Trickster's Tail (§16 of the Trickster Cycle)

translation based on the interlinear of Oliver LaMère

Hocąk Syllabic Text with an English Interlinear Translation

(349) Then in the course of time, there by the edge of the water, unexpectedly, Buzzard (Hegega) was going by. He was looking for something dead and decaying. "You homely guy, you did something to me. (350) I also thought I would do something back to you," he said. There he laid on the bank to where the waves come up. He had become a dead buck, but not yet decayed. (351) The crows (wahara) were already there, but they only longed for it. Nowhere could they open it to eat. The hide was tough as it had not yet decayed. (352) There, as Buzzard was going about, these crows shouted at him. "Call him," as they said, "only he usually has a sharp knife with him," they said. They called him. Finally, he came. (353) There wasn't much he didn't do. Then he still went all around looking at it. Finally, he did it. He got around to the hind end. He worked at the rectum. When they hurt Trickster by pecking him, (354) he would nearly jump. Finally, he got his head in. There he would bite off pieces. When he got his head in, he closed his anus tightly on him. He stood up. "Hąhą-ą Buzzard, (355) you did something harmful to me. Some day I thought I also might do something well," he said. Then he went on. There he tried to get free, but it was a no avail. (356) He could not get free. Initially, his wings were flapping, but now they only flapped once in awhile.

As he did thus, unexpectedly, he came upon a bear. (357) It said, "Hohó Kunu, how that tail becomes you," he said. He, on the other hand, did not answer. Still he kept on. Again he said, "Kunu, how that tail becomes you. (358) I wish I could be that way," he said. The fourth time he said, "Kunu, how that tail becomes you. If it were okay to do this, I wish I were that way," he said. (359) "Korá, you are still this ways always. Ho, what difficulty there is there. Hišjąge, I liked that kind of thing. This too — I saw some of them and I liked them. (360) They made one for me. If you wanted to, you could do it," he said. "All right Kunu, if you say so, I thought you might make me one, is why I said it," he said. "All right, then, I will do it for you," he said. "Look at it. (361) If anyone should like one, you can do it this way," he said to him. He brought it forth. "Hąhó, another tail is desired, go after one," he said to it and he turned it loose. (362) It stunk. Everything had come off its head. Buzzard went on home. The the bear said, "Even now let me fix it for you, so that when he comes back, (363) I can place it in there for you," he said to him. He took his knife and cut its rectum out. When he pulled the intestines out of him, he died. There he built a fire and singed it. (364) "Hąhą, it's been so long. I will get my fill of that food which I like best," he said.¹

Version 2

by Felix White, Sr.

This was collected by Kathleen Danker and presented in her thesis. She refuses to release it for my use in any form.

[White's version is only half of the story, the episode of tricking the bear is left out altogether. It is otherwise like the version above, except for a few minor differences. Rather than making himself into a deer (ca) he makes himself into a buffalo (ce). A wooly woodpecker announces the find. Instead of crows, a mob of birds appear led by the magpie (hípahinįk, "little-sharp-bill"), and it is this bird who opens the carcasse at the anus.]

Commentary. "Buzzard" — the story is puzzling with respect to the translation of the name of the principal character, Hekega, whom Radin, presumably following his sources, translates as "Hawk." The name is formed from Hek-ge-ga, and follows the pattern of Kecągega, "Turtle," from Kecąk-ge-ga; or Wašjįgega, "Hare." The stem would be hek-, which is found in Marino's dictionary with the variants hek and heg, both meaning "turkey buzzard."² In Omaha, the trickster figure Ictinike assumes the form of a buzzard, which in that cognate language is called Hega.³Also compare Biloxi, éxka, héxka, black-headed buzzard; Ofo, éskha, buzzard.⁴ In the story The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster, Trickster vows to get even with a turkey buzzard, there called hegagre.⁵ The present story certainly seems to be the account of how Trickster got even with the hegagre. In the close, cognate Ponca version of this story, the bird is also said to be a buzzard.⁶ Furthermore, the story ends with the bird losing all the feathers on its head, a condition normally found only in vultures. In White's version, the character is explicitly said to be Hegega, "Buzzard." Why, then, is the name Hekega not translated as "Buzzard"? Radin gives no explanation whatever, suggesting that he accepted this anomaly. The story was collected in 1912 by Sam Blowsnake of the Thunderbird Clan from an older man living in Nebraska and written down by Blowsnake in the Hocąk syllabary.⁷ Radin says that the Trickster Cycle was translated by two different people, John Baptiste and Oliver LaMère.⁸ Perhaps this is the problem. It may be that one translated The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster and the other translated the present story. Judging from Marino's dictionary, the only attestation of the meaning "Hawk" for Hekega is the present story. The normal term for "hawk" is kerejų, as in kerejų-sep, "black hawk." If we were to have allowed this translation to stand, it would lead to interesting interpretations, inasmuch as Hekega is complemented by a bear and by the avian counterparts of the bear, the wahara or kaǧi (crows/ravens).

"you did something to me" — in the previous episode Trickster was flying by riding on Buzzard's back, but the bird dumped him into a hollow tree. See The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster.

"nowhere could they open it to eat" — "... Jim Brandenburg ... described ravens coming to an unopened bear carcass. They could get nothing but eyeballs since ravens can't open a carcass. The ravens then started yelling, and soon a wolf arrived and tore the carcass open. Brandenberg repeatedly saw wolves as well as coyotes come to a carcass that he provided shortly after it was discovered by ravens who were yelling."⁹

Perhaps part of the reason why the bear wants such a tail is the peculiar discharge found after hibernation. "A tough, fibrous plug" is often found in dens. It is formed at least partially of food remnants, and functions as an anal plug during hibernation.¹⁰ Apparently this has some role in preventing the digestive process from disturbing the bear's sleep, or perhaps to prevent the infiltration of insects.

Buzzard now plays the role that Trickster played in The Elk's Skull: he puts his head into an organic hole that tightens up around his neck. However, this story is really a continuation of The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster (§8). The internal repetitions can be set out on a table:

It may be that further light on the meaning of this myth can be gleaned from Indo-European comparative material.

Comparative Material. The trickster cycle of the related Ponca people has a very similar episode in which their trickster, Ictinike, transforms himself into a dead animal and traps a buzzard's head.¹¹

The Kickapoo have a very similar story that is also a continuation of the abduction episode. After the Kickapoo trickster Wiza'ka'a is freed from the stump in which he had been trapped, he began to think about how to avenge himself on the buzzard who put him there. Suddenly he had an idea. Wiza'ka'a fell over as if dead. He was a tempting meal for any bird, as he was very fat indeed. Soon many birds descended to eat his flesh. At last, there came Buzzard and he too began to partake of the meal. He stuck his head into Wiza'ka'a's anus all the way up to his shoulders. Suddenly Wiza'ka'a tightened up and caught Buzzard in the grip of his anus. Buzzard flapped his wings, but could not escape. Wiza'ka'a held him like that for 10 days, and when he released him he was no longer like other birds, but was a buzzard indeed.¹²

The Fox version is fairly close to the Hocąk, but like the Kickapoo, it follows the buzzard episode. Wī́sa‘kä́ka meets his friend Elk and tells him how Buzzard dropped him from the sky. "'Now I want you to bring Buzzard to me; bring him any way you can and as soon as you can'. Elk went away happy, for he was glad to be on an arrand for Wī́sa‘kä́ka, whom he loved. He knew just where to go. It was at a place where all animal-kind was wont to frequent, and there he lay himself down and pretended to die. Wolf was the first to find him, and it pained when Wolf dug his teeth in and began to pull on the flesh. Then came Crow, whose sharp beak pricked through the skin. But Elk lay still as if sure enough dead. By and by Buzzard lit on a mound close by in the rear. Presently he began to sidle nearer, hop by hop, till he was close enough to pull on the flesh. Elk endured it all till Buzzard got his beak in past the head. Then up jumped Elk, holding Buzzard by the head, and ran off to Wī́sa‘kä́ka's lodge." Wī́sa‘kä́ka told Buzzard that after he created people, he would punish him. "'They will look upon you, and you will be to them the most loathsome of all living-kind. The beautiful colors of your feathers shall change to the color of the soil of the earth. And your neck and head, once so fair of form, shall remain disfigured as Elk made them in dragging you to me'."¹³

There is a concluding episode to the trickster abduction story among the Ioway which is a good parallel to our story. After Ictinike escapes from the stump in which he was dumped by a buzzard, he lies upon the ground covered in raccoon skins pretending to be dead. Many birds of prey come to devour him: the raven, the magpie, and the eagle. Finally, the offending buzzard comes along, and just as he was about to get a bite, Ictinike jumps up and rips the feathers off his head. This is why buzzards are bald to this day. (See the full story in the Ioway website. For the beginning of the story, see the episode in The Abduction of Trickster.)¹⁴

That the Abduction and Rescue of Trickster (§8) forms a continuous story with the present one is seen in its Assiniboine counterpart. This story is summarized by Radin:

Sitcóⁿski wishes to travel with the eagle. Eagle abandons him on a mountain top. Sitcóⁿski tumbles down head foremost, and sticks in a swamp. When he frees himself, he turns into a moose to entice the eagle down. When the eagle eats of the meat, Sitcóⁿski kills him.¹⁵

Sitcóⁿski is the Assiniboine trickster, the counterpart of Wakjąkága.

Partial parallels are found even among the distant Miwok of California. The Falcon suggested to Coyote that he create human beings. In order to do this, Coyote played dead. Many crows and buzzards came to the corpse and worked their way in through the buttocks. Then Coyote suddenly shut the hole, trapping the birds inside. When Coyote released the birds, Falcon plucked them. Coyote placed the feathers in various places, and these became people. However, now that there were human beings, the animals, who had gone around in anthropomorphic shape, had to change into the various shapes that exhibit today.¹⁶

The Ojibwe story has many differences, but is in the main similar to the Hocąk. As Wenebojo (the trickster) is walking along, he hears the pleasant sound of bells ringing in the distance. He soon discovers that it is Fox that is making this noise as he walks. He asks Fox if he too might not be able to make such a sound when he walked. Fox was difficult to persuade, but finally told him that he would have to get a rounded stone of a particular kind. Having done this, Fox put the stone in Wenebojo's backside where the sun doesn't shine. Wenebojo was very pleased with the sound he made, but after awhile, the sound seems to grow fainter. He turned around and discovered that his intestines had been falling out as he walked. So he took these lost guts and hung them in a tree. These became the fruit of that tree, which his aunts, human women, will sometimes collect for food.¹⁷

The Tlingit of the Pacific northwest have a trickster tale similar to the episode of the death of the bear in the Hocąk story. It is summarized by Radin: "One time Raven invited the bears to a feast, and induced the wren to pull out the entrails of one of them through his anus and thus kill him."¹⁸

In Mexico the Mayan Tzeltal and Tojolabal tell a story in which the vulture loses its feathers the same way it does in the Hocąk story. "... the vulture (José) was sent by the Angel (or by God) to inform him of the state of the earth after the flood. Forgetting his mission, José started to devour the decomposed bodies of the bictims; heavy with food, he could not start flying again: 'as he had eaten carrion, God twisted his head around and made it come out through his anus and this is why his head is still this way today'."¹⁹

At a far remove, but still worth mentioning is a Mundurucu story. Karujuribo is always turning into animals to fool his nephew Akainoatpo. The latter's grandmother tells him that if he wants to kill a tapir the best way is to ram his arm up the animal's anus; so Karujuribo turns himself into a tapir and pretends that he has fallen asleep. When Akainoatpo does his grandmother's bidding and inserts his arm into the rectum of the tapir, suddenly it awakens and runs away, dragging Akainoatpo with him all the way across the Tapajos River. At last he released him by defecating. After that, he was known by the name Perisuat.²⁰See also, "Trickster Takes Little Fox for a Ride."

The fate of the bird, who withdraws his head from the deer's anus at the price of losing all his feathers, reminds us of the withered hand of Iranian hero Jamshid. In the Iranian story, in order to rescue his brother Taxmoruw who had been swallowed by the devil Ahriman, Jamshid had to offer to stimulate the devil by sticking his hand in his rectum. Jamshid plunged his entire arm into the rectum of Ahriman and was able to pull out Taxmoruw in that direction. However, the result of this feat was that Jamshid's arm shriveled up.²¹ Another story of this type that begins at the opposite end of the digestive tract, is the Norse myth of the binding of the Fenris Wolf.²² In this story, the Fenris Wolf is the greatest threats to the gods, so they decide to trick him into consenting to be bound. They tell him that if he can break the bonds that they make for him, his fame will be boundless. They give him lying reassurances that he could easily do this. Much to their horror, he actually breaks two sets of bonds that they place on him. Finally, they make a bond of nonentities called Gleipnir. This time the wolf is suspicious, and demands concrete assurances. He says that someone must put his hand into his mouth, so that if he cannot breaks his bonds, whoever has placed his hand there will lose it. None of the gods step forward, since they know what will happen. Finally, Týr, the god of the Thing or law court, steps forward and places his hand on the row of teeth and makes a lying pledge that the bonds will never hold. They bind the wolf successfully, so Fenris bites off Týr's hand. What these and other myths exemplify is what I term the "Mutilation Paradox" (see 1, 2). The paradox is that the function of which the organ that is lost is symbolic is not diminished by its loss, but rather augmented. The hand Týr loses is the hand that is placed on the stallahringr (oath ring) when an oath is sworn in court. The oath ring is dipped in the blood of the sacrifice. The model for the Mutilation Paradox is the sacrifice itself. When an animal is sacrificed to the gods, it is really not a sacrifice at all, but a covert barter: by giving up the animal to the gods, the gods insure that it is replaced or even more than replaced. What appears to be a loss is in fact an investment with good returns. The Hocągara have the same philosophy of sacrifice and therefore ought to have their own examples of the Mutilation Paradox. The present story appears to be such a myth.

It is the interpretation along the lines of the Mutilation Paradox that leads us to think that "Hawk" would be the right character for the part of Hekega. The deer is symbolic of the center and the four quarters. The legs symbolize the quarters. Both the bear (clan) and the hawk (clan) want to reach the center of the deer. The center symbolizes power and control. When the hawk tries to enter through the only opening, he suffers the same fate as Jamshid, who did much the same thing. Like the Fenris Wolf, Hekega is bound and made a prisoner. The head symbolizes superiority, and the feathers lost represent the war honors attached the successful execution of the warrior function. The deer also represent timidity, the very center of the deer being its heart, which is said to be dry as the result of the deer's fear.²³ The deer expels, rather than consumes, the warrior function in the end. The loss of hawk's head feathers corresponds to his alienation from the timidity associated with the center of the deer. By the Mutilation Paradox, the missing feathers on the hawk's head would symbolize the accentuation of the function which they represent. This function is that of war honors, which is to say the warrior function, which is associated with the opposite of timidity. It should be noted here that the Thunderbirds when they assume human shape have heads that are entirely bald except for a wreath of arbor vitæ. The implicit argument in translating Hekega as "Hawk," is that when the hek bird still had its feathers, it was nothing more than a variety of hawk.

Links: Trickster, Kaǧi, Bears, The Sons of Earthmaker.

Links within the Trickster Cycle: §15. The Elk's Skull, §17. A Mink Tricks Trickster. The incident that inspired the revenge in this story is found in §8. The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster.

Stories: featuring Trickster as a character: The Trickster Cycle, Trickster Gets Pregnant, Trickster's Warpath, Trickster's Anus Guards the Ducks, Lake Winnebago Origin Myth, The Mission of the Five Sons of Earthmaker, Baldheaded Warclub Origin Myth, Trickster Soils the Princess, Trickster, the Wolf, the Turtle, and the Meadow Lark, Soft Shelled Turtle Gets Married, The Medicine Rite Foundation Myth, Trickster Concludes His Mission, The Abduction and Rescue of Trickster, The Elk's Skull, Trickster and the Plums, Trickster and the Mothers, The Markings on the Moon, The Spirit of Gambling, The Woman who Became an Ant, The Green Man, The Red Man, Trickster Takes Little Fox for a Ride, Trickster Loses His Meal, A Mink Tricks Trickster, Trickster's Penis, Trickster Loses Most of His Penis, The Scenting Contest, The Bungling Host, Mink Soils the Princess, Trickster and the Children, Trickster and the Eagle, Trickster and the Geese, Trickster and the Dancers, Trickster and the Honey, Trickster's Adventures in the Ocean, The Pointing Man, Trickster's Buffalo Hunt, Trickster Eats the Laxative Bulb, Trickster Visits His Family, The Coughing Up of the Black Hawks, The Petition to Earthmaker, Waruǧábᵉra, Hare Secures the Creation Lodge; mentioning kaǧi (crows & ravens): Kaǧiga and Lone Man, Bear Clan Origin Myth (vv. 2, 3), The Hocąk Arrival Myth, The Spider's Eyes, The Old Man and the Giants, Turtle's Warparty, The Shaggy Man, The Healing Blessing, The Medicine Rite Foundation Myth, Spear Shaft and Lacrosse, Ocean Duck, The Stench-Earth Medicine Origin Myth, A Snake Song Origin Myth; mentioning (spirit) bears (other than were-bears): White Bear, Blue Bear, Black Bear, Red Bear, Bear Clan Origin Myth, The Shaggy Man, Bear Offers Himself as Food, Hare Visits His Grandfather Bear, Grandmother Packs the Bear Meat, The Spotted Grizzly Man, Hare Establishes Bear Hunting, The Woman Who Fought the Bear, Brass and Red Bear Boy, Redhorn's Sons, The Meteor Spirit and the Origin of Wampum, The Wolf Clan Origin Myth, Hocąk Clans Origin Myth, The Messengers of Hare, Bird Clan Origin Myth, The Hocąk Migration Myth, Red Man, Hare Recruits Game Animals for Humans, Lifting Up the Bear Heads, Hare Secures the Creation Lodge, The Two Boys, Creation of the World (v. 5), Spear Shaft and Lacrosse, The Brown Squirrel, Snowshoe Strings, Medicine Rite Foundation Myth, East Enters the Medicine Lodge, Lake Winnebago Origin Myth, The Spider's Eyes, Little Priest's Game, Little Priest, How He went out as a Soldier, Morning Star and His Friend (v. 2), How the Thunders Met the Nights, The Race for the Chief's Daughter, Old Man and Wears White Feather, The Warbundle Maker, Whiskey Making, cf. Fourth Universe; featuring deer as characters: Deer Clan Origin Myth, A Deer Story, Little Fox and the Ghost, Porcupine and His Brothers, Wolves and Humans, The Green Man, The Resurrection of the Chief's Daughter, Fireman's Brother, cf. The Race for the Chief's Daughter.

A variant of this story is found in The Baldness of the Buzzard.

Themes: a great spirit changes his form in order to deceive someone: The Skunk Origin Myth (Turtle), The Twins Retrieve Red Star's Head, The Man with Two Heads, The Children of the Sun, The Baldness of the Buzzard, Trickster Gets Pregnant, The Elks Skull, Trickster Soils the Princess, Old Man and Wears White Feather, The Seven Maidens; someone sticks his head into an orifice of a dead animal, and it tightens around his neck: The Baldness of the Buzzard, The Elk's Skull; someone's rectum is prepared for a very special function: The Bungling Host.

Notes

¹ Paul Radin, The Trickster: A Study in American Indian Mythology (New York: Schocken Books, 1956) 35-36. The Hocąk text is found in Oliver LaMère (trs.), "Wakdjukaga," in Paul Radin, Winnebago Notebooks, Freeman #3897 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, ca. 1912) Winnebago V, #7: 349-364.

² Mary Carolyn Marino, A Dictionary of Winnebago: An Analysis and Reference Grammar of the Radin Lexical File (Ph.D. Thesis, University of California, Berkeley, December 14, 1968 [69-14,947]) 249, sv hek.

³ Roger Welsch, Omaha Tribal Myths and Trickster Tales (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1981) 48, 131-132.

⁴ James Owen Dorsey and John R. Swanton, A Dictionary of the Biloxi and Ofo Languages (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology, 1912) s.s. vv.

⁵ Marino, A Dictionary of Winnebago, 249, sv hek, sv hegagre.

⁶ Radin, The Trickster, 128, #7. The Ponca trickster cycle is found in James Owen Dorsey, ¢egiha Texts, in Contributions to North American Ethnology (Washington, D. C.: 1890) vol. 6.

⁷ Radin, The Trickster, 111.

⁸ Radin, The Trickster, 112.

⁹ Bernd Heinrich, Mind of the Raven: Investigations and Adventures with Wolf-Birds (New York: Harper-Collins, 1999) 238.

¹⁰ Gary Brown, The Great Bear Almanac (New York: Lyons and Burford, 1993) 154.

¹¹ Radin, The Trickster, 128, #7; Dorsey, ¢egiha Texts, vol. 6.

¹² Kickapoo Tales, collected by William Jones, trs. by Truman Michelson. Publications of the American Ethnological Society (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1915) IX:11-13.

¹³ William Jones, "Episodes in the Culture-Hero Myth of the Sauks and Foxes," The Journal of American Folk-lore, XIV, #55 (Oct-Dec, 1901) 225-238 [236].

¹⁴ Lewis Spence, Myths of the North American Indians (London: George G. Harrap & Company, 1916).

¹⁵ Radin, The Trickster, 98, #8. These tales are collected in R. H. Lowie, The Assiniboine, in The Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History (New York: American Museum of Natural History, 1909) 4:239-244.

¹⁶ "How People were Made," in American Indian Trickster Tales, selected and edited by Richard Erdoes and Alfonso Ortiz (New York: Penguin Putnam, Inc., 1998)12.

¹⁷ Tom Badger, "The Wenebojo Origin Myth," trs. by Julia Badger, in Victor Barnouw, Wisconsin Chippewa Myths and Tales (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1977) Story 8: 22-23.

¹⁸ Radin, The Trickster, 107. Tlingit trickster tales are collected in J. R. Swanton, Tlingit Myths and Texts, Bureau of American Ethnology (Washington, D. C.: Bureau of American Ethnology, 1909) Bulletin 39, 416-419.

¹⁹ Guilhem Olivier, Mockeries and Metamorphoses of an Aztec God: Tezcatlipoca, "Lord of the Smoking Mirror" (Boulder: University of Colorado, 2003) 114. Mario Humberto Ruz, Los legítimos hombres. Aproximación al grupo tojolabal. 4 vols. (Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas, Centro de Estudios Mayas, 1981-1986) 1:16. Esther M. Hermitte, Poder sobrenatural y control social en un pueblo maya contemporáneo (Mexico City: Instituto Indigenista Interamericano, 1970) 26-27.

²⁰ A. Kruse, "Erzählungen der Tapajos-Mundurukú," Anthropos 41-49, ##4-6 (1946-1949): 614-656.

²¹ Arthur Christensen, Les types du premier homme et du premier roi dans l'histoire légendaire des Iraniens (1917) 1:184-189, discussed in Georges Dumézil, "'Le Borgne' and 'Le Manchot': The State of the Problem," in Gerald James Larson, Myth in Indo-European Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974) 17-28 [22-23]; Georges Dumézil, Mythe et épopée (Paris: 1973) 3:267-281.

²² Snorra Edda, Gylfaginning 13, 21.

²³ Paul Radin, "The Blue Man," Winnebago Notebooks (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society) Notebook 55; Paul Radin, (untitled), Winnebago Notebooks, Freeman #3858 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society) Winnebago IV, #5: 4-16.