The
Skagit Creation/Flood Myth
The Creator made the earth and gave four names for it
-- for the sun, waters, soil and forests. He said only a few people,
with special preparation for the knowledge, should know all four
names, or the world would change too suddenly. After a while,
everyone learned the four names. When people started talking to
the trees the change came in the form of a flood. When the people
saw the flood coming, they made a giant canoe and filled it with
five people and a male and female of all plants and animals. Water
covered everything but the summit of Kobah and Takobah (Mts. Baker
and Ranier). The canoe landed on the prairie. Doquebuth, the new
Creator, was born of a couple from the canoe. He was told to go
to a lake (Lake Campbell) and swim and fast to get his spirit
powers, but he delayed. Finally he did so after his family deserted
him. The Old Creator came to him in dreams. First he told Doquebuth
to wave his blanket over the water and the forest and name the
four names of the earth; this created food for everyone. Next,
at the direction of the Old Creator, he gathered the bones of
the people who lived before the flood, waved the blanket over
them and named the four names, and made people again. These people
couldn't talk, so he similarly made brains for them from the soil.
Then they spoke many different languages, and Doquebuth blew them
back to the places they lived before the flood. Someday, another
flood will come and change the world again.
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