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 |  | Monday November 23, 2009 3:32 AM |
 | | Native American Myths and Legends | |
Spokane Lake of long ago
A long time ago the country around where Spokane Falls are now,
and for many days' journey east of it, was a large and beautiful
lake. In the lake were many islands, and on its shores were many
villages with many people. The Indians were well fed and happy,
for there were plenty of fish in the lake and plenty of deer
and elk in the country around it.
But one summer morning the people were startled by a rumbling
and a shaking of the earth. The waters of the lake rose. Soon
the waves became mountains of water that broke with fury
against the shore.
Then the sun was blotted out, and darkness covered the land and
the water. Terrified, the people ran to the hills to get away
from the pounding water. For two days the earth rumbled and
quaked. Then a rain of ashes began to fall. It fell for several weeks.
At last the ashes stopped falling, the waters of the lake became
quiet, and the Indians came down from the hills. But soon the lake
began to disappear. Dry land rose where the water had been.
Many people died, for there was nothing to eat. The game
animals had run away when the people fled to the hills, and
no one dared go out on the lake to fish.
Some of the water was flowing westward from the lake that remained.
The people followed it until they came to a waterfall. Soon they
saw salmon coming up the new river from the big river west of them.
So they built a village beside the waterfall in the new river and
made it their home.
(Inland Northwest - Spokane)
Move than sixty years ago, Chief Lot, a respected leader of a
band of Spokane Indians, told this legend to the army over who
was then the Indian agent on the Colville Reservation. Major
R. D. Gwydin reported it in a paper read before the Spokane
Historical Society.
reprinted in
Indian Legends of the Pacific Northwest
, edited by Ella E. Clark,
University of California Press, 1953
Last Updated
December 23, 2004
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