This section is for stories, myths and legends, especially those about Coyote.
A funny Coyote story in dirty joke form
An old Coyote tale told in joke Form. WARNING! This one is rather a naughty joke (I used to say it was ribald, but got tired of people asking what "ribald" meant). This is for the grown-ups in the audience. For some reason, it's one of my favorites.
Okay... stop me if you've heard this one! Hee hee! It'll be too late by the time you do.. I'll have already typed it in! (Grin)
Fox sees that Coyote is pretty frazzled looking one morning. Fox asks:
"Cousin! You look like shit! What's the matter? Did you sleep badly?"
Coyote replies "I had the most awful nightmare! I didn't sleep a wink afterwards! It's still bothering me, that terrible dream!"
Fox suggests, "Tell me about it.. sometimes you'll feel better after you tell someone a bad dream."
Coyote says, "Well... it's pretty awful... but here goes. I dreamt that I came to a road... and on the other side was a beautiful pond with ducks swimming in it... frogs, very nice."
Fox interrupted,"That doesn't sound so bad. What's wrong with that?"
Coyote continues, "Shhh, Cuz! I'm getting to it. Anyway, I'm standing across the road from this little pond, and three beautiful young women show up! Long black hair, very pretty, all giggling. They were there to take a bath!"
Fox interrupts again, "This dream sounds pretty good to me so far!"
Coyote shushes him and says, "I'm getting to the bad part. I hid in the bushes on the other side of the road from the pond, and the girls didn't see me! They began taking off their clothes to bathe. They took aff all their clothes and they were really knockouts!"
Fox says, "I wish I had such a bad dream. This sounds like a good dream to me!"
Coyote responds, "Trust me Fox, you should be glad you didn't have this dream. Anyway... the girls were so pretty and all, splashing there, that I felt myself becoming aroused just watching them. My penis began to grow bigger."
Fox cut in again and says "Well, that sure would have happened to me, too!"
Coyote says, "If you keep interrupting like that, I'll tell Fox Woman you said that. Now anyway... my penis grew right across that road, through the bushes, and into the water. And it snuck up right by the girls. One of them saw it, and they started playing with it. Soon, I was having sex from all the way across the road, with all three of them!"
Fox says "Wow! That's one hot dream! How is it that you think this dream is so bad?"
Coyote replies... "Well... it was then, right at that point that I heard a noise... there was a big wagon rumbling down the road... and the girls would not let go of my penis! A wagon with four horses in front of it... like the wasichus drive... a wagon with iron wheels, cousin..."
Fox interrupted again... "You are right Coyote... that was a VERY bad dream!"
I've heard many many permutations of this particular story, but for some reason, I kinda like it told in joke form. I've heard it as the tale of how Coyote seduces the Duck Women, or a story about how well hung Coyote is. I like this version. Maybe because it has Fox in it too. I assure you, I like it ONLY because it was just a dream!
Another tale of why death is forever
Another story in this vein, wherein Coyote brings a woman back from the dead, but loses her again, and is so angry that he prevents others from ever raising the dead again.
Coyote once fell in love with a woman. And not the kind of love where the woman was pretty and he just wanted to have intercourse with her (he fell in that kind of love a lot of times). He really loved her.
Her parents didn't like Coyote. "He is a good-for-nothing, everyone knows that," they told her. "You are a chief's daughter, you need a better husband than him." She always respected her parents and did what they told her.
Coyote would still come by to woo her. Her parents told him to go away.
"You are no good. Get away from here! We don't want someone like you for a son-in-law!"
One day, while the girl was out picking berries, or maybe fishing, I don't remember, she was bitten by a snake. She stepped on it, and it bit her.
Coyote saw this and said "That snake is poisonous. You should let me doctor you."
"No. My parents said I am not to be around you. I am going home."
After a while she didn't feel well. She went home and laid down to sleep. When her parents tried to wake her up to eat something, she was dead.
Coyote came by. He said "Your daughter is probably very sick. If you let me doctor her, I can make her well again."
Her father told him "You get away! My daughter is dead, and I'll bet you know something about it. It's probably your fault!"
Coyote left.
They had a funeral. After they had put the girl on the scaffold, they cried for a while, then went away. Coyote was nearby the whole time. He went and got the girl's body. It had already begun to smell, even through the wrappings. He took her body away, and got into a canoe. They gave her up for dead he thought, obviously they don't want her as much as I do.
At four places on the river, he sang a special song, and each time some of the bad smell went away, and she looked more alive. After this, he fixed her eyes, and made her wake up and breathe. She was confused. He told her that she had died, and he had doctored her so that she was all right again. He told her that for this, he was now going to be allowed to marry her. He took her to a little house he had built down the river, and they lived there for a while.
One day, one her father's friends happened by. He stopped to see what Coyote was up to. Coyote reluctantly invited him in. When he asked how it was that she was alive again, Coyote told him. The man stayed and had dinner with them, and then went straight back to tell her parents that their daughter was alive again.
The girl's father came. Coyote invited him in and didn't say anything. The father told the girl that she should come back to her mother. He told her that Coyote hadn't really fixed her. He said "You were sick, but that is all over now. You can come back with us." Coyote didn't say anything. He just watched as the girl agreed to leave with her father.
After they got home, the girl was fine for a bit. She helped her mother, and they had a big homecoming. One night, after being by the river, the girl said she didn't feel good again. She went to bed. When they went to wake her up, she was dead.
The chief was anguished. He realized what he had to do. He went downriver to where Coyote was living. He said "My daughter has died again. I will give you anything. Everything I own, horses, blankets, just doctor my daughter. Bring her back to life. You can even marry her. We won't prevent this anymore."
Coyote told him. "No. I am not a good son-in-law. Your daughter needs someone better than me. I'm not good for anything, you said so. And she didn't want to be alive if she had to be with me. Her life ended when that snake bit her, and I shouldn't have made her come back from the dead in the first place just to make her like me."
"I will not bring her back again. You have wronged me, and she went with you. If you had acted better, people would be able to come back from the dead, but because of this, there will be no coming back. From now on, medicine men will only be able to help people who are still alive. It is because of you. If you had acted better, it would not be this way."
And it is still like this. Medicine men can heal the sick, but the dead stay dead. It is because of what happened with Coyote and that girl. Some people say he was just being spiteful. I think he really loved her. You ask Coyote and he'll tell you so.
One of Several Stories where Coyote is credited with the invention of death.
In the beginning, when human people were still new in the world, nobody ever died. After a time, this got to be a problem, because new people were being born and it was getting crowded in some places.
Seeing a problem, the elders and wise men and women and chiefs got together to think of a solution before things got out of hand.
Coyote came to this big meeting. He said "Oh that's easy" (Coyote is always saying things are easy) "from now on, people will die, to make room for the new people, and someday they will die to make room for the ones after that.
Some of the people thought this was a good idea, but many more started talking about how they didn't want to have their loved ones die and be gone.
Someone came up with the idea that people should just die for a little time and then come back. Everyone thought that was really good. They decided to do that. They had Coyote invent death, and then they made a new ceremony for bringing people back.
The person's spirit would leave their body when they died, and roam around as a little breeze, or even a dust devil. In this way people knew their relatives were still close, waiting to be brought back. The dead person's body would be put in a special lodge until it was time to make them alive again.
Coyote did not like this. For one thing, there were spirits everywhere, and even though they didn't eat, it was still crowded. And the bodies were still there too... so it wasn't like they were saving a whole lot of space.
And they still were going to do the ceremony to bring people back from the dead, so they wouldn't even stay dead. They would come back and it would be just as before. Only now, people would be fussing around taking care of dead bodies.
Coyote argued this point before the council, but no-one listened. They didn't want their relatives to stay dead, and that was that.
It came time to do the bringing back ceremony. A special lodge was made. The first dead person's body was brought on, and they prayed over it. The door of the lodge was opened so that the spirit of the person could come back and enter the body and be alive again. When no-one was looking, Coyote closed the door. The spirit, which was in the form of a dust devil, whirled right past, and away. They finished the ceremony, and the person was still dead. They found out why.
"Coyote you wicked creature," the people cried. "You have ruined this ceremony, and now the spirit has gone away. Now death will be forever. We all voted to do it our way and you went against the decision."
They chased Coyote away. They would never let him have anything to eat. Coyote was always hungry after that.
And when someone sees a dust devil go by, sometimes they think "there goes someone's spirit".
Coyote tells this story. Maybe it is true
Hey. I have a story for you:
It's about why Coyotes are lonely. I thought it might be something you'd care to hear.
Everyone knows you don't ever see a bunch of coyotes in one spot. Almost never. They get together, mate, and when the cubs get a little older, they all split up. They come back and visit each other sure, but mostly they live apart. You hear naturalist types always saying "Coyotes are solitary... they aren't like wolves. They just aren't gregarious."
They howl to each other though. To say where they are, and talk about some things coyotes talk about. For such "solitary, non-gregarious" critters... they sure do like to keep in touch. If you hear poets and storytellers talk about coyotes though, you'll hear them say that the coyote's howl sounds lonely, or lonesome.
A lot of human people don't know this, but coyotes used to live together in big families, just like wolves, their cousins. They liked it too. But it's really easy for people to find big groups when they want to shoot them. It's harder to find you and keep track of you when you split up. It's a lot harder to find one coyote than ten. When people started shooting coyotes, they realized they'd have to not live the way they always had. They had to change it. Now they can't be with each other, because humans will kill them if they can catch them.
Not all humans of course. Just a certain kind without connectedness. The kind there are a lot of.
And so coyotes wait. They howl to each other from far off. But they aren't completely unhappy, because they know that loneliness won't last forever. If they can wait long enough, things will change, and they can go back to their families. Coyotes know this inside down deep. But while they wait, still they are sad and lonely. You can hear that when they howl, if you know how to listen.
If you ask people in the east of Turtle Island now, they'll tell you that coyotes don't live too solitary. Sure enough, you'll find that they've started being able to live together again.
Coyote tells this story.
A retelling of a Paiute myth, by dogteam
(Told by dogteam, on Therianthropy.org)
A long time ago, when the World was very young, Wolf and Coyote were brothers. Wolf was wise and strong; his younger brother Coyote was fast and determined, but foolish at times as well. Together, none could stand against them; they were feared as warriors, and respected as hunters. The world had been made for them, they knew...and few would have disagreed.
Wolf, the frugal one, had collected all the game in the country into a cave, and brought out only one at a time - only what could be eaten each day. Ever the impatient one, Coyote pestered his brother until Wolf told him the secret of the cave, and he found it. Then he tried to lift the skin on the door only a crack, enough for one animal. But at the sight of all those elk, buffalo and deer, Coyote got excited and let the opening gape as wide as his open mouth. As all the animals pounded out in a crush of hooves and dust, Coyote shot but hit nothing. Too late, he rushed about shouting at the remaining deer, trying to herd them back into the cave.
This commotion had not gone unnoticed by the Pumas; game had been scarce for them in the foothills. Now...they conferred, and decided that if they were to kill Coyote and Wolf, the game would all be theirs. Normally they would not try such a thing, but the scent of prey was in the air, and it drove them to distraction. Occupied as he was, they were on Coyote before he even realized their presence. There were too many, and he knew he had no hope of defeating them.
Suddenly, Wolf burst from the underbrush, and quicker than thought, two of the cats lay dead. But as he struggled with a third, and Coyote a fourth, the largest of them all manuvered behind Wolf and sank her teeth deep into his neck; with this as purchase, she raked frantically at his haunches with her massive hind paws. Enraged, Coyote fought his attacker so fiercely that he ran for his life, the other two followed suit shortly afterward. They all ran in different directions, and never cooperated on anything again after that day.
As Wolf lay dying, Coyote wept like a pup and held his brother close. Wolf said, "My Brother; the game has all scattered, and I will hunt with you no more. You must put the sagebrush into piles, and it will fill with rabbits. The hunting will be easier then." And with the last of his magic, Wolf caused that to be.
There are no wolves in the desert now. And Coyote screams to the moon each night, asking the Great Spirit to return his brother to him. He lives to learn the discipline and resources to take revenge; and in the night he can be seen carrying bones...bringing home his brother's remains so that he might be reborn.
Told by Henry Crow Dog
This is the story... the version told by Henry Crow Dog, how the first Crow Dog (aka Crow Coyote) got his name. It differs a little from the version told by Leonard Crow Dog.
This is Henry Crow Dog speaking. Here's is how my grandfather, the first Crow Dog, got his name. He was chief about to lead a raiding party into hante paha wakan - now called cedar valley in South Dakota.
Before riding out, he had a vision; he saw a white horse in the clouds that have him the sacred horse power. As a result, his pony became shunkaka-luzahan, the swiftest horse in the band.
But that wasn't all of the vision. The chief heard the voice of Shunkmanitu, the Coyote saying: "I am the one!" Then his horse suddenly pricked up his ears, and the wind whistled through the two eagle feathers the chief was wearing. The feathers spoke, telling him: "There's a man standing on that hill over there, between the trees." The chief and his companions clearly saw the man, who raised his hands and then was gone. The chief dispatched two scouts, one to the north and one to the south, but they returned saying that they had seen no one.
"This man on the hill must have been a wanagi, a ghost," the chief said. "He tried to warn us, but what did he warn us of? I don't know, I'm a warrior about to lead a raid, and I can't bother overmuch about ghosts." So they rode out and came to a river. The chief decided to camp there so that if enemies came, the riverbank would prevent them from surrounding his party.
During the night the chief heard the coyote howl four times. Shunkmanitou was telling him: "Something bad is going to happen to you!" The chief understood and gathered the men of his party together. There were some Tokala, some Kit Fox warriors there. They sang a strongheart song:
I am the fox.
I am supposed to die.
I already threw my life away.
Something daring,
something dangerous,
I wish to do.
They painted their faces black. They made themselves sacred. They prepared to fight and to die. They said that it would be a good day for a man to give his life.
At dawn the enemy attacked. There were some wasichu, some white settlers, led by a blue-coated soldier, and many crow scouts and absaroka warriors helping them. Indians helping whites to fight indians! This was indeed a bad thing.
In the chief's party, however, were many famous warriors. There was Two Strikes - Numpa Kachpa - who got his name when he shot with one bullet two white soldiers riding on the same horse. Kill-in-water was there, and Hollow Horn Bear's son, and Kills-in-Sight. Two crow scouts wounded Kills-in-Sight and shot his horse from under him. The chief went to him at a dead run, killed the traitors, counted first coup on them and put Kills-in-Sight on his own fast horse. Kills-in-Sight whipped the horse, which took off with him hanging onto it. The horse was so fast that no enemy could come near, and it carried Kills-in-Sight safely home.
On foot now, the chief was looking around, hoping to catch himself one of the riderless crow horses, when he took two enemy arrows, one high on his chest right under the collar bone, the other in his side. The second arrow went deep, right into his bladder. He broke off the arrows with his hand, and Hollow Horn Bear's son and two others of the band came to help, though they too had been wounded. Their horses all had at least one arrow in them.
The chief told them: "No use bothering with me. I'm hurt bad. I can't live. So save yourselves!" Still, they caught a fallen man's horse and put the chief on it saying: "Be strong; hold on!" Then the absaroka and some wasichu swooped down upon them and they had a hard time forcing their way through. Fighting for their lives against many, they lost sight of the chief. They thought he must have been killed and rode home talking of the bad things that had happened.
The chief had been riding, but he soon became so weak from the loss of blood that he fell off the pony. Lying in the snow in great pain, he hardly had the strength to sing his death song. He was alone, with neither friend nor enemy in sight.
Suddenly two coyotes came, growling but gently. They said: "We know you!" And kept him warm during the night by lying on either side of him. They licked the blood off his face. They brought him deer meat to make him strong and a sacred wound medicine which they told him to apply where the arrows had hit him. The medicine made his flesh tender and caused it to open up so that he could pull out the arrowheads and what was left of the shafts. The medicine brought by the coyotes cured the chief, and the meat they gave him made him strong. When he was able to walk, a crow came flying and guided him home. All the people marvel on seeing him and hearing his story.
Sometimes after the chief recovered, he went out alone to hunt and was ambushed by a war party of pahanis. These enemies had guns, and the chief took two bullets, one in the arm and one in the ribs. The second touched his lungs so that in later life he was always somewhat weak in the chest.
He managed to get far away on his fast horse to be safe from the pahanis, but then he could ride no further. He got down from his horse and stretched himself on the ground. "This time I die for sure," he said to himself.
But again the two coyotes came, bringing meat and bullet medicine, nursing and warming him for four days until his strength returned and his wounds were a little better. And again the crow came flying, watching over the man, warning him when enemies were close, guiding him to the place where his horse had strayed. So once more the chief came back alive from the dead.
Then he made himself a shield from the neck skin of a buffalo and using sacred procedures, painted two arrowheads and two circles representing bullets on it. This was his wotawe, his crest and protection, because after he had survived these four wounds, and after he had made the shield, nothing further could ever hurt him.
And then also he took his last name - Kangi Shunkmanitu, Crow Coyote - which the white census takers misuderstood and made into Crow Dog. You can stand on a name like this.
Told by Henry Crow Dog on Rosebud Indian Reservation, South Dakota, in 1969, and recorded by Richard Erdoes
Ute Creation Myth
(Told by Soul Guardian on Therianthropy.org)
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Once, there were no people in the world. So, Sinawaf (the Creator) began a project. He began to collect and cut sticks into little pieces and put them in a large bag. He did this for a long time until the bag was full.
His brother, Coyote, was watching him the whole time. Sinawaf, knowing his brother, told him that this was a special project and not to look in the bag.
One day, when Sinawaf was away, Coyote could no longer hold back his curiosity. He crept over to where Sinawaf had left the bag and peeked in. Many people burst out of the bag. They were wild and would not listen to Coyote, who was pleading for the people to return to the bag. The people only kept pouring out and running wild. They spoke different languages and scattered all over the world.
When Sinawaf returned, he found his brother and the empty bag. He was so angry with him for not listening to him. He said, "The people were not ready to come into the world. They were to be placed evenly across the land. The trouble you have caused will create wars and the people will try to gain land from each other."
As punishment for Coyote's mischievous ways, the Creator sent him to live in the world. He made him what he is today, a coyote. That is why Coyote cries to the sky. He wants to go home.
Sinawaf picked up his empty bag and discovered that deep within the bag a few people remained. To these people, Sinawaf said, "This small tribe shall be known as the Noochew (Ute). They will be very brave because the people in the world are not complete and you will be able to overcome them. I will place you high in the mountains so that you will be close to me." That is how the Utes came to live high in the mountains of Utah and Colorado.