Ten'a texts and tales from Anvik, Alaska / by John W. Chapman, with vocabulary by Pliny Earle Goddard.

  • Chapman, John W. (John Wight), 1858-1939.
Date:
1914
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Ten'a texts and tales from Anvik, Alaska / by John W. Chapman, with vocabulary by Pliny Earle Goddard. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    his resting upon the seventh day, as the Christians do. The first of the creatures that he made was a porcupine, the next a white bear, the third was a man, and the fourth a brown bear. After that, he made all other things, and then went up to heaven, and there he remains -, and there is no heaven higher than the one where he is. But there was on the earth another man, the Raven, who remained, and changed many things; so that what was originally intended to be good became perverted. He made wooden imagoes, and filing^ them in different directions, and told them to come to life and do whatever they pleased. Originally men did not die in the same way as they do now, but passed into the spirit state and back again. The Raven changed that by making a trail for the dead people to take, and since then they do not return. When the spirit enters upon this path, it has to camp for four nights before it reaches its destination. At the end of each day, it finds a camp-fire burning. This fire burns perpetually. The path leads to some place near the sources of the Yukon River. There is a story of a young man who went up the river as far as he could go, but was warned by the people there that he should go back ; for they told him that if he kept on, he would come to a portage that the souls of the dead took, and that if he were to enter on that portage and hear any sounds, he would never be able to return. So he was afraid to continue, and went back. There is also another story of a young woman who was snatched up, and found herself among the dead; but she made her escape and returned to her own people. While she was among the dead, she w^as sustained by the oft'erings of her friends, who supposed her to be dead; and it is from that time that the feast for the dead began. At this feast, clothing and food are formally given to some one wdio represents