1 00:00:01,720 --> 00:00:04,920 Speaker 1: When Native people cast about for an American animal to 2 00:00:04,960 --> 00:00:11,960 Speaker 1: carry their creation stories, the intelligent survivor coyote became Deity. Coyote, 3 00:00:12,200 --> 00:00:15,600 Speaker 1: an avatar for humans who taught them about human nature 4 00:00:15,920 --> 00:00:19,720 Speaker 1: for thousands of years. I'm Dan Flores, and this is 5 00:00:19,760 --> 00:00:24,520 Speaker 1: the American West, brought to you by velvet Buck. Still 6 00:00:24,560 --> 00:00:27,960 Speaker 1: in barrel, Velvet Buck arrives this summer just in time 7 00:00:28,120 --> 00:00:31,080 Speaker 1: for the season that calls us home. A portion of 8 00:00:31,200 --> 00:00:35,839 Speaker 1: every bottle supports backcountry hunters and anglers to protect public lands, 9 00:00:36,040 --> 00:00:59,000 Speaker 1: waters and wildlife enjoy responsibly. Old Man America in the 10 00:00:59,040 --> 00:01:03,000 Speaker 1: remotest time of early North America, after he had molded 11 00:01:03,080 --> 00:01:06,800 Speaker 1: mud from the ocean bottom into mountains, plains, and forests 12 00:01:06,880 --> 00:01:11,000 Speaker 1: to create the essential topography of the continent, Coyote was 13 00:01:11,080 --> 00:01:15,640 Speaker 1: going along. He had placed stars in the sky, some 14 00:01:15,840 --> 00:01:19,680 Speaker 1: as pictures, some as a latticed road across the night. 15 00:01:20,240 --> 00:01:24,200 Speaker 1: Some tossed willy nilly into the inky black. He had 16 00:01:24,280 --> 00:01:27,880 Speaker 1: arranged the year into four seasons, and he had populated 17 00:01:27,920 --> 00:01:32,360 Speaker 1: the world with humans as the special helper of the Creator, 18 00:01:32,640 --> 00:01:36,080 Speaker 1: who seemed not especially interested in any of this hands 19 00:01:36,120 --> 00:01:41,000 Speaker 1: on creation work himself. Coyote had killed monster after monster 20 00:01:41,160 --> 00:01:43,880 Speaker 1: on behalf of his human charges, who he had then 21 00:01:44,000 --> 00:01:48,600 Speaker 1: located in good monster free spots across America. He had 22 00:01:48,600 --> 00:01:52,640 Speaker 1: released animals like buffalo from underground, and admittedly with a 23 00:01:52,680 --> 00:01:56,480 Speaker 1: few unlucky mistakes, had placed salmon and other fish and 24 00:01:56,560 --> 00:02:00,080 Speaker 1: many of the rivers. He had invented penises and z 25 00:02:00,120 --> 00:02:02,560 Speaker 1: giinas and taught humans what to do with them, and 26 00:02:02,640 --> 00:02:06,760 Speaker 1: he created a sexual division of labor among men and women. 27 00:02:07,600 --> 00:02:12,440 Speaker 1: The first technology in the form of fire, came from Coyote. Then, 28 00:02:12,720 --> 00:02:17,919 Speaker 1: not without some remorse, he had introduced death to the world. Now, 29 00:02:17,960 --> 00:02:21,760 Speaker 1: with all these fundamental creations in place, Coyote had no 30 00:02:21,880 --> 00:02:25,560 Speaker 1: intention of stepping into the background or hiding himself. He 31 00:02:25,639 --> 00:02:41,200 Speaker 1: wanted to enjoy how much humans appreciated his creativity. One morning, 32 00:02:41,240 --> 00:02:44,840 Speaker 1: Coyote was going along and spotted a handsome young warrior 33 00:02:45,080 --> 00:02:47,760 Speaker 1: who told Coyote he was embarking on a journey of 34 00:02:47,800 --> 00:02:52,400 Speaker 1: war against his enemies. Although Coyote was actually a peaceful 35 00:02:52,440 --> 00:02:54,840 Speaker 1: sword who thought war and battles to the death were 36 00:02:54,960 --> 00:02:58,079 Speaker 1: very bad ideas, he told his new companion that he 37 00:02:58,120 --> 00:03:01,720 Speaker 1: was a famous warrior and would be indispensable on the quest. 38 00:03:02,840 --> 00:03:05,359 Speaker 1: That first night, the warrior said they would camp at 39 00:03:05,360 --> 00:03:09,840 Speaker 1: a place called scalped Man by the fire. Coyote did 40 00:03:09,880 --> 00:03:12,760 Speaker 1: not like the sound of that. At the camp, Kyote 41 00:03:12,919 --> 00:03:15,840 Speaker 1: relaxed while the warrior cooked and did all the chores. 42 00:03:16,200 --> 00:03:19,440 Speaker 1: Then Coyote took the best pieces of the meal for himself, 43 00:03:19,720 --> 00:03:22,799 Speaker 1: even laying extra meat over his chest and legs in 44 00:03:22,800 --> 00:03:26,320 Speaker 1: case he woke hungry in the night. Sometime in the night, 45 00:03:26,400 --> 00:03:29,320 Speaker 1: Coyote heard a sound, and when he looked, there was 46 00:03:29,440 --> 00:03:32,640 Speaker 1: scalp man standing over him. Quick as he could, he 47 00:03:32,720 --> 00:03:36,280 Speaker 1: swung his club, but somehow what he hit was his knee, 48 00:03:36,640 --> 00:03:40,200 Speaker 1: which caused him to yowl in pain, waking the warrior. 49 00:03:41,120 --> 00:03:44,080 Speaker 1: I have taken care of Scalpman, Coyote told him, and 50 00:03:44,120 --> 00:03:47,760 Speaker 1: they went back to sleep. Having clubbed his own knee, 51 00:03:48,000 --> 00:03:50,839 Speaker 1: Coyote leapt through much of the next day, but made 52 00:03:50,880 --> 00:03:54,840 Speaker 1: it okay to a camp called cooked meat flying all around. 53 00:03:55,680 --> 00:03:58,960 Speaker 1: But when Coyote heard the warrior described the next night's 54 00:03:59,000 --> 00:04:02,840 Speaker 1: camp where the the arrows fly around, his knee suddenly 55 00:04:02,840 --> 00:04:06,720 Speaker 1: took a turn for the worse. Coyote lagged far behind 56 00:04:06,800 --> 00:04:10,000 Speaker 1: that next day, hoping for a camp somewhere else, but 57 00:04:10,120 --> 00:04:13,920 Speaker 1: the warrior led them on that night. Arrows began to 58 00:04:14,000 --> 00:04:17,680 Speaker 1: fly from every direction. The warrior stood and caught one 59 00:04:17,800 --> 00:04:21,479 Speaker 1: after another, while Coyote twisted and twirled and crawled on 60 00:04:21,520 --> 00:04:25,239 Speaker 1: the ground, trying to avoid them, until one arrow grazed 61 00:04:25,240 --> 00:04:29,520 Speaker 1: his arm. I've been killed, Coyote shouted, But when the 62 00:04:29,560 --> 00:04:32,120 Speaker 1: warrior pulled him to his feet and he found himself 63 00:04:32,160 --> 00:04:36,360 Speaker 1: still alive, Coyote asserted that actually his hurt knee had 64 00:04:36,400 --> 00:04:38,960 Speaker 1: caused him to fall asleep, and he had been dreaming. 65 00:04:40,160 --> 00:04:42,560 Speaker 1: The next night, their camp was at a place called 66 00:04:42,839 --> 00:04:46,400 Speaker 1: where the women visit the men. This place sounded like 67 00:04:46,440 --> 00:04:50,560 Speaker 1: an excellent camp to Coyote. His knee improved so remarkably 68 00:04:50,600 --> 00:04:53,440 Speaker 1: that day that he got far ahead on their march. 69 00:04:54,400 --> 00:04:57,240 Speaker 1: That night, a woman did come to Coyote, but in 70 00:04:57,279 --> 00:05:01,360 Speaker 1: the darkness he believed her to be old. Hoping much 71 00:05:01,440 --> 00:05:05,120 Speaker 1: younger women would arrive, he sent her away, only to 72 00:05:05,160 --> 00:05:07,480 Speaker 1: see in the firelight as she turned away that in 73 00:05:07,520 --> 00:05:12,039 Speaker 1: fact she was young and very beautiful. Coyote cried out 74 00:05:12,040 --> 00:05:14,520 Speaker 1: for her to return, telling her it had been some 75 00:05:14,800 --> 00:05:17,760 Speaker 1: spirit who had told her to leave, but she vanished 76 00:05:17,760 --> 00:05:21,880 Speaker 1: into the night. The camp following this one was called 77 00:05:22,240 --> 00:05:25,920 Speaker 1: war Clubs. Flying around all that day Coyote's knee hurt 78 00:05:26,000 --> 00:05:28,560 Speaker 1: so much that he was barely able to arrive at 79 00:05:28,560 --> 00:05:32,640 Speaker 1: the spot sure enough that night, clubs twirled at them 80 00:05:32,680 --> 00:05:36,360 Speaker 1: from every direction. The warrior caught to one for each 81 00:05:36,400 --> 00:05:39,520 Speaker 1: of them, but Coyote dodged and weaved so much that 82 00:05:39,600 --> 00:05:43,400 Speaker 1: a club finally beamed him. When he came to, Coyote 83 00:05:43,440 --> 00:05:46,440 Speaker 1: told the warrior that in his boredom, he had actually 84 00:05:46,520 --> 00:05:49,320 Speaker 1: just fallen asleep. That's why he had been lying so 85 00:05:49,480 --> 00:05:53,400 Speaker 1: flat and still. Then the warrior told Coyote that their 86 00:05:53,480 --> 00:05:56,800 Speaker 1: next camp was to be at a place called Vagina's 87 00:05:56,800 --> 00:06:00,760 Speaker 1: Flying around, Coyote's knee at once felt into entirely well, 88 00:06:01,000 --> 00:06:03,960 Speaker 1: and he was ready to depart then and there. He 89 00:06:04,040 --> 00:06:08,240 Speaker 1: pleaded for more details, but the warrior fell asleep. Coyote 90 00:06:08,320 --> 00:06:11,000 Speaker 1: sat by the fire all night, thinking of vaginas and 91 00:06:11,040 --> 00:06:12,919 Speaker 1: how many he might be able to carry with it. 92 00:06:13,800 --> 00:06:16,880 Speaker 1: His knee now stronger than had ever been in his life, 93 00:06:17,200 --> 00:06:20,520 Speaker 1: Coyote left early and ranged far ahead the next day. 94 00:06:21,600 --> 00:06:24,880 Speaker 1: That night, as promised, vaginas began to sail into camp, 95 00:06:25,080 --> 00:06:27,880 Speaker 1: and Coyote could tell they were just the kind he liked, 96 00:06:27,960 --> 00:06:31,599 Speaker 1: Young and plump. For most of the night, juicy vaginas 97 00:06:31,640 --> 00:06:35,480 Speaker 1: whizzed maddeningly out of reach, with Coyote flailing and chasing 98 00:06:35,520 --> 00:06:39,600 Speaker 1: and panning until he was near collapsed. Finally, near dawn, 99 00:06:39,720 --> 00:06:43,240 Speaker 1: Coyote caught one, but exhausted as he was when he 100 00:06:43,320 --> 00:06:47,920 Speaker 1: finally pinned it and mounted it, Coyote's organ resolutely refused 101 00:06:47,920 --> 00:06:51,680 Speaker 1: to rise to the occasion. The next night was their 102 00:06:51,760 --> 00:06:55,400 Speaker 1: final camp, and the warrior told Coyote this one was 103 00:06:55,480 --> 00:07:00,400 Speaker 1: called where the enemy attacks without delay. Coyote his knee 104 00:07:00,400 --> 00:07:03,400 Speaker 1: began to throb, and all day long he hung back 105 00:07:03,440 --> 00:07:06,840 Speaker 1: on the trail, crying piteously, and sure enough, when the 106 00:07:06,880 --> 00:07:11,040 Speaker 1: next morning came, enemies attacked from all sides. Coyote at 107 00:07:11,080 --> 00:07:17,160 Speaker 1: once ran for far horizons, but was overtaken, clubbed, and scouted. Meanwhile, 108 00:07:17,200 --> 00:07:22,160 Speaker 1: the warriors subdued all his enemies, then looked for Coyote. 109 00:07:22,280 --> 00:07:25,760 Speaker 1: When he knew all was clear, Coyote stood and announced 110 00:07:25,760 --> 00:07:28,280 Speaker 1: that he was going along now, but the warriors should 111 00:07:28,280 --> 00:07:32,320 Speaker 1: consider himself lucky that he had happened upon Coyote, otherwise 112 00:07:32,400 --> 00:07:34,960 Speaker 1: he would have had to engage in this adventure with 113 00:07:35,160 --> 00:07:46,920 Speaker 1: no help at all. From a famous warrior. Stories about Coyote, 114 00:07:47,080 --> 00:07:51,120 Speaker 1: often called Old Man coyote and rarely, although they are 115 00:07:51,280 --> 00:07:55,160 Speaker 1: present in the Cannon. Stories about old Woman coyote are 116 00:07:55,200 --> 00:08:00,320 Speaker 1: the oldest preserved human stories from North America. Both is 117 00:08:00,360 --> 00:08:04,520 Speaker 1: that coyote spelled with upper case a capital see to 118 00:08:04,600 --> 00:08:08,320 Speaker 1: distinguish the deity version from the ordinary coyote trotting by 119 00:08:08,440 --> 00:08:13,920 Speaker 1: while you read is America's oldest surviving literary figure. He 120 00:08:14,080 --> 00:08:17,360 Speaker 1: is also the most ancient god figure of which we 121 00:08:17,480 --> 00:08:21,800 Speaker 1: have record from the continent. When Siberian hunters first started 122 00:08:21,840 --> 00:08:25,840 Speaker 1: boting down the coastlines are crossing Beringia, at some point 123 00:08:25,880 --> 00:08:29,880 Speaker 1: in their entry of northwestern America, they began to encounter coyotes. 124 00:08:30,360 --> 00:08:33,040 Speaker 1: Wolves they knew from Asia and well enough that at 125 00:08:33,080 --> 00:08:36,000 Speaker 1: some point in their migration, these first Americans arrived with 126 00:08:36,120 --> 00:08:41,000 Speaker 1: domesticated ones, wolf like dogs whose wild ancestors in those 127 00:08:41,040 --> 00:08:44,640 Speaker 1: times were recent. But by the time of the Clovis 128 00:08:44,720 --> 00:08:48,000 Speaker 1: people at least, who spread to America more than thirteen 129 00:08:48,080 --> 00:08:54,920 Speaker 1: thousand years ago, continental coyotes were familiar creatures. Intriguingly, something 130 00:08:54,960 --> 00:09:01,119 Speaker 1: about coyotes captured the imaginations of these first Americans. Religious 131 00:09:01,120 --> 00:09:05,079 Speaker 1: explanations for the world and how it works are untold, thousands, 132 00:09:05,160 --> 00:09:10,000 Speaker 1: maybe millions of years old, so these former Siberians arrived 133 00:09:10,000 --> 00:09:14,199 Speaker 1: with intact religions and deities. But as these first human 134 00:09:14,240 --> 00:09:17,960 Speaker 1: residents settled in from California to the Mississippi River, from 135 00:09:17,960 --> 00:09:22,600 Speaker 1: the Pacific northwest to future New Mexico and Arizona, Coyote 136 00:09:22,679 --> 00:09:27,000 Speaker 1: emerged as the deity of the ancient Contina. No one 137 00:09:27,040 --> 00:09:30,440 Speaker 1: knows when this happened or exactly how coyote came to 138 00:09:30,480 --> 00:09:34,600 Speaker 1: embody so many different people's creation stories and ruminations on 139 00:09:34,720 --> 00:09:39,040 Speaker 1: human nature. All we know now, based on the oral 140 00:09:39,120 --> 00:09:43,079 Speaker 1: coyote stories collected among American Indians and set down by 141 00:09:43,200 --> 00:09:47,640 Speaker 1: nineteenth and twentieth century ethnographers and folklores, is that there 142 00:09:47,679 --> 00:09:52,240 Speaker 1: were thousands of coyote tales. No other native deity in 143 00:09:52,320 --> 00:09:55,960 Speaker 1: America came anywhere close to producing a body of oral 144 00:09:56,000 --> 00:10:00,600 Speaker 1: literature to rival them. The story here about Coote and 145 00:10:00,640 --> 00:10:03,840 Speaker 1: his knee, although written in my own voice, in its 146 00:10:03,840 --> 00:10:07,840 Speaker 1: original form, was collected from the Wichitas of the southern plains, 147 00:10:08,480 --> 00:10:12,240 Speaker 1: But the opening paragraph of this episode I distilled from 148 00:10:12,400 --> 00:10:16,040 Speaker 1: several groups from all over the West, the Navajos in 149 00:10:16,080 --> 00:10:19,800 Speaker 1: the southwest, the Crows on the northern plains, the Kurrak, 150 00:10:19,880 --> 00:10:23,480 Speaker 1: and wasco in California, the Monomonee of the Great Lakes, 151 00:10:23,760 --> 00:10:27,000 Speaker 1: the Coalville and Klamath of the Pacific Northwest, and the 152 00:10:27,040 --> 00:10:31,760 Speaker 1: Salish in Blackfeet from the northern Rockies. For almost all 153 00:10:31,800 --> 00:10:35,040 Speaker 1: of the past ten thousand years west of the Mississippi River, 154 00:10:35,200 --> 00:10:40,400 Speaker 1: coyote has been America's universal deity. Originally, he was a 155 00:10:40,480 --> 00:10:45,240 Speaker 1: Paleolithic god, but he survived the millennia to appear among 156 00:10:45,400 --> 00:10:50,600 Speaker 1: agricultural peoples like the Wichitas. Ultimately, his fame reached as 157 00:10:50,640 --> 00:10:55,559 Speaker 1: far south as the Aztecs, who knew him as Wayway Coyotal. 158 00:10:56,600 --> 00:11:09,720 Speaker 1: Old Man Coyote truly is Old Man America. The history 159 00:11:09,760 --> 00:11:13,199 Speaker 1: of coyotes and the history of humans has many parallels, 160 00:11:13,480 --> 00:11:16,600 Speaker 1: but one difference between us is that across our own 161 00:11:16,679 --> 00:11:21,160 Speaker 1: evolutionary history, we humans have created thousands of philosophies of 162 00:11:21,280 --> 00:11:25,320 Speaker 1: meaning we call religions, while coyotes, so far as we 163 00:11:25,360 --> 00:11:30,760 Speaker 1: can tell, embrace no religious tradition beyond life the sacredness 164 00:11:30,800 --> 00:11:34,720 Speaker 1: of existence. In so far as we go, our oldest 165 00:11:34,760 --> 00:11:38,920 Speaker 1: forms of religious explanations featured animals as deities, a type 166 00:11:38,920 --> 00:11:42,960 Speaker 1: of religion called animism that was fashioned by humans living 167 00:11:43,040 --> 00:11:47,280 Speaker 1: their lives as hunters or hunter gatherers, what we might 168 00:11:47,360 --> 00:11:54,280 Speaker 1: call Coyotism is certainly a paleolithic religion. The famed psychologist 169 00:11:54,400 --> 00:11:57,719 Speaker 1: Carl Jung is only one of hundreds, from scientists to 170 00:11:57,800 --> 00:12:02,920 Speaker 1: poets who have found coyote enduringly fascinating, in part because 171 00:12:02,960 --> 00:12:07,480 Speaker 1: of how fundamental he is in human thought. In Jung's view, 172 00:12:07,880 --> 00:12:11,920 Speaker 1: the character of coyote is a faithful copy of an 173 00:12:12,000 --> 00:12:18,719 Speaker 1: absolutely undifferentiated human consciousness, a forerunner of the Savior, and 174 00:12:19,000 --> 00:12:23,760 Speaker 1: like him god, man and animal at once, he is 175 00:12:23,840 --> 00:12:33,560 Speaker 1: both subhuman and superhuman, a bestial and divine being. The 176 00:12:33,600 --> 00:12:39,080 Speaker 1: Western religious traditions of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity sprang from 177 00:12:39,200 --> 00:12:43,680 Speaker 1: later periods of human history, following our domestication of plants 178 00:12:43,679 --> 00:12:50,520 Speaker 1: and animals, what anthropologists called the Neolithic Revolution. Early religions 179 00:12:50,520 --> 00:12:54,840 Speaker 1: could feature animals, particularly the sacred bull, as deities, but 180 00:12:55,040 --> 00:13:00,559 Speaker 1: over time, hurting and agricultural cultures gradually replaced animal gods 181 00:13:01,040 --> 00:13:04,680 Speaker 1: along with gods of special places on the landscape, another 182 00:13:04,760 --> 00:13:10,320 Speaker 1: feature of animism with deities that assumed human form. The 183 00:13:10,360 --> 00:13:13,600 Speaker 1: Greek gods, who are so foundational in Western cultures, are 184 00:13:13,679 --> 00:13:18,000 Speaker 1: classical examples of this evolution. Four thousand years ago, the 185 00:13:18,040 --> 00:13:21,800 Speaker 1: Greeks replaced animal and plant deities with gods and goddesses 186 00:13:22,080 --> 00:13:26,560 Speaker 1: in human form, Artemis, who became a mistress of the 187 00:13:26,600 --> 00:13:30,680 Speaker 1: animals as a goddess of the hunt, and Demater, who 188 00:13:30,760 --> 00:13:34,840 Speaker 1: evolved into a human form goddess of wheat and crops. 189 00:13:36,320 --> 00:13:39,719 Speaker 1: One of the most intriguing questions about coyote is simply this, 190 00:13:40,320 --> 00:13:43,160 Speaker 1: Why did the ancient settlers of North America pick this 191 00:13:43,200 --> 00:13:47,160 Speaker 1: particular animal as their deity? Ten thousand years and more 192 00:13:47,160 --> 00:13:49,679 Speaker 1: in the past, the first Americans would have had many 193 00:13:49,720 --> 00:13:55,120 Speaker 1: scores of animal candidates for their deity figures. Charismatic creatures 194 00:13:55,200 --> 00:13:59,120 Speaker 1: like mammos or dire wolves or saber toothed cats might 195 00:13:59,160 --> 00:14:02,439 Speaker 1: seem to us more likely choices, and in the early 196 00:14:02,480 --> 00:14:06,320 Speaker 1: stages of human settlement, perhaps they had been gods. My 197 00:14:06,400 --> 00:14:09,760 Speaker 1: own speculation is that as the Wisconsin I says, gave 198 00:14:09,840 --> 00:14:13,439 Speaker 1: way to a rapidly warming world, joined at the same 199 00:14:13,520 --> 00:14:18,160 Speaker 1: time by the great simplification event known as the Pleistocene extinctions, 200 00:14:18,320 --> 00:14:21,800 Speaker 1: which took all three of my suggested species and many others. 201 00:14:22,560 --> 00:14:27,240 Speaker 1: The wild coyotes around Indian peoples of the time fascinated 202 00:14:27,280 --> 00:14:32,480 Speaker 1: them as creatures endowed with special abilities. I suspect that 203 00:14:32,560 --> 00:14:36,640 Speaker 1: it was the coyotes self evident ability to survive those 204 00:14:36,720 --> 00:14:41,280 Speaker 1: profound changes when the big charismatic species could not that 205 00:14:41,400 --> 00:14:46,120 Speaker 1: attracted human attention. There probably was also an easy identification 206 00:14:46,240 --> 00:14:50,040 Speaker 1: with the social lives of predatory wild coyotes that made 207 00:14:50,040 --> 00:14:56,360 Speaker 1: them feel familiar to human hunters. In his book Pueblo 208 00:14:56,520 --> 00:15:02,080 Speaker 1: Gods and Myths, anthropologists Hamilton Tyler writes that the ability 209 00:15:02,200 --> 00:15:05,120 Speaker 1: of an animal to become a god is in part 210 00:15:05,200 --> 00:15:09,120 Speaker 1: due to his symbolic potential, which is to say, the 211 00:15:09,240 --> 00:15:12,600 Speaker 1: number of ideas he can stand. For a god, even 212 00:15:12,640 --> 00:15:15,960 Speaker 1: the simplest god, is based upon a certain amount of 213 00:15:16,040 --> 00:15:22,160 Speaker 1: abstraction in the human mind. Another anthropologist, Lewis Hyde, believes 214 00:15:22,160 --> 00:15:26,760 Speaker 1: that coyote stories point to coyotes to teach about the mind. 215 00:15:27,640 --> 00:15:31,240 Speaker 1: The stories themselves look to predator pray relationships for the 216 00:15:31,240 --> 00:15:35,200 Speaker 1: birth of cunning. How it goes on, One reason native 217 00:15:35,240 --> 00:15:38,680 Speaker 1: observers may have chosen coyote is that the former in 218 00:15:38,800 --> 00:15:42,760 Speaker 1: fact does exhibit a great plasticity of behavior and is 219 00:15:42,800 --> 00:15:48,800 Speaker 1: therefore a consummate survivor in a shifting world, especially before 220 00:15:48,840 --> 00:15:52,560 Speaker 1: our lives in cities which obscured our deep dependency on 221 00:15:52,720 --> 00:15:56,920 Speaker 1: nature and diverted our powers of observation. We humans were 222 00:15:57,040 --> 00:16:01,520 Speaker 1: profound observers of the natural world. These early Americans would 223 00:16:01,600 --> 00:16:04,400 Speaker 1: not have failed to notice one other characteristic of wild 224 00:16:04,440 --> 00:16:08,640 Speaker 1: coyotes in a dangerous and changing world, that the secret 225 00:16:08,800 --> 00:16:12,880 Speaker 1: of their uncanny ability to survive everything nature through at 226 00:16:12,920 --> 00:16:17,840 Speaker 1: them lay in a remarkable intelligence, the kind of trickster 227 00:16:18,040 --> 00:16:21,840 Speaker 1: figures that hide mentions make up a very old human 228 00:16:21,920 --> 00:16:26,200 Speaker 1: religious figure found in many animistic religions around the world 229 00:16:26,480 --> 00:16:31,240 Speaker 1: in the form of many creatures hairs, spiders, blue jays, ravens, 230 00:16:31,600 --> 00:16:36,280 Speaker 1: even human figures like the Norse trickster Loki. But here 231 00:16:36,320 --> 00:16:39,520 Speaker 1: in America, the coyote took up the mantle of a 232 00:16:39,600 --> 00:16:43,200 Speaker 1: god who lived by his wits. Having a smart god, 233 00:16:43,280 --> 00:16:47,840 Speaker 1: after all, was crucial to survival also to our understanding 234 00:16:47,920 --> 00:16:57,440 Speaker 1: of human nature in the animal within. In early American mythology, 235 00:16:57,520 --> 00:17:02,920 Speaker 1: coyote is almost never the ultimate cause God. More often, 236 00:17:03,000 --> 00:17:06,000 Speaker 1: as in the coyote stories from people like the Salish 237 00:17:06,080 --> 00:17:11,000 Speaker 1: and the Nespers, he's an immortal helper deity, semi divine 238 00:17:11,359 --> 00:17:15,359 Speaker 1: and present and engaged in earthly life. Most often in 239 00:17:15,400 --> 00:17:20,359 Speaker 1: the stories, coyote inhabits the world before humankind. Sometimes his 240 00:17:20,440 --> 00:17:23,159 Speaker 1: initial form is human, which he gives up for his 241 00:17:23,280 --> 00:17:27,280 Speaker 1: coyote body once humans are present. In stories that are 242 00:17:27,320 --> 00:17:31,640 Speaker 1: set following the creation, however, coyote is commonly a kind 243 00:17:31,640 --> 00:17:35,919 Speaker 1: of an anthropomorphic animal, a coyote man. He preserves a 244 00:17:36,000 --> 00:17:38,720 Speaker 1: tale and a sharp muzzle and erect ears, but he 245 00:17:38,800 --> 00:17:41,880 Speaker 1: stands and walks upright, has a wife and a family, 246 00:17:42,160 --> 00:17:45,600 Speaker 1: and is capable of shape shifting into a form so 247 00:17:45,880 --> 00:17:49,360 Speaker 1: human like that often the other characters in a story 248 00:17:49,640 --> 00:17:53,679 Speaker 1: only suspect by his behavior that they are dealing with 249 00:17:53,920 --> 00:17:58,119 Speaker 1: Coyote himself. It does not take very much time or 250 00:17:58,160 --> 00:18:01,359 Speaker 1: analytical effort with the coyote s tales to draw a 251 00:18:01,400 --> 00:18:05,359 Speaker 1: conclusion about who Coyote really is, and that realization is 252 00:18:05,440 --> 00:18:09,800 Speaker 1: what makes him so intriguing. As a god. Coyote is 253 00:18:09,880 --> 00:18:15,320 Speaker 1: the god within his mythical function in the beginning is creation. 254 00:18:16,040 --> 00:18:19,200 Speaker 1: Coyote takes the basic structure of the world as set 255 00:18:19,240 --> 00:18:22,600 Speaker 1: in motion by the Creator, then improves on it and 256 00:18:22,720 --> 00:18:26,800 Speaker 1: gives it the natural laws that make it work that done. 257 00:18:26,960 --> 00:18:29,960 Speaker 1: His larger purpose in the many oral stories about him 258 00:18:30,359 --> 00:18:34,399 Speaker 1: is to reveal human nature more clearly and rather than 259 00:18:34,440 --> 00:18:39,400 Speaker 1: a perfect deity, Jung's savior figure a Jesus who teaches 260 00:18:39,520 --> 00:18:42,880 Speaker 1: a codified morality and is set up as a role 261 00:18:42,960 --> 00:18:49,000 Speaker 1: model for humans. Coyote personifies the full suite of humanity's traits, 262 00:18:49,480 --> 00:18:54,840 Speaker 1: good and bad. As a character, Coyote is the full Monty. 263 00:18:55,359 --> 00:19:01,840 Speaker 1: He's at once admirable, inspirational, imaginative, inner, energetic, a whirlwind 264 00:19:01,920 --> 00:19:06,160 Speaker 1: biophysical force with a large capacity for taking sensuous pleasure 265 00:19:06,359 --> 00:19:12,000 Speaker 1: in life. But he's also selfish, vain, deceitful, and quite 266 00:19:12,000 --> 00:19:17,560 Speaker 1: often envious, lustful, and ridiculous, possessed of an overconfidence that 267 00:19:17,720 --> 00:19:22,880 Speaker 1: gets him into endless fixes. Coyote's major flaw, resulting from 268 00:19:22,880 --> 00:19:25,760 Speaker 1: a combination of all of his human traits, is that 269 00:19:25,800 --> 00:19:31,639 Speaker 1: he finds cause, sometimes admirably, sometimes laughably, never to be 270 00:19:31,920 --> 00:19:36,080 Speaker 1: quite satisfied with the world, And because he is invariably 271 00:19:36,160 --> 00:19:40,520 Speaker 1: unable to predict consequences with any accuracy, his tinkering with 272 00:19:40,600 --> 00:19:44,760 Speaker 1: the world can produce disaster, especially and this is a 273 00:19:44,800 --> 00:19:48,360 Speaker 1: major theme in so many of the stories for Coyote himself. 274 00:19:52,680 --> 00:19:56,159 Speaker 1: Coyote is almost universally referred to as a trickster. But 275 00:19:56,240 --> 00:19:59,760 Speaker 1: after reading many scores of Native Coyote stories, I've begun 276 00:19:59,760 --> 00:20:03,080 Speaker 1: to think think we've been missing the point. While there 277 00:20:03,160 --> 00:20:07,520 Speaker 1: are certainly stories that feature tricks, the foolly is actually 278 00:20:07,640 --> 00:20:11,000 Speaker 1: just a means to an end. Again and again, the 279 00:20:11,119 --> 00:20:14,560 Speaker 1: point is not the trick. The point is why the 280 00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:18,639 Speaker 1: trick works, and invariably the reason is a result of 281 00:20:18,680 --> 00:20:23,040 Speaker 1: the foibles of human nature. These stories survive for thousands 282 00:20:23,080 --> 00:20:27,560 Speaker 1: of years because there's such penetrating exposees of the human condition. 283 00:20:28,359 --> 00:20:31,840 Speaker 1: Coyote was at his best when he taught lessons, almost 284 00:20:31,880 --> 00:20:36,400 Speaker 1: always uncomfortable or funny, ones about human behavior and motives. 285 00:20:39,600 --> 00:20:43,640 Speaker 1: As North America's oldest surviving deity, Coyote has bequeathed us 286 00:20:43,680 --> 00:20:49,719 Speaker 1: a continental world of imagination, creation, artistry, also hubrious and trouble, 287 00:20:50,400 --> 00:20:53,720 Speaker 1: it's difficult not to see the Coyote impulse writ large 288 00:20:53,800 --> 00:20:57,439 Speaker 1: in humanity. In deed, to my mind, therein lies a 289 00:20:57,600 --> 00:21:02,040 Speaker 1: test for stories about old men America, given what we 290 00:21:02,200 --> 00:21:07,440 Speaker 1: now know about ourselves using the modern tools of evolutionary 291 00:21:07,480 --> 00:21:12,720 Speaker 1: psychology and neuroscience. Looking at these ancient stories with twenty 292 00:21:12,720 --> 00:21:17,480 Speaker 1: first century insight, what can we say about how accurately 293 00:21:17,600 --> 00:21:22,640 Speaker 1: they show that people living thousands of years ago understood 294 00:21:22,760 --> 00:21:26,120 Speaker 1: as well as we do today exactly who we humans are. 295 00:21:27,600 --> 00:21:31,440 Speaker 1: The acquisition of status in games of romance and love, 296 00:21:32,440 --> 00:21:38,520 Speaker 1: experiential jolts to enhance neurochemistry and mood states a mind 297 00:21:38,680 --> 00:21:43,879 Speaker 1: conflicted over sin and virtue. For the long ago Americans 298 00:21:43,920 --> 00:21:47,800 Speaker 1: who selected wild coyotes as a suitable avatar for their 299 00:21:47,840 --> 00:21:51,520 Speaker 1: earthly deity, then worked out so many stories about him. 300 00:21:51,920 --> 00:21:55,200 Speaker 1: What better subjects for the adventures of their coyote god 301 00:21:55,320 --> 00:21:59,359 Speaker 1: than these, No doubt, Over the centuries, storytellers of Mark 302 00:21:59,440 --> 00:22:03,720 Speaker 1: Twain like Brilliance dazzled audiences laid into the night with 303 00:22:03,840 --> 00:22:09,080 Speaker 1: the many astounding adventures of Coyote, and romanticize their people's 304 00:22:09,119 --> 00:22:14,240 Speaker 1: trajectory through time. Coyote often operates as the very god 305 00:22:14,320 --> 00:22:18,760 Speaker 1: of Richard Dawkins's selfish gene, in which form his character 306 00:22:18,960 --> 00:22:23,600 Speaker 1: is usually that of a self absorbed buffoon. The stories 307 00:22:23,680 --> 00:22:27,720 Speaker 1: are that holds up such behavior and plain view. For 308 00:22:27,960 --> 00:22:34,119 Speaker 1: comic ridicule, Coyote stories were wildly entertaining. It was still 309 00:22:34,240 --> 00:22:38,760 Speaker 1: is perversely pleasurable to observe a character who so blithely 310 00:22:38,840 --> 00:22:44,160 Speaker 1: ignores rules and restrictions, usually with predictable results. Although benefits 311 00:22:44,200 --> 00:22:47,680 Speaker 1: from rule breaking happen often enough with Coyote to keep 312 00:22:47,720 --> 00:22:53,280 Speaker 1: things interesting, but a moral code it's rarely there, nor 313 00:22:53,440 --> 00:22:57,960 Speaker 1: are there promises of eternal life salvation from death, that 314 00:22:58,200 --> 00:23:02,920 Speaker 1: ancient and oppressive burden of our self awareness. What Old 315 00:23:02,920 --> 00:23:07,960 Speaker 1: Man America teaches us instead is delight in being alive 316 00:23:08,200 --> 00:23:13,879 Speaker 1: in a world of wondrous possibilities. Coyotism is a philosophy 317 00:23:14,000 --> 00:23:17,280 Speaker 1: for the realists among us, those who can do a 318 00:23:17,400 --> 00:23:21,679 Speaker 1: Cormac McCarthy like appraisal of human motives but find a 319 00:23:21,800 --> 00:23:25,520 Speaker 1: kind of chagrined humor in the act, who may think 320 00:23:25,560 --> 00:23:30,359 Speaker 1: of the human story as cyclical, even predictable, because human 321 00:23:30,480 --> 00:23:43,040 Speaker 1: nature never seems to change. These ancient stories from across 322 00:23:43,080 --> 00:23:47,080 Speaker 1: Western America lay death for all of us directly on 323 00:23:47,200 --> 00:23:53,320 Speaker 1: Coyote's doorstep, and story after story, it is Coyote who decreed, 324 00:23:53,840 --> 00:23:58,600 Speaker 1: for two admittedly rather admirable reasons, that all human beings 325 00:23:58,640 --> 00:24:02,800 Speaker 1: would have to die if humans never died. Coyote reason 326 00:24:03,359 --> 00:24:05,600 Speaker 1: this explanation is a part of stories from both the 327 00:24:05,680 --> 00:24:10,520 Speaker 1: Yanas of California and the Navajos of the Southwest. Overpopulation 328 00:24:10,800 --> 00:24:14,560 Speaker 1: and the destruction of the earth would be the result. Hence, 329 00:24:14,600 --> 00:24:19,800 Speaker 1: the initial reason Coyote invented death was actually an environmental one. 330 00:24:20,880 --> 00:24:24,600 Speaker 1: The Yanas said it was Coyote, who made it law 331 00:24:24,760 --> 00:24:27,919 Speaker 1: that humans would have to die to create space for 332 00:24:27,960 --> 00:24:32,919 Speaker 1: the generations down the timeline. Coyote also rationalized death for 333 00:24:32,960 --> 00:24:38,560 Speaker 1: a second reason, this time as a great teacher about life. Well, 334 00:24:38,680 --> 00:24:41,960 Speaker 1: you know, if you die, then you really have to 335 00:24:42,040 --> 00:24:45,760 Speaker 1: take life seriously. You have to think about things more. 336 00:24:47,280 --> 00:24:51,600 Speaker 1: Coyote himself was immortal, but when death visited him directly, 337 00:24:51,960 --> 00:24:55,479 Speaker 1: he had some serious second thoughts about what a good idea. 338 00:24:55,600 --> 00:24:59,720 Speaker 1: Death was one of the most poignant of all Coyote stories. 339 00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:04,280 Speaker 1: He's a nest purse account called Coyote and the Shadow People. 340 00:25:04,880 --> 00:25:08,120 Speaker 1: It's something close to a North American version of the 341 00:25:08,119 --> 00:25:12,960 Speaker 1: Greek myth of Orpheus and his wife Eurydus. I tell 342 00:25:13,040 --> 00:25:16,840 Speaker 1: it here rewritten in my own voice from the original 343 00:25:16,880 --> 00:25:27,040 Speaker 1: ethnographic account. Coyote and his wife were living happily when 344 00:25:27,080 --> 00:25:31,919 Speaker 1: she became sick. When she died, Coyote was overcome with 345 00:25:32,040 --> 00:25:35,800 Speaker 1: grief and loneliness. Others had died, but this was different. 346 00:25:36,680 --> 00:25:39,480 Speaker 1: So when death spirit came to him and offered to 347 00:25:39,520 --> 00:25:42,520 Speaker 1: take him to the place where his wife had gone, Coyote, 348 00:25:42,560 --> 00:25:46,160 Speaker 1: who was filled with hope, What I tell you, said, 349 00:25:46,200 --> 00:25:49,840 Speaker 1: Death Spirit, you must do everything exactly as I say. 350 00:25:50,200 --> 00:25:53,080 Speaker 1: Not once are you to disregard my commands and do 351 00:25:53,240 --> 00:25:58,159 Speaker 1: something else. So Coyote traveled with Death Spirit, thinking of 352 00:25:58,240 --> 00:26:01,320 Speaker 1: his wife, but noticing that his god was very difficult 353 00:26:01,359 --> 00:26:04,400 Speaker 1: to see and follow. He looked more like a shadow 354 00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:08,240 Speaker 1: than anything real. When he pointed out herds of horses 355 00:26:08,280 --> 00:26:11,560 Speaker 1: in the plane over which they traveled our bushes covered 356 00:26:11,600 --> 00:26:16,680 Speaker 1: in service berries, Coyote saw nothing, but he exclaimed over 357 00:26:16,720 --> 00:26:21,200 Speaker 1: the horses and pretended to eat the berries. Soon enough, 358 00:26:21,200 --> 00:26:24,120 Speaker 1: the guide announced that they had arrived and led Kyote 359 00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:26,679 Speaker 1: to where his wife was said to be sitting with 360 00:26:26,840 --> 00:26:32,000 Speaker 1: many others inside a very very long lodge. Again, the 361 00:26:32,040 --> 00:26:36,560 Speaker 1: spirit cautioned Coyote to do exactly as he said. Coyote 362 00:26:36,600 --> 00:26:39,439 Speaker 1: made every effort to do so, but while he felt 363 00:26:39,480 --> 00:26:42,840 Speaker 1: the spirit's presence, as far as he could see, they 364 00:26:42,840 --> 00:26:46,680 Speaker 1: were sitting in an open prairie. But Death Spirit told 365 00:26:46,720 --> 00:26:49,639 Speaker 1: him that conditions were different here, that when night fell 366 00:26:49,720 --> 00:26:52,800 Speaker 1: in the living world, it would be dawn in this place. 367 00:26:53,800 --> 00:26:57,400 Speaker 1: Sure enough, when night fell, Coyote began to hear people whispering. 368 00:26:57,840 --> 00:27:00,439 Speaker 1: He began to see many fires in the lot, and 369 00:27:00,520 --> 00:27:03,879 Speaker 1: to recognize old friends, whom he greeted and was able 370 00:27:03,920 --> 00:27:08,000 Speaker 1: to walk about with and reminisce, and he was overjoyed 371 00:27:08,040 --> 00:27:11,760 Speaker 1: to find his wife at his side. Late in the day, 372 00:27:11,800 --> 00:27:14,120 Speaker 1: the people began to grow faint and hard to see. 373 00:27:14,400 --> 00:27:16,520 Speaker 1: Then the spirit came to him and told him that 374 00:27:16,640 --> 00:27:20,680 Speaker 1: as Don came in the living world, night came for them, 375 00:27:21,000 --> 00:27:24,280 Speaker 1: but that Coyote should remain where he sat and not move, 376 00:27:24,640 --> 00:27:28,960 Speaker 1: and Coyote said he would. When Don came, Coyote found 377 00:27:29,040 --> 00:27:32,720 Speaker 1: himself sitting in the open prairie. As instructed, He remain 378 00:27:32,800 --> 00:27:36,120 Speaker 1: there all day, broiling in the heat, but sitting as 379 00:27:36,119 --> 00:27:39,800 Speaker 1: he had been told. This went on for several dawns 380 00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:43,720 Speaker 1: and several nights, with Coyote's friends and his wife returning 381 00:27:43,760 --> 00:27:47,680 Speaker 1: and making merry, then fading as Don came, and kyoteing 382 00:27:47,760 --> 00:27:51,879 Speaker 1: waiting patiently in the heat of the day. Finally, after 383 00:27:51,920 --> 00:27:54,520 Speaker 1: too long, the death spirit came to him and said, 384 00:27:55,200 --> 00:27:58,760 Speaker 1: tomorrow you will go home. You will take your wife 385 00:27:58,800 --> 00:28:02,359 Speaker 1: with you. He told Coyote they would travel for five 386 00:28:02,480 --> 00:28:05,520 Speaker 1: days and pass five mountains, and that while he could 387 00:28:05,600 --> 00:28:08,280 Speaker 1: talk with his wife no matter what, he should not 388 00:28:08,440 --> 00:28:11,080 Speaker 1: touch her. That he should never lay a hand on 389 00:28:11,200 --> 00:28:14,640 Speaker 1: her until they had passed the last of the five mountains. 390 00:28:15,040 --> 00:28:20,080 Speaker 1: Then the spirit admonished Coyote, You, Coyote, must guard against 391 00:28:20,119 --> 00:28:27,720 Speaker 1: your inclination to do foolish things. At dawn, Coyote and 392 00:28:27,760 --> 00:28:31,560 Speaker 1: his wife started out, although Coyote could barely discern her, 393 00:28:32,320 --> 00:28:35,280 Speaker 1: but when they crossed the first mountain, Coyote could feel 394 00:28:35,320 --> 00:28:38,640 Speaker 1: her presence more strongly. When they camped on the homeward 395 00:28:38,720 --> 00:28:41,640 Speaker 1: side of the second mountain, she became clearer to him, 396 00:28:42,120 --> 00:28:45,479 Speaker 1: and in the next camp, beyond the third mountain, clearer still. 397 00:28:46,520 --> 00:28:49,000 Speaker 1: Now they were making their fourth camp, with only the 398 00:28:49,120 --> 00:28:52,520 Speaker 1: final mountain to cross the next day, and Coyote could 399 00:28:52,560 --> 00:28:55,800 Speaker 1: at last see his wife's face and her young body. 400 00:28:56,240 --> 00:29:00,400 Speaker 1: She was almost a living person again, Kayo. He had 401 00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:03,640 Speaker 1: dared not reach out to her before, but now looking 402 00:29:03,680 --> 00:29:06,640 Speaker 1: at her right there with him, he was overcome with 403 00:29:06,760 --> 00:29:10,120 Speaker 1: joy at having her again, and so impulsively ran to 404 00:29:10,200 --> 00:29:15,560 Speaker 1: embrace her. Stop Stop, Coyote, she cried, but it was 405 00:29:15,600 --> 00:29:19,240 Speaker 1: too late. At the very instant he touched her body, 406 00:29:19,720 --> 00:29:25,120 Speaker 1: she vanished. On learning of Coyote's folly, death spirit was 407 00:29:25,200 --> 00:29:29,120 Speaker 1: furious and he did not hesitate You, Coyote were about 408 00:29:29,160 --> 00:29:33,080 Speaker 1: to establish the practice of returning from death. Only a 409 00:29:33,120 --> 00:29:36,040 Speaker 1: short time away the human race is coming, but you 410 00:29:36,080 --> 00:29:40,640 Speaker 1: have spoiled everything and established for them death as it is. 411 00:29:42,240 --> 00:29:45,680 Speaker 1: At this Coyote hung his head and wept. But then 412 00:29:45,720 --> 00:29:49,920 Speaker 1: he had an idea. Drawing himself up, he retraced the 413 00:29:50,040 --> 00:29:53,400 Speaker 1: journey he and death spirit had made. He tried with 414 00:29:53,600 --> 00:29:57,120 Speaker 1: all his might to see the horses taste the service berries. 415 00:29:57,800 --> 00:30:00,920 Speaker 1: He found the spot where the long law which had stood, 416 00:30:01,040 --> 00:30:03,760 Speaker 1: even where he had sat with his wife beside him, 417 00:30:04,080 --> 00:30:08,160 Speaker 1: And when night fell he strained to hear voices and seafires. 418 00:30:09,360 --> 00:30:14,200 Speaker 1: When down came, Coyote found himself sitting in an open 419 00:30:14,600 --> 00:30:39,040 Speaker 1: empty plane. God's come and go, But old Man America 420 00:30:39,240 --> 00:30:43,360 Speaker 1: was too useful a deity to abandon them. One example 421 00:30:43,400 --> 00:30:46,800 Speaker 1: of the native sense of coyote power famously occurred among 422 00:30:46,840 --> 00:30:51,840 Speaker 1: the Navajos during the greatest misfortune that ever befell them hunters, herders, 423 00:30:51,920 --> 00:30:54,720 Speaker 1: and raiders from the North who had arrived in four 424 00:30:54,800 --> 00:30:58,440 Speaker 1: corners of the Southwest some six hundred years ago. The 425 00:30:58,560 --> 00:31:02,560 Speaker 1: Navajos found themselves at war with US troops during most 426 00:31:02,640 --> 00:31:07,320 Speaker 1: of the eighteen fifties and early eighteen sixties, distracted by 427 00:31:07,320 --> 00:31:10,280 Speaker 1: the Civil War. In a fit of exasperation at the 428 00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:14,400 Speaker 1: success of Navajo raids. The Army sent Taos mountain man 429 00:31:14,480 --> 00:31:18,360 Speaker 1: and scout Kit Carson, in command of a contingent of troops, 430 00:31:18,400 --> 00:31:22,560 Speaker 1: into Navajo country in eighteen sixty three, where Carson's men 431 00:31:22,720 --> 00:31:27,840 Speaker 1: conducted a horrific scorched earth campaign against them. By eighteen 432 00:31:27,920 --> 00:31:31,440 Speaker 1: sixty four, some eight thousand Navajos had surrendered to the 433 00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:35,760 Speaker 1: Frontier Army, only to find themselves condemned to an incarceration 434 00:31:35,960 --> 00:31:40,320 Speaker 1: in eastern New Mexico, three hundred miles from home. Their 435 00:31:40,440 --> 00:31:44,280 Speaker 1: long walk to the Bosca Redondo prison camp and four 436 00:31:44,360 --> 00:31:47,880 Speaker 1: years of being held there under constant guard is one 437 00:31:47,920 --> 00:31:52,880 Speaker 1: of the most painful memories of Navajo history. But Navajos 438 00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:58,320 Speaker 1: also remember how this episode ended. After years of pleading 439 00:31:58,320 --> 00:32:01,920 Speaker 1: to return home and frequent breakouts of small groups that 440 00:32:02,000 --> 00:32:05,720 Speaker 1: fled westward across New Mexico, in eighteen sixty eight, the 441 00:32:05,840 --> 00:32:09,200 Speaker 1: US finally agreed to allow the Navajos to return to 442 00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:14,560 Speaker 1: their homeland. In Navajo oral tradition, the act that accomplished 443 00:32:14,560 --> 00:32:19,520 Speaker 1: this long for release was not negotiation or pleading, but 444 00:32:19,680 --> 00:32:25,120 Speaker 1: their ritual performance of a coyote way ceremony, which infused 445 00:32:25,320 --> 00:32:30,680 Speaker 1: Navajo leaders with enough coyote power finally to affect their release. 446 00:32:32,240 --> 00:32:38,080 Speaker 1: Coyote power, surviving by one's intelligence and wits when others cannot, 447 00:32:38,920 --> 00:32:45,000 Speaker 1: embracing existence in a mad, dancing, laughing, sympathetic expression of 448 00:32:45,080 --> 00:32:50,360 Speaker 1: pure joy at evading the grimmest of fates, exultation and 449 00:32:50,480 --> 00:32:56,000 Speaker 1: sheer aliveness, rueful chagrin at our shortcomings. These are the 450 00:32:56,120 --> 00:33:00,560 Speaker 1: lessons Old Man America has been granting for thousands of years. 451 00:33:01,600 --> 00:33:06,360 Speaker 1: Through those flashing canines. Coyote spoke truth, and he spoke 452 00:33:06,400 --> 00:33:09,760 Speaker 1: it across an unfathomable expanse of time. 453 00:33:25,480 --> 00:33:32,200 Speaker 2: In your in your podcast, you talked about, uh, this 454 00:33:32,320 --> 00:33:35,880 Speaker 2: idea that some that someone was the first, some person 455 00:33:36,320 --> 00:33:39,280 Speaker 2: was the first to be like, hey look a coyote. Yeah, 456 00:33:39,360 --> 00:33:43,600 Speaker 2: or coyote right. Uh. That's the thing I never thought 457 00:33:43,600 --> 00:33:45,560 Speaker 2: about with that animal. That's the thing I've wondered about 458 00:33:45,560 --> 00:33:47,840 Speaker 2: a lot, is if you if you accept this that 459 00:33:47,960 --> 00:33:53,680 Speaker 2: this leading theory that that the humans that came to 460 00:33:53,760 --> 00:33:57,080 Speaker 2: North American and South America passed through this kind of 461 00:33:57,160 --> 00:34:04,000 Speaker 2: arctic follow track, right, and they were Arctic people that 462 00:34:04,080 --> 00:34:12,400 Speaker 2: were living north of snakes. Okay, for instance, for generations. 463 00:34:12,960 --> 00:34:18,480 Speaker 2: I mean, all idea of snakes probably was going you know, 464 00:34:18,480 --> 00:34:21,560 Speaker 2: I mean it was like probably race, maybe there was 465 00:34:21,600 --> 00:34:26,279 Speaker 2: some narrative or story that still had it in mythology, 466 00:34:26,440 --> 00:34:29,040 Speaker 2: like probably like buy and large, it was not a 467 00:34:29,239 --> 00:34:33,000 Speaker 2: part of discussions. And then people start picking their way 468 00:34:33,040 --> 00:34:37,120 Speaker 2: down the continent, and there was the first not like 469 00:34:37,200 --> 00:34:39,359 Speaker 2: oh people like if you got into it, there would 470 00:34:39,360 --> 00:34:43,600 Speaker 2: be like a person. A person was the first to say, 471 00:34:44,200 --> 00:34:47,759 Speaker 2: look at that, Yeah, what is that? Do you know 472 00:34:47,800 --> 00:34:49,440 Speaker 2: what I mean? Like picture it? Right? You don't think 473 00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:53,440 Speaker 2: about the fact that someone that they were going like, look, 474 00:34:54,320 --> 00:34:55,560 Speaker 2: never seen one of those before. 475 00:34:56,560 --> 00:34:57,560 Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true. 476 00:34:57,960 --> 00:35:01,479 Speaker 2: It's just so hard. It happened so much much, right, 477 00:35:01,600 --> 00:35:04,000 Speaker 2: it happened hundreds of times over again, but it's so 478 00:35:04,080 --> 00:35:05,799 Speaker 2: hard to picture what that would have been, like, I. 479 00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:08,839 Speaker 1: Know, and it's a fascinating thing to imagine, you know. 480 00:35:08,880 --> 00:35:13,239 Speaker 1: I will say I've read an account one time by 481 00:35:14,719 --> 00:35:20,080 Speaker 1: it was an anthropologist who was arguing that we as humans, 482 00:35:20,160 --> 00:35:24,200 Speaker 1: because you know, most primates do have an aversion to snakes, 483 00:35:24,640 --> 00:35:28,320 Speaker 1: that we may even coming down through an arctic filter 484 00:35:28,480 --> 00:35:32,359 Speaker 1: like that, and having been not around snakes for who 485 00:35:32,360 --> 00:35:36,640 Speaker 1: knows fifteen thousand years or twenty thousand or whatever, that 486 00:35:36,719 --> 00:35:41,200 Speaker 1: we would have had a genetic memory of a snake 487 00:35:41,280 --> 00:35:44,680 Speaker 1: being alarming and hit. One of his arguments about that 488 00:35:44,840 --> 00:35:48,279 Speaker 1: was that he said, notice how easy it is to 489 00:35:48,360 --> 00:35:51,960 Speaker 1: teach a child not to reach out and touch a 490 00:35:52,000 --> 00:35:54,920 Speaker 1: snake or a spider. But it's hard to teach them 491 00:35:54,960 --> 00:35:57,120 Speaker 1: not to walk across the street in front of traffic 492 00:35:57,480 --> 00:36:01,680 Speaker 1: or not stick their hands in an outlet. But if 493 00:36:01,680 --> 00:36:04,920 Speaker 1: they get the whole spider and sake thing really fast. 494 00:36:04,680 --> 00:36:07,680 Speaker 2: Yeah, no, it's a great point. And that's why it 495 00:36:07,680 --> 00:36:11,680 Speaker 2: would be so good to have footage of this first 496 00:36:11,680 --> 00:36:14,279 Speaker 2: snake encounter. That's the thing to see if he just 497 00:36:14,400 --> 00:36:17,319 Speaker 2: tried to jump on it and grab it to bring 498 00:36:17,360 --> 00:36:22,200 Speaker 2: it home to show everybody, or if he thought, like, eah, yeah, 499 00:36:22,520 --> 00:36:24,319 Speaker 2: something about that thing. I don't know what it is, 500 00:36:24,360 --> 00:36:25,120 Speaker 2: but I like it. 501 00:36:25,840 --> 00:36:29,480 Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that may be the reaction something about it. Huh, 502 00:36:29,560 --> 00:36:30,879 Speaker 1: you want to get a slithering thing. 503 00:36:31,000 --> 00:36:33,600 Speaker 2: You don't need to get too many pages into the Bible, 504 00:36:33,600 --> 00:36:37,960 Speaker 2: and there's a snake. He's not a good guy. 505 00:36:38,680 --> 00:36:42,400 Speaker 1: No, that's that's true. But yeah, so somebody did see 506 00:36:43,200 --> 00:36:45,279 Speaker 1: as you have set us up for. Somebody did see 507 00:36:45,280 --> 00:36:47,160 Speaker 1: a coyote for the first time. And you know, the 508 00:36:47,239 --> 00:36:50,040 Speaker 1: thing that I was fascinated by when I sat down 509 00:36:50,640 --> 00:36:53,640 Speaker 1: to work on this podcast, and this one comes out 510 00:36:53,680 --> 00:36:58,680 Speaker 1: of my book Coyote America. When I was working on 511 00:36:58,680 --> 00:37:02,840 Speaker 1: that book, I was confronted with writing this chapter about 512 00:37:02,880 --> 00:37:07,000 Speaker 1: this animal that was a knew was one of the 513 00:37:07,040 --> 00:37:11,840 Speaker 1: most significant deities in North American history. The oldest deity 514 00:37:11,880 --> 00:37:15,000 Speaker 1: of which we have, the oldest literary figure actually of 515 00:37:15,040 --> 00:37:18,880 Speaker 1: which we have any kind of knowledge, is Coyote with 516 00:37:18,920 --> 00:37:23,120 Speaker 1: a capital C, this little canid that so many Native 517 00:37:23,120 --> 00:37:25,520 Speaker 1: people made into a kind of a deity, or a 518 00:37:25,560 --> 00:37:30,440 Speaker 1: semidity at least. And what I was confronted with was 519 00:37:31,200 --> 00:37:33,839 Speaker 1: about one hundred and twenty five years or so ago, 520 00:37:34,000 --> 00:37:39,960 Speaker 1: ethnographers interviewing Native people and collecting their stories, their creation stories, 521 00:37:40,200 --> 00:37:43,000 Speaker 1: and whatever stories they could, and then followed by a 522 00:37:43,040 --> 00:37:45,560 Speaker 1: whole group of folk lories who came along one hundred 523 00:37:45,640 --> 00:37:48,400 Speaker 1: years ago, and we're doing the same thing with Native people. 524 00:37:48,840 --> 00:37:54,120 Speaker 1: They collected thousands of coyote stories. Every group you talk 525 00:37:54,200 --> 00:37:57,840 Speaker 1: to seem to have twenty or fifty or seventy or 526 00:37:57,880 --> 00:38:02,719 Speaker 1: one hundred coyote stories. And so I was trying to 527 00:38:02,760 --> 00:38:06,960 Speaker 1: make sense of all of that and once again kind 528 00:38:06,960 --> 00:38:12,280 Speaker 1: of realizing, all right, a chapter in a book, you know, Okay, 529 00:38:12,440 --> 00:38:15,879 Speaker 1: it can be maybe twenty five pages long here, and 530 00:38:16,000 --> 00:38:19,799 Speaker 1: I've got hundreds of these things, so I can't do, 531 00:38:20,520 --> 00:38:22,359 Speaker 1: you know, just kind of a listing of every one 532 00:38:22,400 --> 00:38:24,520 Speaker 1: of them in some kind of summary. I have to 533 00:38:24,560 --> 00:38:28,359 Speaker 1: try to figure out what they were all about, what 534 00:38:28,480 --> 00:38:32,239 Speaker 1: they meant. And the ready example that seemed to be 535 00:38:32,280 --> 00:38:35,560 Speaker 1: out there in the existing literature was that Coyote was 536 00:38:35,600 --> 00:38:38,640 Speaker 1: one of these trickster figures that we have around the world, 537 00:38:38,719 --> 00:38:41,120 Speaker 1: low key among the Norse, for example. I mean, most 538 00:38:41,440 --> 00:38:44,680 Speaker 1: cultures have some record of a trickster figure. But as 539 00:38:44,719 --> 00:38:47,480 Speaker 1: I kept reading these things, I kind of decided, you know, 540 00:38:47,520 --> 00:38:50,359 Speaker 1: and I don't know if anybody else believes me on this, 541 00:38:51,160 --> 00:38:55,399 Speaker 1: but what I decided about this was that we had 542 00:38:55,440 --> 00:38:59,680 Speaker 1: actually kind of missed the point in talking about Coyote 543 00:38:59,719 --> 00:39:04,440 Speaker 1: as a trickster, because him being a trickster was not 544 00:39:04,680 --> 00:39:07,760 Speaker 1: really the point of what these stories were all about. 545 00:39:08,040 --> 00:39:12,280 Speaker 1: What these stories are all about is why the trick works, 546 00:39:12,920 --> 00:39:16,320 Speaker 1: on whoever it is who's being tricked, and the reason 547 00:39:16,400 --> 00:39:18,279 Speaker 1: the trick works. And this is what kind of gave 548 00:39:18,280 --> 00:39:20,640 Speaker 1: me the insight into the sort of stories I ended 549 00:39:20,719 --> 00:39:23,719 Speaker 1: up telling in that chapter, is that the reason the 550 00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:27,279 Speaker 1: trick works is because of human nature, because of our 551 00:39:27,440 --> 00:39:32,200 Speaker 1: own foibles and our ability to fall for things because 552 00:39:32,320 --> 00:39:36,640 Speaker 1: we are glutton us or where jealous are you know, 553 00:39:36,640 --> 00:39:42,880 Speaker 1: we're narcissistic or whatever. It's like the Seven Deadly Sins. 554 00:39:43,239 --> 00:39:46,520 Speaker 1: That's kind of what many of the coyotes stories are about. 555 00:39:46,640 --> 00:39:53,120 Speaker 1: And so they're actually instruction in human nature and how 556 00:39:53,160 --> 00:39:58,000 Speaker 1: easy it is to fool somebody or trick somebody because 557 00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:01,319 Speaker 1: of who human beings are. To me, that seemed to 558 00:40:01,320 --> 00:40:03,680 Speaker 1: be a more interesting thing about these stories than that 559 00:40:04,360 --> 00:40:05,600 Speaker 1: just coyote was a trickster. 560 00:40:10,200 --> 00:40:10,880 Speaker 2: I think. 561 00:40:12,160 --> 00:40:18,080 Speaker 3: Obviously, this is a story of people projecting ideas and 562 00:40:18,680 --> 00:40:22,520 Speaker 3: values and thoughts on this animal. But there's a reason. 563 00:40:23,640 --> 00:40:27,960 Speaker 3: There's also a biological basis for it. Right, There's a 564 00:40:28,000 --> 00:40:34,000 Speaker 3: reason it's not rock stories or snake stories or you know, 565 00:40:34,719 --> 00:40:35,640 Speaker 3: turkey stories. 566 00:40:35,719 --> 00:40:37,040 Speaker 1: Right. I wonder if you. 567 00:40:37,040 --> 00:40:40,279 Speaker 3: Can kind of you obviously covered it in the podcast, 568 00:40:40,360 --> 00:40:43,360 Speaker 3: but distilled down what it is about the coyote. It 569 00:40:43,360 --> 00:40:45,320 Speaker 3: makes it such a natural foil for people. 570 00:40:45,600 --> 00:40:50,319 Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a great question, because obviously it's like ten 571 00:40:50,360 --> 00:40:53,280 Speaker 1: thousand years ago or you know, further back in time 572 00:40:54,120 --> 00:40:56,759 Speaker 1: when people are first here, and we don't know how 573 00:40:56,800 --> 00:40:59,920 Speaker 1: far back the coyote stories go whether they were present 574 00:41:00,160 --> 00:41:04,120 Speaker 1: during the actual Padiolyithic where there were pleciscene stories, or 575 00:41:04,520 --> 00:41:09,120 Speaker 1: they occurred after that. But they're obviously old. There doesn't 576 00:41:09,160 --> 00:41:12,560 Speaker 1: seem to be anything any older. And so what you 577 00:41:12,680 --> 00:41:16,840 Speaker 1: have to then kind of come up with an explanation 578 00:41:16,920 --> 00:41:21,760 Speaker 1: for us why pick that animal? I mean, if indeed 579 00:41:21,800 --> 00:41:25,120 Speaker 1: the stories go back into the Pleistocene. I mean, you've 580 00:41:25,120 --> 00:41:28,759 Speaker 1: got mammoths around, you've got saber toothed cats. If you're 581 00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:32,520 Speaker 1: looking for a deity, you know, what better deity can 582 00:41:32,520 --> 00:41:35,440 Speaker 1: you come up with than a step lion or something. 583 00:41:36,160 --> 00:41:39,040 Speaker 1: And yet the animal that's come down to us in 584 00:41:39,120 --> 00:41:43,720 Speaker 1: North American history as the animal they pick is this little, small, 585 00:41:43,800 --> 00:41:50,000 Speaker 1: thirty five pound, you know, junior wolf. And so there 586 00:41:50,040 --> 00:41:53,120 Speaker 1: had to be an explanation for that. And as I 587 00:41:53,400 --> 00:41:56,160 Speaker 1: cast about for explanations to try to figure it out, 588 00:41:56,239 --> 00:41:58,279 Speaker 1: I thought, well, okay, so one of the things is 589 00:41:58,440 --> 00:42:02,200 Speaker 1: clearly coyotes are survivors of the extinctions in a way 590 00:42:02,200 --> 00:42:06,400 Speaker 1: that sabertoothed cats or ground slaws or step lions aren't 591 00:42:06,560 --> 00:42:11,239 Speaker 1: those all disappear. Coyotes survive, so they're still around. And 592 00:42:11,320 --> 00:42:15,120 Speaker 1: therefore you've come up with a deity figure that is 593 00:42:15,160 --> 00:42:18,200 Speaker 1: still present in your world that you get to see 594 00:42:18,560 --> 00:42:22,680 Speaker 1: or at least see some examples of. But the other 595 00:42:22,680 --> 00:42:25,600 Speaker 1: thing I decided that probably played a role in it, 596 00:42:25,680 --> 00:42:27,600 Speaker 1: and this is a result of reading a lot of 597 00:42:27,600 --> 00:42:34,680 Speaker 1: those coyote tales from the various native groups. Coyote, the 598 00:42:34,840 --> 00:42:40,480 Speaker 1: animal out there in nature, is a supremely intelligent creature. 599 00:42:40,920 --> 00:42:43,839 Speaker 1: That's why they have survived down to the present day. 600 00:42:44,320 --> 00:42:46,520 Speaker 1: No matter what we've been able to throw at them, 601 00:42:46,560 --> 00:42:51,720 Speaker 1: whatever poison, whatever trapping, whatever helicopter shooting, they are still 602 00:42:51,760 --> 00:42:54,960 Speaker 1: here and they're not going anywhere. In fact, they've spread 603 00:42:55,000 --> 00:42:57,920 Speaker 1: across all of North America and are becoming one of 604 00:42:57,920 --> 00:43:00,960 Speaker 1: the first animals since the places seen us the Isthmus 605 00:43:01,000 --> 00:43:05,160 Speaker 1: of Panama into South America. So there's something about them. 606 00:43:05,560 --> 00:43:10,640 Speaker 1: They're obviously extremely successful. That success is based on I 607 00:43:10,640 --> 00:43:16,000 Speaker 1: think an observable intelligence, and I think native people thought 608 00:43:16,120 --> 00:43:18,600 Speaker 1: of them, And that's what I argue in Coyte America 609 00:43:18,680 --> 00:43:22,640 Speaker 1: is they thought of them as avatars, as stand ins 610 00:43:23,239 --> 00:43:25,840 Speaker 1: for humans in the world, where you could watch the 611 00:43:25,920 --> 00:43:29,040 Speaker 1: coyote as it went through the world and watch what 612 00:43:29,160 --> 00:43:32,920 Speaker 1: it did and how it survived, and think this is 613 00:43:33,239 --> 00:43:36,600 Speaker 1: boint that's a good example of how you do that. 614 00:43:37,280 --> 00:43:41,360 Speaker 1: And so as an avatar for humans, as a stand 615 00:43:41,400 --> 00:43:44,320 Speaker 1: in for humans in the world, I think you start 616 00:43:44,400 --> 00:43:47,680 Speaker 1: to get some recognition of you know, this is the 617 00:43:47,800 --> 00:43:51,440 Speaker 1: kind of deity figure they came up with it. And 618 00:43:51,480 --> 00:43:53,239 Speaker 1: we can talk about this if you guys want to. 619 00:43:53,360 --> 00:43:55,600 Speaker 1: But one of the interesting things about coyote to me 620 00:43:55,719 --> 00:43:58,960 Speaker 1: is this is a very different deity figure than say 621 00:43:59,040 --> 00:44:03,560 Speaker 1: a Jesus or something or or Mohammed. I mean, this 622 00:44:03,600 --> 00:44:08,080 Speaker 1: is not a god figure who lives the perfect life 623 00:44:08,080 --> 00:44:12,319 Speaker 1: and offers himself up as an example for everybody else 624 00:44:12,360 --> 00:44:17,960 Speaker 1: because of his perfection. In fact, he's kind of a 625 00:44:18,040 --> 00:44:23,279 Speaker 1: deity figure that you laugh at because he exhibits so 626 00:44:23,480 --> 00:44:27,520 Speaker 1: many of the obvious characteristics of human beings. 627 00:44:27,520 --> 00:44:33,279 Speaker 2: Something I can't help but wonder about with coyotes is 628 00:44:33,760 --> 00:44:39,000 Speaker 2: what was their initial behavior like around people? And when 629 00:44:39,040 --> 00:44:41,160 Speaker 2: I say that, what I'm referring to is it's really 630 00:44:41,239 --> 00:44:48,200 Speaker 2: well documented that animals gradually learn how to deal with people. 631 00:44:49,000 --> 00:44:52,400 Speaker 2: And we have some like pretty recent scenarios right of 632 00:44:52,480 --> 00:44:57,440 Speaker 2: like whalers out in the Pacific or elsewhere coming across 633 00:44:57,600 --> 00:45:02,040 Speaker 2: islands that hadn't been previously alanized by humans and like 634 00:45:02,080 --> 00:45:04,040 Speaker 2: you can just walk up and pick things up. Birds 635 00:45:04,080 --> 00:45:07,680 Speaker 2: are landing on you. They have no idea what you are, right, 636 00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:12,000 Speaker 2: that's exactly right, Yeah, iological first contact. Yeah, it helps 637 00:45:12,000 --> 00:45:18,440 Speaker 2: you kind of explain, well, how we're clovist hunters. How 638 00:45:18,440 --> 00:45:20,680 Speaker 2: are they able to kill a man with a spear? 639 00:45:20,719 --> 00:45:23,120 Speaker 2: And it maybe it might have been that they would 640 00:45:23,160 --> 00:45:26,040 Speaker 2: walk up and jab it in the heart like it might. 641 00:45:25,920 --> 00:45:28,359 Speaker 1: Have been while it stood and looked at them. Yeah. 642 00:45:28,480 --> 00:45:34,640 Speaker 2: So yeah, so picture too, if you picture like is 643 00:45:34,920 --> 00:45:38,600 Speaker 2: kind of sly and opportunistic as that animal is, picture 644 00:45:38,640 --> 00:45:42,080 Speaker 2: it being from his perspective seeing a human or a 645 00:45:42,080 --> 00:45:45,200 Speaker 2: group of humans who got a camp and they got 646 00:45:45,239 --> 00:45:49,080 Speaker 2: stuff they killed, and you know, they got dogs running around, 647 00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:52,160 Speaker 2: Like what is his attitude toward them? And it might 648 00:45:52,200 --> 00:45:53,640 Speaker 2: have been that they might have been just one of 649 00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:55,719 Speaker 2: the most fast. They could have been one of the 650 00:45:55,760 --> 00:45:59,960 Speaker 2: more fascinating things to engage with as they kind of 651 00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:02,200 Speaker 2: tried to figure out what this new thing is. 652 00:46:02,840 --> 00:46:07,480 Speaker 1: Yeah. I think you're probably right in every bit of that, Stephen, 653 00:46:07,560 --> 00:46:12,200 Speaker 1: because I think, for one thing, I think coyotes would 654 00:46:12,200 --> 00:46:14,799 Speaker 1: have regarded the arrival of humans as this is a 655 00:46:14,840 --> 00:46:18,800 Speaker 1: whole new opportunity. I mean, I mean we could hardly 656 00:46:18,840 --> 00:46:21,840 Speaker 1: have imagined how great this might be. And that, of 657 00:46:21,840 --> 00:46:24,240 Speaker 1: course was true for coyotes up until about one hundred 658 00:46:24,400 --> 00:46:27,880 Speaker 1: years ago or so. But I think one of the 659 00:46:27,920 --> 00:46:30,920 Speaker 1: reasons that that coyotes have always hung around humans. And 660 00:46:30,960 --> 00:46:32,600 Speaker 1: I mean, when I was doing the work on this book, 661 00:46:32,640 --> 00:46:36,160 Speaker 1: I was looking at archaeological investigations of say Chaco in 662 00:46:36,200 --> 00:46:40,440 Speaker 1: places like that, and there's evidence of coyotes in the 663 00:46:40,840 --> 00:46:43,839 Speaker 1: in the city itself, so that made me think. And 664 00:46:43,880 --> 00:46:48,000 Speaker 1: of course in Mexico City, where the name comes from, 665 00:46:48,160 --> 00:46:53,400 Speaker 1: coyote is from the original no Wat language of the Aztecs. 666 00:46:54,360 --> 00:46:57,840 Speaker 1: It's yeah, it comes from from the no Wat language. 667 00:46:57,920 --> 00:46:59,880 Speaker 2: And I forgot. 668 00:47:01,640 --> 00:47:05,399 Speaker 1: Coyotl is how it's spelled in the language. But the 669 00:47:05,560 --> 00:47:09,680 Speaker 1: L is silent, and so it would be pronounced coyote 670 00:47:10,960 --> 00:47:13,960 Speaker 1: serve of the way you know, many of us you 671 00:47:14,120 --> 00:47:17,279 Speaker 1: obviously pronounced it with just two syllables. I'm sort of 672 00:47:17,320 --> 00:47:20,600 Speaker 1: more out of the you know, the cartoon phase of 673 00:47:21,360 --> 00:47:25,160 Speaker 1: rod and coyote, yeah, Wiley, so I do three syllables. 674 00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:29,480 Speaker 1: But it was an animal that was I mean, there 675 00:47:29,520 --> 00:47:34,680 Speaker 1: are suburbs of Mexico City named after coyotes, so I 676 00:47:34,719 --> 00:47:38,520 Speaker 1: think it was an animal that was very present around 677 00:47:38,640 --> 00:47:41,279 Speaker 1: human camps and villages, and of course one of the 678 00:47:41,280 --> 00:47:45,640 Speaker 1: reasons it's an urban animal. Today, coyotes have entered cities 679 00:47:45,640 --> 00:47:49,480 Speaker 1: all over the United States in large part because everywhere 680 00:47:49,560 --> 00:47:52,600 Speaker 1: humans are, we generate a lot of rats and mice 681 00:47:52,800 --> 00:47:56,200 Speaker 1: and that's one of their favorite prey, and so the 682 00:47:56,239 --> 00:47:59,359 Speaker 1: presence of humans means, wow, we're going to have an 683 00:47:59,360 --> 00:48:02,399 Speaker 1: abundance of the goodies that we like to go for. 684 00:48:03,320 --> 00:48:05,719 Speaker 1: So yeah, I think they were probably from from a 685 00:48:05,960 --> 00:48:10,520 Speaker 1: very early on in their relationship, humans and coyotes were interacting, 686 00:48:10,600 --> 00:48:12,400 Speaker 1: and that could be one of the reasons why, of 687 00:48:12,440 --> 00:48:17,160 Speaker 1: course that they decided, Wow, these guys, these guys, they 688 00:48:17,200 --> 00:48:20,480 Speaker 1: can functions as a figure that tells us a lot 689 00:48:20,520 --> 00:48:21,240 Speaker 1: about ourselves. 690 00:48:22,760 --> 00:48:26,799 Speaker 2: Of course, you're writing about and talking about the animals 691 00:48:26,840 --> 00:48:30,360 Speaker 2: that these cultures talked about, because there's there's something there. 692 00:48:30,800 --> 00:48:39,600 Speaker 2: Do you ever wonder take the apostle or anything? Right, 693 00:48:39,880 --> 00:48:43,680 Speaker 2: let's take the apostle. There must have been there has 694 00:48:43,760 --> 00:48:47,279 Speaker 2: to have been like an understanding of it. I mean, 695 00:48:47,320 --> 00:48:51,239 Speaker 2: there's an understanding of it. As it produces an oil, right, 696 00:48:51,320 --> 00:48:54,640 Speaker 2: it's really soft fur. The leather's very poor quality, Like 697 00:48:54,680 --> 00:48:58,080 Speaker 2: there's probably like that function. But you know what I mean, 698 00:48:58,160 --> 00:49:02,120 Speaker 2: like like you have you find all these dozens and 699 00:49:02,120 --> 00:49:06,279 Speaker 2: dozens of stories about myths and creation stories and things 700 00:49:06,360 --> 00:49:10,120 Speaker 2: about coyotes. Then you have all these these these religious 701 00:49:10,120 --> 00:49:15,040 Speaker 2: colts built around bears, right, all the all the imagery 702 00:49:15,680 --> 00:49:20,880 Speaker 2: and religious understanding about buffalo. Were there some things that? 703 00:49:20,920 --> 00:49:22,879 Speaker 2: Does it seem like there was some animals were just 704 00:49:23,000 --> 00:49:25,160 Speaker 2: kind of there, like you know, was the apossum just 705 00:49:25,239 --> 00:49:28,640 Speaker 2: kind of there or did it have a spiritual role? 706 00:49:28,880 --> 00:49:34,040 Speaker 1: Well, I have not actually encountered a spiritual a possum 707 00:49:34,560 --> 00:49:35,960 Speaker 1: in any of I reading. 708 00:49:36,280 --> 00:49:38,440 Speaker 2: I mean neither that they just don't get their due now, 709 00:49:38,440 --> 00:49:40,480 Speaker 2: they don't get there. It's like it's noteworthy. He can 710 00:49:40,520 --> 00:49:41,520 Speaker 2: hang from his tail, I. 711 00:49:41,440 --> 00:49:44,239 Speaker 1: Mean, can his sale. He can certainly do things. And 712 00:49:44,280 --> 00:49:46,560 Speaker 1: you know, Native people were obviously they were really close 713 00:49:46,600 --> 00:49:49,840 Speaker 1: observers of all this kind of natural history, and so 714 00:49:49,920 --> 00:49:53,960 Speaker 1: they had a tremendous amount of information. Oh, I'm sure 715 00:49:54,280 --> 00:49:58,040 Speaker 1: about because it was for one thing. I mean, you 716 00:49:58,120 --> 00:50:02,160 Speaker 1: have generation after generation hand down stories. But it's part 717 00:50:02,200 --> 00:50:05,160 Speaker 1: of the entertainment that you engage in in the world 718 00:50:05,200 --> 00:50:08,600 Speaker 1: when you're living in a natural kind of setting and 719 00:50:09,080 --> 00:50:13,120 Speaker 1: engaging the world as a hunter. Gatherer or a early 720 00:50:13,120 --> 00:50:17,080 Speaker 1: agricultural which or something. You're observing things, probably in a 721 00:50:17,120 --> 00:50:19,920 Speaker 1: way that we don't really do as a result of 722 00:50:19,960 --> 00:50:22,040 Speaker 1: the way we live in the twenty first century. So 723 00:50:22,080 --> 00:50:23,479 Speaker 1: I think they knew a hell of a lot about 724 00:50:23,480 --> 00:50:26,439 Speaker 1: a lot of animals. But I've noted and I talk 725 00:50:26,520 --> 00:50:31,000 Speaker 1: about in one of the chapters I think it was 726 00:50:31,160 --> 00:50:33,200 Speaker 1: or one of the podcasts I think was a last one. 727 00:50:34,239 --> 00:50:40,680 Speaker 1: I talked about Joseph Epps Brown's interviews with Lakota elders 728 00:50:40,719 --> 00:50:42,800 Speaker 1: in the nineteen thirties, and he had got the interview. 729 00:50:42,800 --> 00:50:45,880 Speaker 1: He was a religious scholar of religion who taught at 730 00:50:45,880 --> 00:50:50,279 Speaker 1: the University of Montana in fact, and he got to 731 00:50:50,360 --> 00:50:54,680 Speaker 1: interview some of the people who had been present still 732 00:50:54,719 --> 00:51:00,200 Speaker 1: alive as young kids on the buffalo hunting planes. By 733 00:51:00,239 --> 00:51:03,240 Speaker 1: the nineteen thirties, they were in their late eighties and nineties, 734 00:51:03,239 --> 00:51:05,920 Speaker 1: but they still remembered a lot, and they knew a 735 00:51:05,920 --> 00:51:10,560 Speaker 1: lot about the you know, the prior to reservation life period. 736 00:51:11,480 --> 00:51:16,360 Speaker 1: And Brown quizzed them about the animals that had power, 737 00:51:17,200 --> 00:51:21,680 Speaker 1: and the animals that they indicated were the ones not 738 00:51:21,920 --> 00:51:26,759 Speaker 1: like possums, but they were animals like so bears had 739 00:51:26,800 --> 00:51:30,080 Speaker 1: particular power over underground, over the underground, because of course 740 00:51:30,080 --> 00:51:34,359 Speaker 1: they hibernate in the winter. Eagles have particular power in 741 00:51:34,440 --> 00:51:39,920 Speaker 1: the air. Bison are associated with the winds. And one 742 00:51:39,960 --> 00:51:43,920 Speaker 1: of the things that josepheps Brown discovered from these interviews 743 00:51:44,000 --> 00:51:47,520 Speaker 1: is that the Lakota idea was that all of these 744 00:51:48,239 --> 00:51:53,960 Speaker 1: all of those creatures, bears, eagles, bison, along with dragonflies, 745 00:51:55,080 --> 00:52:00,920 Speaker 1: shared a special power that they called umi or yume, 746 00:52:01,920 --> 00:52:06,920 Speaker 1: which was whirlwind power. They all had the ability, and 747 00:52:06,960 --> 00:52:11,960 Speaker 1: this was a highly sought after power by native people because, 748 00:52:12,640 --> 00:52:16,719 Speaker 1: for one thing, if you engage whirlwind power, it made 749 00:52:16,719 --> 00:52:21,440 Speaker 1: you difficult to evidently kill in a battle. But it 750 00:52:21,600 --> 00:52:24,440 Speaker 1: also was a kind of a special power that controlled 751 00:52:24,440 --> 00:52:29,240 Speaker 1: the winds, and bison especially were associated with winds because 752 00:52:29,600 --> 00:52:32,239 Speaker 1: they knew that when the wind began to blow from 753 00:52:32,320 --> 00:52:36,319 Speaker 1: the south, bison herds would start to appear. When the 754 00:52:36,320 --> 00:52:38,239 Speaker 1: wind blew from the north, and of course what they 755 00:52:38,280 --> 00:52:42,080 Speaker 1: were describing were the big annual migrations where you start 756 00:52:42,160 --> 00:52:45,319 Speaker 1: getting northers and the bison herds start migrating south onto 757 00:52:45,320 --> 00:52:48,080 Speaker 1: the plains. When the wind blows in the north. The 758 00:52:48,239 --> 00:52:50,920 Speaker 1: bison are absent when it comes from the south, and 759 00:52:50,960 --> 00:52:54,640 Speaker 1: so all those kind of features were associated with animals. 760 00:52:54,640 --> 00:52:57,400 Speaker 1: I think that we would think of as charismatic in 761 00:52:57,440 --> 00:53:02,000 Speaker 1: some way, and probably not. I haven't seen anything that 762 00:53:02,040 --> 00:53:04,520 Speaker 1: he had to say about possums, but. 763 00:53:04,640 --> 00:53:08,680 Speaker 2: I spent uh, I spent a little bit of time 764 00:53:08,800 --> 00:53:15,080 Speaker 2: with Ammerindian group in South America, the Chimane, and I 765 00:53:15,200 --> 00:53:17,799 Speaker 2: was out with them hunting one time and they were 766 00:53:19,120 --> 00:53:24,640 Speaker 2: very eager to get a howler monkey, and they get 767 00:53:24,640 --> 00:53:27,000 Speaker 2: a holler monkey, and they had some handful of other 768 00:53:27,040 --> 00:53:28,879 Speaker 2: things they ate that are just not part of our 769 00:53:29,560 --> 00:53:33,759 Speaker 2: food repertoire. And one night we're out and there's a possum. 770 00:53:35,000 --> 00:53:37,440 Speaker 2: This is in Bolivia. There's a possum on a tree, 771 00:53:38,600 --> 00:53:41,640 Speaker 2: and I'm thinking to myself, Man, that possum is in 772 00:53:41,800 --> 00:53:45,719 Speaker 2: bad shape. If these guys like monkeys, they're gonna love 773 00:53:45,760 --> 00:53:46,680 Speaker 2: that possum. 774 00:53:46,920 --> 00:53:49,320 Speaker 1: And he just just went right. 775 00:53:51,239 --> 00:53:54,800 Speaker 2: It's just I was like, Wow, there is something about 776 00:53:54,800 --> 00:53:59,040 Speaker 2: the possum. Wasn't even worth commenting. 777 00:54:01,440 --> 00:54:03,920 Speaker 1: Yeah, well maybe that, Yeah, that was a special power 778 00:54:03,960 --> 00:54:05,280 Speaker 1: that made the possum invisible. 779 00:54:07,320 --> 00:54:10,160 Speaker 2: Well, Dan, thank you man, appreciate you taking time to 780 00:54:10,160 --> 00:54:12,280 Speaker 2: talking and looking forward to the next show as usual. 781 00:54:12,520 --> 00:54:13,640 Speaker 1: All right, thank you Steven