Yurok

(map)

The sky fell and hit the water, causing high breakers that flooded all the land. That is why one can find shells and redwood logs on the highest ridges. Two women and two men jumped into a boat when they saw the water coming, and they were the only people saved. Sky-Owner gave them a song, and many days later the water fell when they sang it. Sky-Owner sent a rainbow to tell them the water would never cover the world again.

Bell, Rosemary, Yurok Tales (Etna, California, Bell Books, 1992), 68.

Pulekukwerek and Wohpekumeu are trickster-heroes who figure in many Yurok tales, though they have just bit parts in this one.

An old man living near Okego [Tuley Creek], drew sinews for making a bow, putting them in a basket as he finished them. Once he noticed the basket moving. When he looked inside, he saw something very small lying there. "You will become a person," he said, and he made the basket stronger. Every day the boy grew larger. Before long he was a tall young man.

Pulekukwerek, Wohpekumeu, Kewomer, Eagle, and others were at Kenek, downstream. They played and gambled every day. The old man told the boy to stay away from them. The boy went along the edge of the river and practiced racing against flying ducks. When he could outpace them, he shot arrows and ran against them. When he outraced an arrow, he thought, "Now I think I can do something."

Coyote became angry with the sun because two of his children froze to death one day when the sun went away behind clouds. He prepared some sharp stones and went east, to where the sun lived. He went into the sweathouse. In the evening, ten others came in, including the sun. He began telling all the news. One of them said, "I hear two children froze to death. Is that true?" Sun said, "Yes, that is what I saw." When they laughed a little at that, Coyote struck Sun twice and fled. Mouse had earlier told him to take the poorer path, but without realizing it, Coyote took the well-traveled one. When he realized he had fled into the sky, he looked down and thought, "It is not too far." He spat, and seeing that his spit did not go far, he jumped. He went right through the cloud that he had spat on and continued falling. His bones scattered all about when he hit.

In Kenek, they wondered why day did not come. Wohpekumeu, walking downstream, noticed something white and saw that it was the Sun who had been killed. But none of the people there were strong enough to lift him and put him back. A hundred together could not even lift his foot. Though they did not know if he could help, they sent a messenger to Okego for Rumitsek-onohsun (Grown-in-a-Basket). He came. Without saying anything or looking at anyone, he shifted Sun with his left hand, put his right hand under him, and threw him up so that he stuck against the sky. Turning around, Grown-in-a-Basket left without looking at anyone. He did not see that many of them, shamed at being so far surpassed, turned into rocks, shrubs, and other things.

Now those who had been at Kenek went off to another place, for they were ashamed of the Okego young man. One day, Grown-in-a-Basket went to Kenek to see them. He found only Spider, who told him that they had left to avoid him. Grown-at-Okego still wanted to see them, so Spider led him to a hill on the prairie, attached his string to an arrow, and told him to shoot it. He did, and the arrow stuck in the sky. Spider climbed up and let down a ladder, which the young man climbed. "The best of men are here," Spider told him.

He went to where they were. "Let him play shinny," one of them said. "I cannot play," he said. "Well, try it nevertheless." Then he struck the ball to the very end of the sky and won the game. When he had beaten them, some of them, from shame, turned into things. When he saw that nearly all of them had changed, Spider said, "Let us go back." "Yes, let us go back," he said.

When he came back to Okego, a few people were left at Kenek, and those wanted to leave. Wohpeltun said, "Go ahead, I shall be the last one to leave." But he stayed because he wanted to kill Grown-at-Okego. Shortly after leaving, Pulekukwerek wondered what Wohpeltun meant to do and headed back to confront him. But the river had already risen, and he could not continue.

When Grown-at-Okego saw the river rising, he knew it was meant for him. So he tied his house onto a large box and his sweathouse onto the box's cover. He entered the house, and the old man entered the sweathouse. The water rose. They heard the roof of the house striking against the sky. Water was everywhere. Mountains and hills were made when the water ran off. The house came down in the same place where it stood before. It is the rock pile at Okego now.

A. L. Kroeber, Yurok Myths (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976), 89-94.