Creation Myths of Primitive America: In relation to the Religious History and Mental Development of MankindCurtin, Jeremiah
Religion
Creation Myths of Primitive America: In relation to the Religious History and Mental Development of Mankind
Curtin, Jeremiah
Creation -- Mythology; Indian mythology -- North America; Indians of North America -- Folklore
There is danger, however, in drawing out a very powerful dokos by
sucking, for when it is coming out of the sick man's body it may be
sent down through the mouth of the doctor into his body by the spirit
who owns it, and the doctor is killed in this way.
A doctor may have twenty or thirty spirits, but he rarely calls on
more than two or three, and it is seldom that any great number are
fitted to work together in a given case.
The office of doctor is very dangerous, especially if the doctor is
powerful. If he has many spirits to help him, each has to be pleased
in its own special way; each has its own food, prefers certain kinds,
and dislikes others. The doctor must not eat food hateful to his
spirits: if he does, he is liable to be killed. A man who has twenty
or thirty spirits is greatly limited, therefore, in his manner of
living.
Some spirits do not like venison, others do not eat fish; the doctor
who commands these spirits must eat neither venison nor fish, and so
with other kinds of food in the case of other spirits.
The man who seeks to be a doctor cannot choose his spirits; they come
to him; he cannot refuse to receive them, and must live in a way to
please them.
Every dokos can be extracted from a sick man's body by the aid of a
spirit stronger than the one who put it in.
Among other spirits, doctors have the spirit of the sun, the spirits
of stars and the clouds to help them. These are good spirits. Sedit's
spirit cannot help doctors much. They call it sometimes, but it
doesn't do much; it has not the power. Suku (dog) is very powerful and
bad. If Suku wants to kill a man, he does it quickly. A doctor who has
the Suku spirit in his service is great. If a man has been made sick
by Suku, he will vomit blood, or bleed from his nostrils all the time.
The Suku spirit is a good one to send to kill people. Chir (the sucker
fish) is an evil spirit too. When Chir wants to kill a man, it makes
him giddy and crazy right away. He becomes senseless and dies, unless
some doctor cures him, and generally doctors can do nothing against
Chir. The Chir sickness is the worst that spirits bring. It is called
chiruntowi, sickness from the sucker. The man who has it dies; he
cannot tell where he is troubled; he grows dizzy and senseless. No one
can cure him unless by great luck. Something tried by some doctor may
save him--just by chance, just because it happens so. Kele is also an
evil spirit. He has a song, the same which his two daughters sang on
the mountain top (see the tale "Kele and Sedit"), and which Sedit
heard far away in the west. This is a poison song, and draws people
after it. Kele is here now, suppose, in Cottonwood or in Tehama, and
sees a man up at Yreka. Kele sings, and the song goes as straight as a
string to the man. It draws him and draws him; he is drawn as water is
when people pump it. The man must follow the song; he has got to do
so, he cannot help himself, he is sick; his sickness is called
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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