A legend tells of a woman who, after refusing suitors, married a dog at her father’s curse. Exiled, she lived on an island where the dog provided for her. They bore children, both human and canine. She later ordered her children to kill their father and assigned them identities, creating mythical beings like Europeans, dog-men, wolves, giants, and dwarfs, shaping the mythical origins of these groups.
Source:
Tales of the Smith Sound Eskimo
by Alfred L. Kroeber
[The American Folklore Society]
Journal of American Folklore
Vol.12, No.46, pp.166-182
July-September, 1899
► Themes of the story
Transformation: The woman transitions from human society to a life with a dog, leading to the birth of offspring that are both human and canine.
Origin of Things: This tale explains the mythical origins of various beings, including Europeans, dog-men, wolves, giants, and dwarfs.
Forbidden Knowledge: The woman’s union with a dog, following her father’s curse, delves into the pursuit of hidden or taboo relationships and their consequences.
► From the same Region or People
Learn more about the Inuit peoples
Near the head of Qangirdluxssuang Bay (on Inglefield Gulf) lived a man and his daughter. The girl, however, refused to marry any one. Finally, when she refused suitor after suitor, her father grew angry and threatened to make her marry a dog. She warned him that if he said this often she might take him at his word. Indeed, one of the dogs just then broke his line and came into the house. She soon married him. When she grew pregnant her father and the other people drove her away, and the dog carried her across the water to an island, named Qemiunaarving, off the mouth of the bay. The dog used to bring her food from her father, floating it over by means of a skin of a ground-seal, which was prepared like an ordinary seal-skin float.
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One day the father, desiring to kill him, filled the skin with stones and tied it to him, hoping thus to drown him. But the dog was so strong that he kept on swimming in spite of the stones (which would have drawn down any other being), and finally, although he almost sank, reached the island in safety.
The woman gave birth to a great many children, both persons and dogs. When they were somewhat older, she one day ordered them to kill their father, the dog, which they did, devouring him. [In all other Eskimo versions the woman’s father is thus killed; there are also only two kinds of beings produced, the Qavdlunat (Europeans), and the Adlet, Timerset, or Erqigdlit (dog-men), generally five of each. The tornit (giants) and the inuaudligat (dwarfs) are well-known fabulous Eskimo tribes, though ordinarily not connected with this tale. What the nakassungnaitut are I could not ascertain. The introduction of wolves is curious.] Then she called her children in pairs, a male and a female together. “You two be qablunat (Europeans), and go away from here, and dress in clean clothes, and do not inspire fear.” “You two be nakassungnaitut, and be savage, and also go away,” she said to the next two. “You two be wolves,” she went on to another pair; “do not pursue people nor frighten dogs, and go away.” “And you two be tornit,” she said, “and go away from here; but you shall have no dogs, and shall fear them, but you shall not make people afraid.” “And you be inugaudligat,” she added to the last pair. Thus she sent them all away. The qablunat sailed away in the sole of a boot. And then she went back to live with her father.
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