The Forked Man is a good spirit described as "clever and powerful." He has two bodies [1], one of which is red [2], mounted on one pair of legs, so that he has two heads and four arms. His lodge is found inside a very large hill. [3] The Forked Man is the older brother of the chief of the white cranes, and his grandfather was an Owl Spirit. The Forked Man is the enemy of the creatures of the earth like mice and snakes. [4] The sister of Herok'a picked him among the spirits as the most handsome and became his wife, although the Forked Man had to struggle a bit with Turtle to get her. [5] Inasmuch as Turtle is his brother-in-law, it would seem that Turtle's wife is his sister. [6]

It seems clear that the Forked Man is also a symbol of the bow. When it is drawn back, it bends into a fork. The two arms of the fork terminate in mechanical equivalents to hands, hands which grasp the string with which the arrow is launched. When the man is added as the necessary component to the mechanism, it has four arms and two heads, the other being where the arrow rests. He is married to one of the Herok'a whose symbol is the bow and whose nature is the arrow. She it is that is placed in a quiver in another myth. The Chief of the Herok'a is Redhorn, who often assumes the form of an arrow. Although the race of Forked Men and the Herok'a are closely related (through wood), they hook up in marriage with one another. The point on big game arrows is made of turtle claw, thus explaining his connection to Turtle and the competition between himself and Turtle over the Herok'a bride. That the arrow flies from the action of the bow's arms/wings, explains the many connections that the Forked Man has to birds. He is said to be "a forked tailed bird." [7] When an arrow is mounted and pulled back in the bow, the arrowhead is like a head, the bow itself like wings, and the turkey feathers at the base of the arrow, which are forked, are like its tail.

Links: Disease Giver, Herok'a, Turtle, Wears Sparrows for a Coat, Crane, Owl, Redman, Bluehorn, Great Black Hawk, Bird Spirits, Hare, The Cave of Herok'a.

Stories: in which the Forked Man is a character: The Red Man, Chief of the Herok'a, The Spirit of Gambling, Wears White Feathers on His Head; about Bird Spirits: Crane and His Brothers, The King Bird, Bird Origin Myth, Wears White Feathers on His Head, Old Man and White Feathers, The Boy who was Captured by the Bad Thunderbirds, The Thunderbird, The Boy Who Became a Robin, Partridge's Older Brother, The Woman who Loved Her Half-Brother, The Foolish Hunter, Ocean Duck, Earthmaker Sends Rucewe to the Twins, The Quail Hunter, Baldheaded Warclub Origin Myth, The Hotcâk Arrival Myth, Trickster Gets Pregnant, Trickster and the Geese, Holy One and His Brother (blackbirds, woodpeckers, hawks), Porcupine and His Brothers (Ocean Sucker), Turtle's Warparty (Thunderbirds, eagles, kaghi, pelicans, sparrows), The Dipper (Thunderbirds, kingfishers, hummingbirds, black hawks), Kaghíga and Lone Man (kaghi), The Old Man and the Giants (kaghi, bluebirds), The Bungling Host (snipe, woodpecker), The Red Feather, Eagle Clan Origin Myth, Trickster, the Wolf, the Turtle, and the Meadow Lark, Warughápara, The Race for the Chief's Daughter, Black and White Moons, The Markings on the Moon, The Creation Council, He Who Eats the Stinking Part of the Deer Ankle, Earthmaker Blesses Wagícega (Wecgícega), Hare Acquires His Arrows, Hotcâk Clans Origin Myth, Wonághire Wâkcik Clan Origin Myth, The Hotcâk Migration Myth, Blue Jay, The Baldness of the Buzzard, The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster (turkey buzzard), The Shaggy Man (blackbirds), The Medicine Rite Foundation Myth (blackbirds), Spear Shaft and Lacrosse, Îtcorúcika and His Brothers (Loon), Great Walker's Medicine (loon), Roaster (woodsplitter), The Spirit of Gambling, The Big Stone (a partridge), Trickster's Anus Guards the Ducks, The Journey to Spiritland (Medicine Rite Version) -- see also Thunderbirds, and the sources cited there.

Themes: somatic dualism: The Girl who Refused a Blessing from the Wood Spirits, Disease Giver, The Chief of the Herok'a, Bear Clan Origin Myth, Wears White Feathers on His Head, The Red Man, The Man with Two Heads; a spirit has four arms: Îtcorúcika and His Brothers; a spirit is of a red color: Wears White Feathers on His Head, The Red Man, The Chief of the Herok'a.

Genealogy: The Chief of the Herok'a (+ Forked Men), The Forked Man (+ Chief of the White Cranes, Hîdja Owl Spirit, the Tcarutcge)

Notes:

[1] Oliver LaMère and Harold B. Shinn, Winnebago Stories (New York, Chicago: Rand, McNally and Co., 1928) 83.

[2] Paul Radin, "The Chief of the Heroka," [unpublished] Winnebago Notebooks (American Philosophical Society Library) #33, p. 26.

[3] LaMère and Shinn, Winnebago Stories, 83-84.

[4] Paul Radin, "Wears White Feathers on His Head," [unpublished] Winnebago Notebooks (American Philosophical Society Library) #4, pp. 1-50.

[5] Radin, "The Chief of the Heroka," 37.

[6] Radin, "The Chief of the Heroka," 43.

[7] Radin, "Wears White Feathers on His Head," Notebooks #4, p. 50.