Arapaho Myths: The Origin of Culture
A man tried to think how the people might kill buffalo. He was a hard thinker. He would go off for several days and fast.
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
“The Origin of Culture” from Traditions of the Arapaho by George A. Dorsey and Alfred L. Kroeber, 1903.
A man tried to think how the people might kill buffalo. He was a hard thinker. He would go off for several days and fast. He did this repeatedly. At last he dreamed that a voice spoke to him and told him what to do. He went back to the people and made an inclosure of trees set in the ground with willows wound between them. At one side of the inclosure, however, there was only a cliff with rocks at the bottom. Then four untiring runners were sent out to the windward of a herd of buffalo, two of them on each side. They headed the buffalo and drove them toward the inclosure and into it. Then the buffalo were run about inside until a heavy cloud of dust rose and in this, unable to see, they ran over the precipice and were killed.
This man also procured horses for the people. There were many wild horses. The man had an inclosure made which was complete except for an opening. Horses were driven into this just as the buffalo had been, and then the opening was closed. The horses ran around until they were tired; then they were lassoed. At first it took a long time to break them. In the beginning only one horse was caught for each family, but this was not enough and more were caught. After a few years the horses bred, and soon every man had a herd. The dogs now no longer had to drag the meat and baggage, nor did the women have to carry part on their backs.
The people had nothing to cut up meat with. A man took a buffalo shoulder blade and with flint cut out a narrow piece of it.
He sharpened it, and thus had a knife. Then he also made a knife from flint by flaking it into shape. All the people learned how to make knives.
This man also made the first bow and arrows. He made the arrow point of the short rib of a buffalo. Having made a bow and four arrows, he went off alone and waited in the timber at a buffalo path. A buffalo came and he shot: the arrow disappeared into the body and the animal fell dead. Then he killed three more. He went back and told the people: "Harness the dogs; there are four dead buffalo in the timber." So from this time the people were able to get meat without driving the buffalo into an inclosure.
The people used the fire drill. A man went off alone and fasted. He learned that certain stones, when struck, would give a spark and that this spark would light tinder. He gathered stones and filled a small horn with soft, dry wood. Then he went home. His wife said to him: "Please make a fire." He took out his horn and his flint stones, struck a spark, blew it, put grass on, and soon, to the astonishment of all who saw it, had a fire. This was much easier than using the fire drill, and the people soon all did it.
These three men who procured the buffalo inclosure and the horses, the knife and the bow, and fire, were the ones who brought the people to the condition in which they live.—:K.
Dorsey, George A., and Kroeber, A. L. Traditions of the Arapaho, Field Columbian Museum, 1903.
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