The Native Races [of the Pacific states], Volume 5, Primitive History. Hubert Howe Bancroft

Coxcox and his wife Xochiquetzal were the only human beings who escaped from the great deluge which covered the face of the earth in the Age of Water. How, when the waters went down, the ark in which they had saved themselves – the hollow trunk of a bald cypress – rested upon the Peak of Culhuacan; and how the dumb children that were born to the rescued pair were taught many languages by a dove. We have also read the reputed Tarasco legend of Tezpi, which so closely resembles the biblical legend of the deluge that it cannot be discussed as a native tradition at all, but must be regarded simply as the invention of some Spanish writer who thought it his mission to show that the Hebrew traditions were familiar to the Americans.26 In Guatemala, among the Miztecs, and in Nicaragua there were also traditions of great and destructive deluges.27 The Pápagos tell of a mighty flood that destroyed all life on the earth, except the hero-god Montezuma and his friend the Coyote who had foretold the deluge. Each of these made for himself an ark, and when the waters subsided and they met on the small patch of dry land that first appeared, Montezuma dispatched the Coyote four times to find out exactly how the sea lay.28 Very similar is the Pima legend which relates how the prophet who would not heed the thrice repeated warnings of the Eagle was destroyed by a flood, and how Szeukha, the son of the Creator, saved himself by floating on a ball of gum or resin.29 The Mattoles of California regard Taylor Peak as the point at which their forefathers took refuge from a destructive flood.30 Other Californian tribes have a tradition of a deluge from which the Coyote, with his usual good-fortune, was the only living thing that escaped, if we except an eagle who was miraculously formed from a single feather that floated on the face of the waters.31 Lake Tahoe was formed by a flood which destroyed all mankind but a very small remnant.32 The Thlinkeets relate that many persons escaped the great deluge by taking refuge in a great floating building, which, when the waters fell, grounded upon a rock and was split in twain. From this moment men spake in various tongues, for there remained in one fragment of the divided ark those whose descendants speak the Thlinkeet language, and in the other those whose descendants employ a different idiom.33 The Chipewyan deluge covered all the earth except the high mountain-tops, upon which many of the people saved themselves.34 The Isthmians believed that the world was peopled by a man who with his wife and children escaped the great flood. The Peruvians had several flood-myths. One of them relates that the whole face of the earth was changed by a great deluge, attended by an extraordinary eclipse of the sun which lasted five days. All living things were destroyed except one man, a shepherd, with his family and flocks. It happened in this wise. Some time before the flood this shepherd, while tending his flock of llamas, remarked that the animals appeared to be oppressed with sadness, and that they passed the whole night in attentively watching the course of the stars. Filled with amazement, he interrogated the llamas as to the cause of their concern. Directing his attention to a group of six stars, massed closely together, they answered that that was a sign that the world would shortly be destroyed by a deluge, and counseled him, if he wished to escape the universal destruction, to take refuge with his family and flocks on the top of a neighboring mountain. Acting upon this advice, the shepherd hastily collected his llamas and children and proceeded with them to the summit of mount Ancasmarca, where a crowd of other animals had already sought safety. The warning had not come a moment too soon, for scarcely had they reached the mountain-top, when the sea burst its bounds and with a terrible roaring rushed over the land. But as the waters rose higher and higher, filling the valleys and covering the plains, behold, the mountain of refuge rose with it, floating upon its surface like a ship upon the waves. This lasted five days, during which time the sun hid himself and the earth was wrapped in darkness. On the fifth day the waters began to subside, and the stars shone out on the desolate world, which was eventually re-peopled by the descendants of the shepherd of Ancasmarca.

PERUVIAN FLOOD-MYTHS

      According to another Peruvian legend, two brothers escaped from a great deluge which overwhelmed the world in much the same manner, by ascending a mountain which floated upon the flood. When the waters had retired, they found themselves alone in the world; and having consumed all their provisions, they went down into the valleys to seek for more food. Whether they were successful in their search, the tradition does not say; but if not, their surprise must indeed have been agreeable when on returning to the hut which they had built on the mountain, they found food ready prepared for them by unknown hands. Curious to know who their benefactor could be, they took counsel together and finally agreed that one should hide himself in the hut, while the other went into the valley. The brother who remained concealed himself carefully, and his patience was soon rewarded by seeing two aras with the faces of women,35 who immediately set about preparing a meal of bread and meats. But it was not long before the aras became aware of the presence of the concealed brother, and they instantly essayed flight; but the man seized one of them, and she afterwards became his wife. By her he had six children, three sons and three daughters, from whose union sprang the tribe of the Cañaris, whose descendants to this day hold the ara in great veneration.36

      "The Peruvians were acquainted with the Deluge, and believed that the rainbow was the sign that the earth would not again be destroyed by water." This somewhat startling announcement is made by Lord Kingsborough, and he shows that there can be no reasonable doubt on the subject in an eminently characteristic manner. "This is plain," he says, "from the speech which Mango Capac, the reputed founder of the Peruvian empire, addressed to his companions on beholding the rainbow rising from a hill; which is thus recorded by Balboa in the ninth chapter of the third part of his Miscellanea Antarctica: 'They traveled on until a mountain, at present named Guanacauri, presented itself to their view, when on a certain morning, they beheld the rainbow rising above the mountain, with one extremity resting upon it, when Manco Capac exclaimed to his companions, This is a propitious sign that the earth will not be again destroyed by water.' … Proof having been afforded in the passage quoted from the History of Balboa, that the Peruvians were acquainted with the history of the rainbow, as given in the ninth chapter of Genesis, it may be interesting to add, that according to the account of an anonymous writer, they believed the rainbow was not only a passive sign that the earth would not be destroyed by a second deluge, but an active instrument to prevent the recurrence of such a catastrophe: the latter curious notion proceeded upon the assumption that as the water of the sea (which, like the Jews, they believed to encircle the whole earth) would have a tendency to rise after excessive falls of rain, so the pressure of the extremities of the rainbow upon its surface would prevent its exceeding its proper level."37

THE TOWER OF BABEL

      Many of these flood-myths are supplemented with an account of an attempt to provide against a second deluge, by building a tower of refuge, resembling more or less closely the biblical legend of the tower of Babel. Thus a Cholultec legend relates that all the giants who inhabited the country, save seven, were destroyed by a great flood, and adds that when the waters were assuaged, one of these seven began to build an artificial mountain. But the anger of the gods was aroused, and they slew many of the builders, so the work was stopped.38 In like manner, in the Pápago legend to which I have referred, Montezuma, after he and the Coyote had been saved from the flood, so incensed the Great Spirit by his ingratitude and presumption, that an insect was sent flying to the east to bring the Spaniards, who, when they came, utterly destroyed Montezuma. After the deluge spoken of in the Lake Tahoe myth, the few who escaped built up a great tower, the strong making the weak do the work. This, it is distinctly stated, they did that they might have a place of refuge in case of another flood. But the Great Spirit was filled with anger at their presumption, and amidst thunderings and lightnings, and showers of molten metal, he seized the oppressors and cast them into a cavern.39

      These myths have led many writers to believe that the Americans had a knowledge of the tower of Babel, while some think that they are the direct

26

See vol. iii., pp. 66-9, and comments in accompanying notes.

27

Id., pp. 72-5.

28

Id., p. 76.

29

Id., pp. 78-9.

30

Id., p. 86.

31

Id., p. 88.

32

Id., p. 89.

33

Id., p. 103.

34

Mackenzie's Voyages, p. cxviii.

35

'Ou plutôt deux femmes, portant le nom d'Ara,' says Brasseur de Bourbourg; I prefer, however, the original reading. The Ara is a kind of parroquet, common in South America, and so called because it continually repeats the cry ara, ara. Beings half bird, half woman, are as likely to figure in such a legend as the above as not. Besides, shortly afterwards the narrative speaks of 'les deux oiseaux,' referring to the aras.

36

For both of these flood-myths see: Brasseur de Bourbourg, in Landa, Relacion, pp. xxx-xxxii. Herrera, Hist. Gen., dec. v., lib. iii., cap. vi., gives a native tradition which relates that long before the time of the Incas there was a great deluge, from which some of the natives escaped by fleeing to the mountain-tops. The mountain tribes assert, however, that only six persons escaped this flood in a balsa.

37

Kingsborough's Mex. Antiq., vol. viii., p. 25.

38

See vol. iii., p. 67.

39

See vol. iii., pp. 77, 89.