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 |  | Monday November 23, 2009 2:48 AM |
 | | Native American Myths and Legends | |
how chipmunk got her stripes
There was an old woman who had a granddaughter. Her name was
Chipmunk.
One day she told her grandma, "I'm hungry. Give me
something to eat. " Her grandma gave her camas, but she didn't
want that. She didn't want dried meat or roots.
She saw a
service berry bush, so she ran to that and climbed up. She had a
little bag to put the berries in. The berries were really ripe,
so she picked and ate and picked and ate. She put some in the
bag.
All of a sudden she heard someone down by the bush. It was
Dirty Face, an animal. Dirty Face asked her if her family had
prayed for the berries to be so ripe. Chipmunk said she didn't
have any family. Dirty Face said, "Come here and I will be your
family. "
Chipmunk made Dirty Face close his eyes first and then
she jumped down. Just as she was getting on the ground Dirty
Face was going to catch her, but he just scratched her back. He
ate her skin under his fingernails. It was so good he was going
to kill her and eat her.
Chipmunk ran to her grandma. "Hide me,
hide me. Run run!" she cried. Grandma bid her in the back of the
teepee where the people squat.
Meadowlark told Dirty Face where
Chipmunk was.
He went in the teepee and killed her. He put
Chipmunk on the fire and grandma started to cry.
He let grandma
have the hind legs, the forelegs, the backbone and the head. He
put the heart in his mouth and ate it. Grandma put the backbone,
the legs, and the head together, but there was no heart. She
went out and she looked around and there she saw the
kinni-ki-nic berry. She put it in for a heart. Chipmunk came
alive.
The stripes are where the monkey scratched her back, and
her heart really is red and round like a kinni-ki-nic berry.
(Inland Northwest - Spokane)
As told by Margaret Adams.
Margaret Adams was an Upper Spokane, who moved with her family to
the Coeur d'Alene Reservation according to the Agreement of 1887.
from Children of the Sun - A History of the Spokane Indians
by David C. Wynecoop, Wellpinit, Washington © 1969
Last Updated
December 23, 2004
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