky descended, and a piece of the end of the boat was cut off.

    Then they came to land. Where the beach was sandy they landed. Then very many red-crested woodpeckers came to the boat and covered it, and they cut off their heads, and kept only the heads. Now the boat was full of woodpecker heads.

    Then they returned. They went through as they had come. They waited while the sky was falling. When it rose they passed through. Then it was just daylight, when they landed at Espeu. Then they broke up the boat, for they did not want to use it anymore. They thought that they would have used it only across the ocean.

    Then they made their woodpecker crest headbands. They had seven to begin the Jumping Dance with. Then they found that it was not well to begin to make the dance at Espeu. They tried it there, but it was not well. So when they danced they brought their things to Orekw to dance with.

B8. A FLOOD P. 186, Told by Tskerkr of Espeu
    There used to be a settlement at Siwitsu just north of Orekw. Then it happened that there almost came to be no people (left in the world) on account of (what happened at) this settlement. For an old man and his brother went into the sweathouse to sleep. But a man was outside, and when they slept, he went in and tied their hair together. Then he went out and shouted. "They have come! Somebody will be killed! They are going to fight!"

    Then the ocean began to turn rough (from the anger of the old men). A breaker came over the settlement (of Siwitsu), washed the whole of it away, and drowned everyone. Then all the people of Orekw ran off to the top of the hill, wearing their woodpecker-crest headbands: they were afraid.

    Then he at Orekw who knew the formula for the sacred sweathouse there ran to Oketo, for now the water was already all around Orekw. He looked into the sweathouse at Oketo. There was the one who knew that formula. He spoke to him, but that one did not answer. Four times he spoke to him. Then he said, "Were they drowned?" "Yes, I saw them drown," said he of Orekw, "but I am afraid the water will cover the whole land."

    And now the breakers were already dashing against on side of that sweathouse (at Oketo). Then that one began to speak his formula in that sweathouse. He had to do it hastily; therefore he used old boards to make the fire. Then the ocean went down.

From: Spott, Robert, and A.L. Kroeber, 1942, Yurok Narratives, University of California Publication in American Archaeology and Ethnology, Vol. 35, No. 9 pp. 143-256. III. Myths of Woge Times

[p.224, 24. THE INLAND WHALE]

    [RSL Synthesis: After the water which covered the world went down, a whale was trapped in Fish Lake on the mountain above Beitchpec and Bluff Creek. A girl from a wealthy family at Ko'tep became pregnant by a poor young man. When her family found out, they rejected the young man, and he went off and was lost. The girl was put out of her house and went to live with her lover's mother. She bore a boy child who grew up. She took her son to a Deerskin Dance upriver, and they were seated in the front row by persons who did not know of her disgrace. She felt bad, and started for home with her boy. She took a secluded trail home, because she was ashamed to meet people. She and her son camped out that night. In the morning they went on, and came to Fish Lake. She began to walk around it, but her son crossed on what looked like a great tree fallen across the lake. "So she followed him and they crossed on the log. When they were over they saw it shake and tremble." The reached home late that night.

    The only one of her people who spoke to her or the boy was her father's father. The boy say this old man carving a trunk, and watched him. The boy whittled a little one for himself, and hunted birds to fill his box with feathers. Then he made more trunks and filled them with skins from fur animals and woodpeckers. He grew rich with enough treasure to give both a Jumping Dance and A Deerskin Dance.

    The whale had appeared to him in a dream, and said that she was a bastard too, and therefore took pity on him and gave him wealth. When he grew to a man, the boy became rich and went back to live in his ancestral house. His mother died, and was buried.]

[p. 227-232, 25. BRAVE FROM THE THUNDERS]
    [RSL Synthesis: A young man obtains spirit power at a seastack about a mile north of Otsegep. He jumps from a boat to the rock. When he does up from the water rattlesnakes are hanging from his body. He instructs his companions to return home. They wait five days, and offer a woodpecker headband for the return of his body. After nine days he returns. He tells a story of diving and passing through a hole into another land. There were twelve houses in a row, with the largest one was in the middle. A man comes from the sweat house and tells him that he is expected and should go to the large house, where the grandfather and grandmother are. The house door is guarded by "water panthers" who make a noise "as when breakers hit a rock in a heavy wind". The "water panthers" growl until an old man comes to welcome him. He sits with the old man and and old woman. One by one the sons come in:

      As we sat there I heard something, the house shook, and the youngest brother came in. "Careful. We have a visitor," the old man said to him. He unstrapped his carrying case, hung it up, and greeted me as the two old people had done.

      When the second one came in, the house shook more. So it went on. I counted them, straightening out my finger, because the old man had said that there were twelve sons. When the ninth one came I could hardly keep on my stool, but he, too, greeted me. The eleventh was still stronger. I was almost shaken off the stool, but the old man said the same to him and he too greeted me.

      Then the youngest one said to me, "Hang onto your seat, for our oldest brother is rough when he comes in." Then it was if a great wind blew. The house planks rattles as in an earthquake, and I was shaken. But the others did not move; only the old man shouted, "Careful! the one we were talking about is here."

    The sons describe what they have been doing. The young man takes out his pipe and smokes with them. They tell him you much they appreciate the smoke that people send them. Then the old man stands up and introduces himself and his family:

      We are the ones they call Thunders, All these are my boys, I have no daughter.

    They escort the young man outside, to send him home to his people. As the oldest brother comes out of the house,

      ".... all the earth shook, and I with it, but not his brothers"

    The Thunderbird brothers give the young man strength to fight with a tyrant who took boats or food form those who passed by, enslaved them, or pulled their arms out if they resisted.

    The young man is able to defeat the tyrant.

From: Austen D. Warburton and Joseph F Endert, 1966, INDIAN LORE OF THE NORTH CALIFORNIA COAST Story told by Bluff Creek Tom, a packer for the Brizard Company, as described in the column written by Andrew Guinzoli for the Times Standard in 1966.

THE BIRTH AND GROWTH OF HUMBOLDT BAY

    A long time ago there was a small grassy pool located where Humboldt Bay now lies. In this pool there were many frogs, so many that there was not food enough for all of them. They became very hungry and talked loud and long at night, calling to their friends, the Indians, for help. In those days there was a great friendship between the two peoples.

    There was an old man commonly known as May-wee-Mur. May-wee-Mur went to see what was troubling the frogs after hearing them talk so much at night. The frogs told him that they wanted a bigger pool where there would be more food. May-wee-Mur told them that he would try to find such a pool, and in return the frogs said they would help him. They told him that a deer had passed that way going to the ocean to lick salt off the rocks. The old man had his bow and quiver full of arrows with him, and headed for the ocean.

    When the old man came near the ocean he saw the deer licking the rocks, and the old man was able to kill it with his first arrow. While May-wee-Mur was dressing the deer, Kah-ha-mis, the water spirit, came close to shore in the breakers near where the old man was. Kah-ha-mis said: "I am very hungry. The sea has been so rough I have not been able to get any food. If you will give me the deer I will do much for you in your lifetime."

    The old man was sorry for Kah-ha-mis as he, too, knew what hunger was in his younger life, and he gave the deer to the Water Spirit

    In those days the Indians used to hunt sea lions for food on the rocks toward Trinidad, and when one would be killed the carcass of the animal would be towed in the water behind the Indians seagoing canoe to the place where the entrance to Humboldt Bay is now. The carcass was there dragged across the land to where the place where the Indian village was located. This required a great deal of effort and consumed a great deal of time. When Kah-ha-mis saw how hard the Indians had to work to get their food, he was sorry for them. He also wanted too show his appreciation to May-wee-Mur, and decided to help the Indians.

    Kah-ha-mis went to the little pond and thrashed around with his great strong body many times, until it grew to its present size. He then had to connect it with the ocean. To do this he had to thrash his way back and forth between the bay and the ocean many times before he had a channel wide and deep enough for ocean going canoes to travel freely. A great earthquake occurred and a tidal wave came which further widened the entrance to the bay now known as Humboldt. Ever since the Indians had no trouble in bringing the sea lions and their canoes right up to their village. Thus, for the old mans kindness to Kah-ha-mis he was repaid many times. "It is always that way," say the Indian grandmothers.

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