Kiwa'kwe

Q: Do you recognize the (Penobscot?) word Kiwa’kwe, documented by Frank G. Speck? It was the name of a game children played about a man-eating ogre, and, I understand, the ogre's name.

A: Yes, this is a man-eating ice giant of Wabanaki folklore. It is spelled many different ways such as Giwakwa, Kee-wakw, Kiwahq, etc. The reason for all the spelling variations is that the Wabanaki languages were traditionally unwritten. At the time Frank Speck wrote his book, there wasn't any standardized Penobscot alphabet. In the modern Abenaki-Penobscot spelling system, the word is spelled Giwakwa. Here's our online information about this legend: Giwakwa

Our Abenaki and Maliseet volunteers have also heard this was the name of a children's game, but it's not one they ever used to play so we couldn't tell you how it goes!

Inuit Giants

Q: I read that according to Inuit legends, the first people of Nunavut, who lived there before the Inuit, were giants. Do you know whether there is any truth to this legend-- could prehistoric people like the Dorset culture have been giants, and could this be related to Northwest legends of Sasquatch?

A: Well, archaeology is a bit outside our wheelhouse, so I couldn't tell you with any authority how tall the Dorset people were in real life. However, one thing you should keep in mind is that back then, Inuit men were 5'2"-5'4" in height and Inuit women were almost all shorter than five feet. So "giant" may have been a relative term! Ordinary Plains Indian men would probably have looked like giants to the Inuit ancestors.

With that said, the Tuniit (giants) had many other supernatural qualities in Inuit legends. In some stories they could carry a walrus (which weighs more than a ton) or shapeshift into polar bears. So those would definitely not have been things the real-life Dorset people could have done no matter how tall they were! Either the Tuniit were not the Dorset people at all and were indeed mythological wilderness beings like Sasquatch, or else these legends were historical stories about the Dorset civilization which became changed and embellished over time to include supernatural elements.

Hope that is interesting to you, have a good day!

Further reading:

Inuit people
Sasquatch

Gitche Gumee

Q: I would like to know whether Gitche Gumee is a true Ojibwa name and if the popularly accepted translation is accurate.

A:  Thank you for writing. Yes, that is the Ojibwe name for Lake Superior. In the modern Ojibwe spelling system it is spelled Gichigami (pronounced gih-chih-guh-mih) and it literally means "big lake."

Hope that is what you were looking for. Have a good day!

Further reading:
Ojibwe language
Native American names in Longfellow's Hiawatha
Native American lakes   

Heng, God of Typos

Q: I found a reference to an Iroquois Storm God named Heng. Can you please tell me which Iroquois tribe this god came from because I cannot find anything else about him anywhere.

A: We're pretty sure this is a typographical error. The thunder god is named Hinon in Iroquois mythology (pronounced similar to hee-noan or hee-noon, with a half-pronounced "n" sound as in French.) This name is spelled many different ways, partially because of dialect differences and partially because all the Iroquois languages were traditionally unwritten: Hino, Hinu, Hinun, Heno, etc. In some orthographies, particularly those used by linguists, the character "ǫ" is used for the nasal vowel at the end. Most likely, somebody at some point misread "Henǫ" as "Heng," or even just mistakenly printed a "g" instead of an "o" (this kind of error happens all the time in OCR texts converted from old anthopology books.) It's definitely not pronounced Heng in any of the Iroquoian languages.

Tribes whose traditional mythology included Hinon, in any of his spelling variants, include the Mohawk, Wyandot/Huron, Seneca, Cayuga, and Tuscarora.

Hope that helps, have a good day!
Native Languages of the Americas


Further reading:
Hinon
The Iroquois tribes
Native American gods

The Dog-Face Star

Q: I read a story online about the star Sirius being called the Dog-Face Star in Blackfoot. Of course this is really interesting because Sirius also means Dog Star in Latin. In the story I read, Dog-Face was a peasant boy and he taught the Blackfeet the Sun Dance and then became a star. Have you heard about this story? What is the name Dog-Face in Blackfoot language?

A: The information you found is not entirely accurate. The name in question is Payoowa (often anglicized "Poia,") an important Blackfoot mythological figure who was fathered by the Morning Star (Venus.) However, this name actually means scar-face, not dog-face. Also, we've always heard that his astronomical reference is Jupiter, not Sirius. A lot of star lore has been diluted or lost over time, so it's not impossible that Poia was actually Sirius, but since the legend always connects the wanderers Poia and Morning Star, it would be strange for Poia to be a fixed star like Sirius (most ancient cultures were well aware that the planets Venus, Jupiter, and Mars moved around the sky differently than other stars.)

"Sirius" doesn't literally mean "Dog Star," by the way... it means "searing" in Ancient Greek. The Romans called the star Canicula, "little dog" or "she-dog," and associated it with the dog of the hero Orion, whose constellation is nearby.

Q: Thank you very much for your time on this. What about the Pawnee name for Sirius? Wikipedia says it is the Wolf Star.

A: Very close... the Pawnee name for Sirius is Ckiriti'uuhac, pronounced tskee-ree-tee-oo-hots, which means "fools Wolf." This comes from folklore in which Wolf foolishly mistook Sirius for the Morning Star.

Hope that helps, have a good day!
Native Languages of the Americas



Further reading:
Poia
The Blackfoot tribe
Native American star myths
 

The Jersey Devil

Q: Hopefully you can help me in my quest.  Here in New Jersey, we have a legend about the "Jersey Devil" born of a witch. But years ago, I talked to an historian about the folk lore, and he said that a native tribe who lived by the Jersey shore, had a legend about flying sea dragons that were around for hundreds of years.  And this fits the description of
the Jersey devil.  This person told me that there were colonies of these creatures that also lived in the caves.  I thought that if this was true, you would definitely know for sure.

A: Thanks for writing. I've never heard of the Jersey Devil having any basis in Native American myth... it's a folk tradition of English settlers, with an origin story in the 1700's (being born to a settler woman at that time.) But there certainly were plenty of monsters and other creatures in the folklore of local Native American tribes as well. I'm not sure underwater monsters are a good match for the Jersey Devil, which was a winged devil-like creature that lived in the pine forest. But here's our page on Lenape mythology-- maybe you can find something of interest there. (The historian you were talking to was probably thinking of underwater panthers, a race of dragonlike big cats that lurk in lakes and drag people to a watery grave.)

Hope that helps, have a good day!
Native Languages of the Americas


Further reading:
Native American legends
New Jersey Native Americans
Lenape language