Pomo

(map)

Coyote dreamed that water would soon cover the world, but nobody believed him. Next morning, though, it started raining, and the water began rising. There were no mountains at the time, so the people tried to escape to what little elevation they could find, to the tops of hills and trees. Coyote broke a tree to make a large log, and he and a number of other people climbed onto it. The log did not roll, and the people were able to ride on it easily. He assured the people that the water would go down in time.

Coyote tried to make mountains, but he could not. So he hired Mole, who went below the water and made the hills and mountains. As he did so, the water went down. This took several days. Coyote rewarded Mole with a basket full of magnesite beads.

After the water went down, the grass and flowers grew, and the world was new. Coyote thought he should create more people to replace those drowned by the flood. He made a big dance house with a central pole and eight side posts, and he built a fire inside. Then he went outside and shouted four times while facing south. He went inside and slept the night, and in the morning, he got some willow and elder wood, which he split into small sticks. When evening came, he again went outside and shouted to the south. He did this for four days and four evenings, and after his shouting on the last evening, he heard people laughing and talking inside the house. He called these people, whom he had created from sticks, to come out of the house. He divided them into groups and told each group where to go and what their name should be. He warned them to act properly, or perhaps they would fall, or a bear would bite them, or some other ill would befall them.

S. A. Barrett, Pomo Myths, Bulletin of the Public Museum of the City of Milwaukee, vol. 15 (Milwaukee: Cannon Printing Company, 1933), 129-131; Roheim, 1952, 153.

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, 1952, 153-154.

Everyone but Gopher was killed in a flood. He climbed Mt. Kanaktai as the water rose, and just as the water was about to wash him off the top, it began to recede. Gopher had no fire nor any neighbors to borrow it from, so he dug down and down into the mountain until he found fire inside, thus bringing fire again to the world.

S. A. Barrett, Pomo Myths, Bulletin of the Public Museum of the City of Milwaukee, vol. 15 (Milwaukee: Cannon Printing Company, 1933), 135; Roheim, 1952, 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, 1952, 154.