/ 
LEGEND AND LANDSCAPE: 
CONVERGENCE OF ORAL AND SCIENTIFIC TRADITIONS WITH 
SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE YUKON TERRITORY, CANADA 
by 
Julia M. Cruikshank 
St Catharine's College 
A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment 
of the requirements for the Diploma in Polar Studies 
T \~ 
SCOTT POLAR 
RESEARCH INSTITUTE 
MS l~i l I 1 
Scott Polar Research Institute 
Cambridge 
May 1980 
Acknowledgements 
Field research on which this paper is based was financed by 
the Urgent Ethnology Division of the National Museum of Man, 
National Museums of Canada, and by the Council for Yukon Indians. 
My thanks to Mrs Pat Little for typing this manuscript. 
/1tclv..a.~s )'1.o-n..,"'-1 Wh1G'-. 
d UY\~ ( II'- C,c, ( I o.._ b D V' (A. h-oY\ 
,s 
ABSTRACT 
The paper examines two distinct intellectual traditions in 
the north, Native oral tradition and western scientif~c research. 
It begins by discussing my own anthropological field research in 
the southern Yukon Territory, Canada, the present interest of 
natural scientists in oral tradition, and the cultural context 
within which the narratives should be viewed. It then looks 
at oral tradition and western science as contrasting theoretical 
frameworks and discusses the strengths and limitations of each. 
With this background, examples of 'convergence' of the two 
traditions in the southern Yukon are discussed. Oral traditions 
about glacier movement and impounded lakes, climatic fluctuations, 
geography and geology, fauna and flora, and prehistory are compared 
with present day scientific research about the same phenomena. 
Scientific interest in oral narrative elsewhere in the circum~ 
polar north is summarized. 
The suggestion emerges that in combination the two approaches 
can provide a broader perspective on the natural environment 
than can either by itself, particularly if lin guistic categories 
used by Native speakers can be corr e lated with scientific kn owled ge 
of the same phenomena. Oral history and lin guistic research may 
have a con~ribution to make to an 'anthropology of natural history'. 
Oral tradition must be seen as a distinctive intellectual tradition, 
not simply as an adjunct to western science. 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
List of Maps 
I NTRODUCTION 
SECTION I: THE RESEARCH CONTEXT 
I.1 Background of Research 
I.2 Northern Scientific Interest 
in Oral Tradition 
1.3 Cultural Context of Oral Tradition 
in Yukon Territory, Canada 
(a) Traditional economy 
(b) Social relations 
(c) Languages 
(d) Historical change 
(e) Role of oral tradition 
SECTION II: ORAL TRADITION AND SCIEHTIFIC TRADITION: 
CONTRAST I NG FRAMEWORKS 
II.1 Cognition, Literacy and Knowledge 
II.2 Oral Tradition 
(a) 
(b) 
Attractions of oral tradition •• 
(i) Persistence •• 
(ii) Individual variations and consistency 
(iii) Inte gration of historical events 
(iv) Oral traditions as technology 
(v) Duration of observations 
(vi) Absence of documentary sources 
Limitations of oral tradition 
(i) Cultural context 
(ii) Language 
(iii) Ac cessibility 
(iv) Literary style 
( v) Symbolism 
(vi) Time perspective 
(vii) Space 
(viii) ~uantitative data 
(ix) Deliberate distortion 
II.J Scient ific Tradition 
(a) The Context of Northern Science 
(b) Limitations of Western Science 
page 
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SECTION III: CONVERGEN CE OF ORAL AND SCIEN'l'IFIC TRADITION 29 
III.1 Glacier Movement and Impounded Lakes 
(a) Oral Data 
(b) Scientific Data 
(i) Glacial Lake Champagne 
(ii) Glacial Lake Alsek 
(iii) Donjek, Kashawulsh and 
Steele glaciers 
(iv) Kluane Lake •• 
(v) Scientific confirmation of 
related traditions 
III.2 Climate 
(a) Oral Data 
(b) Sc~entific Data 
III.3 Cartography, Geology and Landforms 
(a) Cartography 
(b) Geology 
( c) Landforms 
(d) Athapaskan 'cosmos' and western 
'landscape' 
III.4 Flora and Fauna 
(a) Oral Traditions 
(b) Biology 
(i) Faunal history 
(ii) Recent faunal changes 
(iii) Fish, plants 
III.5 Prehistory 
(a) Oral Data 
(b) Archaeology 
III.6 Volcanoes 
III.? Earthquakes 
SECTION IV: CIRCU J-:POLAR RESEARCH I N ORAL TRADI TIOH 
IV.1 Oral Tradition and Northern Science 
(a) Inuit traditions 
COl'JCLUSION 
(b) Korthern Indian traditions 
( c) Scandinavian, Icelandic and Northern 
Asiatic traditions 
(d) Related research possibilities 
.. 
29 
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1 . Cultural Dimensions of Oral and Scientific Traditions 73 
2. Possibilities. for an Anthropolo gy of Na tural History 76 
NOiES 79 
REFER EhCES 80 
APPEHDIX 
r I 
(i) 
LIST OF MAPS 
page 
Map 1 Native groups of North-western North America 9 
Map 2 Yukon Native languages 10 
Map 3 The research area: south-west Yukon Territory 
and Gulf Coast of Alaska 30 
Map 4 Glaciers, south-west Yukon Territory 32 
Map 5 Maximum extent of Glacial Lake Champagne 
and Glacial Lake Alsek 
Map 6 Drainage routes in the area of Kluane Lake, 
Yukon Territory 
Map 7 Map after drawing of Tlingit Chief Kohklux, 
1869 
Map 8 Distribution of White River Ash 
40 
47 
61 
. I 
-1 -
INTRODUCTION 
This paper examines two distinct intellectual traditions in 
the north - Native oral traditions and western scientific research. 
Each developed from a very different institutional and cultural 
setting and each is transmitted by a very different method of 
communication. Each tradition has generated different theories 
about the natural world. 
The issue which I will examine can be set out as follows: 
Some scientists working in the Arctic and sub-Arctic are studying 
phenomena about which Indians and Inuit have longstanding oral 
traditions. Several of these scientists have expressed an 
interest in learning these traditions in relation to their own 
work, particularly because there are so few historical documentary 
sources available in the north. Does a non-literate society 
have in its oral tradition anything which makes an essential 
contribution to scientific knowledge which science can obtain 
from no other source? Is it possible to 'translate' information 
about the natural world from one tradition to another? Can oral 
traditions be helpful to scientists or are they so rooted in 
cultural context that they may simply mislead or confuse someone 
from a western· tradition? Or , to rephrase the question with 
a somewhat different bias, can so meone trained in a western 
rationalist fra mework really make any claim's to understand 
cognition which considers time 1 space, causality, materiality 
as secondary characteristics of the universe? (Heuscher 1979, 
p.244-45) . 
My own interest is in oral narr ative, specifically i n 
2 -
anthropological interpretations of myth. The selection of this 
topic emerged directly from the interdisciplinary nature of the 
Diploma in Polar Studies Programme at the Scott Polar Research 
Institute; this programme examines northern research in physical 
sciences, social sciences and humanities. An examination of 
the relationship between oral tradition and science necessarily 
considers linkages among these various branches of study. The 
materials presented here will focus on the Yukon Territory, 
Canada, but conclusions may be more broadly applicable to other 
areas of the circum-polar north. 
Section I provides some background to the discussion: 
my field research in the Yukon Territory, the interest of some 
scientists in oral tradition and the cultural context within 
which narratives must be viewed. Section II examines oral 
tradition and science as two different theoretical frameworks 
for understanding the world and considers some of the· strengths 
and limitations of each. Section III presents some applications 
of the two frameworks to the natural environment in the Yukon: 
glacier movement and impounded lakes, climate, mineral resources, 
map making, fauna and flora, prehistory, volcanic eruptions and 
earthquakes. - Section IV gives a brief overview of similar 
research in other parts of the circum-polar north. The 
concluding section offers some observations about the validity 
of incorporating oral traditions into scientific investigation 
in the north. 
I 
11 
I 
i 
I 
I 
2 -
anthropological interpretations of myth. The selection of this 
topic emerged directly from the interdisciplinary nature of the 
Diploma in Polar Studies Programme at the Scott Polar Research 
Institute; this programme examines northern research in physical 
sciences, social sciences and humanities. An examination of 
the relationship between oral tradition and science necessarily 
considers linkages among these various branches of study. The 
materials presented here will focus on the Yukon Territory, 
Canada, but conclusions may be more broadly applicable to other 
areas of the circum-polar north. 
Section I provides some background to the discussion: 
my field research in the Yukon Territory, the interest of some 
scientists in oral tradition and the cultural context within 
which narratives must be viewed. Section II examines oral 
tradition and science as two different theoretical frameworks 
for understanding the world and considers some of the · strengths 
and limitations of each. Section III presents some applications 
of the two frameworks to the natural environment in the Yukon: 
glacier movement and impounded lakes, climate, mineral resources, 
map making, fauna and flora, prehistory, volcanic eruptions and 
earthquakes • . Section IV gives a brief overview of similar 
research in other parts of the circum-polar north. The 
concluding section offers some observations -about the validity 
of incorporating oral traditions into scientific investigation 
in the north. 
3 -
SECTION I 
THE RESEARCH CONTEXT 
I . 1 Background of Research 
Between 1974 and 1979 I worked intermittently with several 
~lderly Native women in the southern Yukon Territory who wanted 
their biographies recorded and transcribed for their families. 
My initial interest was in learning something about how northern 
women's lives were changing and how these changes were reflected 
in personal histories. After some months of work, the three 
oldest wo men, all born before 1900 , began to shift emphasis away 
from personal history to traditional stories which they wanted 
duplicated and distributed to a wider audience. This was done 
with assistance from the National Museum of Canada, the Council 
for Yukon Indians, the Yukon Indian News and the Department of 
Education , Government of the Yukon Territory (Cruikshank 1977, 
1979a, 1979b, 1979c). 
In all, more than 100 stories of varying length and complexity 
were recorded, transcribed and distributed1 • While I believe 
that the majority of these narratives reflect a ~pecffic view 
o f the soci a l _order and wome n 's place i n it , a n umbe r of the 
narratives are concerned much more directly with the nature of 
the physical environment . These latter stories are of central 
interest to this p a per . I t s hou l d be stated at the outset t h a t 
t he content of these stories is never exhausted by .materialistic 
explanations , which often just ski m the surface , and it is not 
the intent of th i s paper to do this. 
Oral tradit i on has been defined succinctly as "oral test i mony 
4 -
transmitted verbally from one generation to the next or more" 
(Vansina 1971, p.444). Anthropolo gists and classicists tend to 
divide traditional narratives into. two genres, myth and legend. 
'Myth' tells of a time different from historical time as we know 
it, and describes origins and transformations of the world as 
it now appears. 'Legend' may be highly embellished but it can 
usually be traced to an historical event. This paper considers 
both legends about landscape and myths which provide a non-western 
perspective on the natural environment. 
I.1 Northern Scientific Interest in Oral Tradition 
In speaking of science I am referring to soience broadly 
as 11 ••• the human activity of finding an order in nature by 
organizing the scattered meaningless facts under universal 
concepts ••• such creations of the mind as gravitation" 
( Bronowski 1977, p.225). Some scientists have demonstrated 
interest in learning Hative oral traditions which relate to their 
research. While examples will be discussed later in the text, 
a list of some demonstrates the kinds of interest. 
Two arc haeolo g ists documented examples of ho w Native Amer ican 
traditions, passed on for several centuries , have been confirmed 
by independent archaeological or geological reports (Pendergast 
and Meighan 1959; Meighan 1960). A geo gr ,apher cited four 
Eskimo testimonies recorded in . journals of explorers or anthro-
pologists which he interpreted as reflecting an understanding 
of isostatic rebound (Spink 1969a). A historian works with 
scientists at the University of East Anglia's Climatic Rese arch 
Unit evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of Icelandic 
tradition in reconstruction of that island's climate (Ogilvie, 
personal communication; Ogilvie 1978; Bell and Ogilvie 1978). 
One geophysicist in Alaska is recording traditions associated 
with sea ice on the north Alaska coast; another hopes to 
record oral traditions as evidence of volcanic eruptions at 
Mount Wrangell (Benson, personal communication). A glaciologist 
working in the St Elias range of mountains, south-west Yukon, 
considers that traditions recorded in the Yukon may help to 
reconstruct events surrounding the emptying of a glacier-dammed 
lake in the area (Clarke, personal communication). A dendro-
climatologist from Columbia University who is reconstructing 
~ast climates in northern Canada is interested in Yukon traditions 
about an extremely cold summer during the last century (Jacoby, 
personal communic~tion). The director of a major archaeological 
project at Old Crow Flats in the northern Yukon has emphasized 
the importance of data obtained from oral history (Irving 1975, 
p.1455). Even if the verbal record only supports a scientist's 
hypothesis, it helps him to develop that hypothesis with greater 
assurance. 
At another level, scientists have been trying to reconstruct 
the impact of geological , climatic and environmental processes 
on early human populations in the north (Black 1976; Barry and 
others 1977). Oral traditions could play an important role 
in such studies . 
I.3 The Cultural Context of Oral Tradition in the Yukon Territory 
Anthropologists have stressed repeatedly the need to view 
oral traditions in a broader cultural context (Durkheim 1915; 
6 -
Boas 1938; Malinowski 1954). The British functionalist school 
of anthropologists carried the idea of context to an extreme by 
considering only the context rather than the narrative form 
worthy of study, particularly the functions performed by traditions 
in maintaining the social structure. Myth was considered to be 
derived not from rational inductive observations of natural 
phenomena; rather it was treated as a body of tradition handed 
down to the individual by the community in which he was submerged, 
a social force exerting a practical function in day-to-day life. 
Such analysis considered only those aspects of narrative which 
contributed to a wider analysis of community organization (Colby 
and Peacock 1975, p.614-15). 
North American cultural anthropology has shown more interest 
in analysis of actual texts, view,ing these in the con text of 
the narrator's personal history as well as culture (Boas 1904; 
Garfield 1953; McClellan 1970a; Colby and Peacock 1975, 
p.617-31). Recently historians, too, have begun to argue that 
oral tradition has important historical content; however, they 
stress that it is impossible to evaluate the importance of a 
text without a clear understanding of its social meaning in a 
historical and- geographical milieu (Vansina 1971, p.446). 
It is useful to outline briefly the cultural context of 
southern Yukon Indian society at the end of the last century in 
order to delineate the economic, social, linguistic, historical 
and educational setting within which present day narrators grew 
up, and some of the influences on their stories. 
(a) Traditional Economy 
Ab original ly, Natives o f t he s out hern Yukon Territory 
t i . 
were hunters and fishermen. Animal and plant resources on which 
they depended varied cyclically; hence families migrated over 
large areas of land to obtain food, clothing and shelter. In 
summer, people fished. In late summer and autumn they hunted 
and dried meat. In winter they tried to minimize unnecessary 
movement. Trapping fur bearers predominated in spring. Because 
of the unpredictability of the natural environment they had to 
be prepared to modify their annual movements when necessary. 
People tended to live in relatively small groups of perhaps two 
or three hunters with dependents. Somewhat larger groups gathered 
at fishcamps in summer. There were no permanent settlements 
before the end of the century. People developed an intimate 
knowledge of the land from which they derived their livelihood. 
(b) Social Relations 
Social relations in the central and southern Yukon were 
clearly structured by a rnatrilineal moiety system, a bipartite 
division of society. Each individual automatically belonged 
to the same moiety as his or her mothe~ and rights, obligations 
and even oral traditions were passed on through the female line. 
Marr iages were exogamous; that is, each individual was expected 
to marry someone from the opposite moiety and marriage within 
one's own moiety was tantamount to incest. Marriage, then, was 
an alliance between kin groups reinforcing a whole series of 
rights and obligations. Rules of moiety reciprocity guided 
behaviour at birth, puberty, death, visiting, story · telling, 
distribution of food and other occasions. Political leadership 
also functioned within kinship rules. 
Yukon Indians, then, combined the characteristic i n dependence 
8 -
of sub-Arctic hunters with clear social ideals of cooperative 
behaviour appropriate to the sharing of resources, activities 
and work. 
(c) Languages 
Most of the languages spoken in the Yukon are classified 
by linguists under the general term Athapaskan, the dominant 
language "family" in north-western Canada and Alaska (see Map 1, 
page 9). Athapaskan languages are also spoken as far away as 
northern California and the south-western United States (Navaho 
and Apache, for example). In the Yukon, they include Kutchin · 
(also written Gwich'in) in the northern Yukon, Han spoken near 
what is now Dawson City, Tutchone in the central and southern 
Yukon, Kaska in the south-eastern Yukon and Tagish, an almost 
extinct language in,the southern Yukon (see Map 2, page 10). 
Tlingit, spoken in the extreme southern Yukon is a coastal 
language very different from Athapaskan languages. Some time 
during the last century, Tlingit speakers moved into the southern 
Yukon and neighbouring Athapaskan groups adopted Tlingit words 
and some of their customs. Athapaskan linguistic research has 
begun relatively recently in this region but a great deal of work 
is currently in progress in Alaska and northern Canada (see 
Krauss 1973). 
(d) Historical Change 
For at least a century before they had direct contact 
with whites, Yukon Indians were involved in trade relations with 
coastal Tlingit who acted as middlemen, bringing European goods from 
the Russians and British on the Pacific coast to the interior 
and taking back furs. In effect they were colonized by the 
9 -
Map 1 
Native groups of North-western North America 
(after McClellan 1975, Map 1). 
- 10 -
Map 2 
Yukon Native languages 
(Map produced by Yukon Native Languages Project) 
:Briti5£ 
wlvm6il1v, 
uW1CH '1/ 
(LOUC-HEV") 
AlortAntst 
Ttrrit'1ries 
--, - - - - - - - -
• Carmacks / , 
I 
I 
1 • Ross River 
I 
Haine5 J,mcf;on 1 
• 
.'whifehors~ KASKA 
I 
e lJafson Late 
- 11 -
Tlingit who clearly had the upper hand in the trade relationship. 
Much of the feeling of these days is retained in oral tradition. 
The Klondike gold rush broke the Tlingit monopoly and for 
the next three decades Yukon Indians negotiated directly with 
white traders, miners, missionaries and other entrepreneurs who 
had come north. With characteristic willingness to adapt, some 
built permanent year-round homes near the posts and took seasonal 
wage employment in the dominant white economy, especially on 
riverboats and in woodcamps. The second 'rush' which took 
place during the construction of the Alaska Highway in 1942 
permanently enforced a new settlement orientation. The ability 
of Athapaskans to adapt to new circumstances when necessary has 
been repeatedly mentioned by ethnographers and is also reflected 
in oral narratives. 
(e) Role of Oral Tradition 
Oral tradition had a central role in transferring 
knowledge from generation to generation. Until recently, Yukon 
Indians acquired all their knowledg e either from their own 
expe rience or from the descriptions of others . 
by an 85-y e ar-old woman was t y pical : 
An explanation 
In the ~arly d a y s we l e arn fro m our grandmothers . 
Th ey t ell u s a story and we listen all the time . 
Now we try to teach our kids. We talk to them about 
what is ri ght . We remember what our people say. 
Now kids get too much movies, TV , all kinds of things . 
Don't learn language. Don't learn things. Try to 
be Whiteman . This is no good. 
While women usually told stories informally to children , the 
oldest men repeated the traditions publicly . Most of the women 
with whom I worked a greed that they had learned many of the 
traditions from un cles and gran d f a thers (pa r ticularl y mat ri -
- 12 -
lineal k in). 
Much of the int ellectual interest of Yukon Indians focussed 
on supernatural powers and this theme occupies a central place 
in Athapaskan mythology (McClellan 1975, p.91). Mythological 
stories address the uneasy balance between culture and nature, 
man and environment, and the symbolic journeys taken by men and 
women beyond the realm of ordinary reality. While it is relevant 
to this discussion , it is impossible to delve into themes in 
Yukon Indian myth without making them the central focus of the 
paper. 
The remainder of this paper attempts to examine some of the 
problematic issues associated with the use of oral traditions 
(specifically Athapaskan traditions) by scientists. It is only 
a preliminary exploration of the problems, because recording 
narratives about natural phenomen a was never the main focus of 
my research . It may, however, set parameters for mor~ systematic 
invest i gation in the future. 
- 13 -
SECTION II 
ORAL TRADITION AND SCIENTIFIC TRADITION: 
CONTRASTING FRAMEWORKS 
II . 1 Co gnition, Literacy and Knowledge 
Ever since the Renaissance, it has been a feature of western 
intellectual tradition to distinguish between western and non-
western, 'primitive ' and 'modern ' thought as though intrinsic 
differences separate the two. Obviously this sort of discussion 
takes place within a western framework, using a multi-dimensional 
western standard. 
Anthropology developed very much within this tradition and 
has contributed to the dual classification system , particularly 
in distingµishing non-western beliefs from western science. 
Within this framework, for example, western tradition is viewed 
as embodyin g 'objectiv e kno wledge' and non-western traditions are 
interpreted as 'magic ' or 'religion' rather than technical thinking. 
Si gnificantly, many anthropolo gists no w question the value of 
usin g reli g ion as an analytical cate gory since it has become 
cl ear t ha t there is no cross-culturally valid de f inition of 
re l igi on: oft en it b ecome s a c a tch-all dustbi n category f or 
behaviour con sidered unintelli g ible within ·a rationalist frame-
work. The cate gories which a n thropolo gists -use to describe 
trad i t ional s ocie ti e s ma y reflect more about their own so c ieties 
than those which they propose to study. The contemporary debate 
in an t hropolo gy a bout whethe r one can use for ma lis t models 
a ppl i cable to all societies , or whether one must study a society 
on its own t erms, usi n g it s own classification system , ref l ect s 
- 14 -
this controversy (see Frake 1969). 
Cross-cultural cognition is of particular interest to 
anthropologists and linguists. 
Levi-Strauss argues that contrary to conventional western 
beliefs 'primitive' people view the world intellectually rather 
than just materially; for them, as for modern western man, 
classification of environmental phenomena is extremely important 
I see no reason why mankind should have waited until 
recent times to produce minds of the caliber of a Plato 
or an Einstein. Already, over two or three thousand 
years ago, there were probably men of similar capacity, 
who were of course not applying their intelligence to 
the solution of the same problems as these more recent 
thinkers; instead they were probably more interested 
in kinship (Levi-Strauss 1968, p.351). 
Levi-Strauss distinguishes two modes of scientific thought 
or "two strategic levels at which nature is accessible to scientific 
inquiry": one is at a level of perception and imagination, the 
other at a more abstract level; one culminates in the science 
which led to neolithic agriculture, the other in modern science 
(Levi-Strauss 1966, p.15). Whe ther or not we agree with his 
'two science' approach, it is clearly the perceptive, empirical 
nature of traditional Indian and Inuit knowledge, the astute 
observations made over many years of living, which are of interest 
to modern scientists working in the north. 
Some of the best writing about the nature of cognition in 
non-western societies comes from Africa. Conclusions from 
this work may be more broadly applicable. While acknowledging 
that there are real differences between traditional African 
thought and western scientific thinking, Robin Horton finds 
certain similarities in the t wo processes, particularly in their 
- 15 -
search for general explanatory theories: 
The quest for explanatory theory is basically the 
quest for unity underlying apparent diversity~ for 
simplicity underlying apparent complexity; for 
order underlying apparent disorder; for regularity 
underlying apparent anomoly . (Horton 1976, p.1). 
However, says Horton, while the two traditions do share 
certain similarities, they differ in their awareness of alter-
natives: African tradition resists alternative explanations of 
phenomena; modern science is based on highly developed awareness 
of alternatives. African communities react with anxiety to 
threats to their theoretical tenets; science is (at least 
ideally) based on constant reassessment of the theoretical under-
pinnings (Horton 1967, p.156). This dichotomy may apply less 
to northern Athapaskan traditions, where one characteristic of 
narrators is their willingness and ability to incorporate new 
events and ideas rather than - to rej,ect them out of hand. 
Professor Jack Goody considers the distinction between modes 
of thought inadequate and suggests that it is simply~ arbitrary 
western classification system trying to make our world view 
appear orderly: 
••• the division of societies or modes of thought into 
advanced and primitive, domesticated or· savage, open 
or closed, is essentially to make use of a folk-
taxonomy by which we bring order and understanding 
into a complex universe. But the order is illusory, 
the meaning superficial ••• the categorization is 
often value laden and ethnocentric (Goody 1977, p.36). 
Literacy, he says, can account for the shift in perspective, 
because once people can write things down , they can store 
information and inspect it. Thi s permits criticis m and the 
growth of cumulative knowledge, the basis of western science. 
- 16 -
Goody also points out that in any case it is not possible to talk 
about two distinctive modes of thought, because both are present 
not only in the same societies but in the same individuals. 
This is a point which seems critical in discussions about traditions 
in the circum-polar north where 'traditional' and 'modern' 
perspectives regularly co-exist. 
Linguists have long debated this issue from the perspective 
of language. During the 1920's and 1930's, Edward Sapir and 
Benjamin Lee Whorf published articles suggesting that one's view 
of the world is dependent on the lan guage one speaks. Language, 
they said, was not simply a technique of expression but a way of 
classifying sensory experience in a cruder but broader way than 
science. \-/horf argued, for example, that the metaphysical frame-
work of Hopi grammar with its "built-in calculus" might be better 
equipped than English to deal with concepts of modern Einsteinian 
physics . Hopi verbs are extremely com plex but have no tenses . 
Time and space are inseparable in the language. Verbs focus 
on the contrast between particle and field of vibration and seem 
ideally suited to describe wave particle theory or relativity 
physics (Whorf 1956, p.51-56). 
While the Whorfian hypothesis is attacked directly by some 
con t emporary linguists like Chomsky who argue that language has 
an innat e basis, all linguists would agree that language is 
fund amental to any study of cognition. Some linguists (especially 
those dealing with Athapaskan languag es in north-western Canada 
and Alaska ) argue, like Goody, that a fundamental pre-requisite 
for continuing development of languages in the twentieth century 
is literacy, the development of orthographies for each language . 
- 17 -
Athapaskan scholar Michael Krauss recently testified at an Inquiry 
in northern Canada: 
••• no language, including English, is from the 
linguistic point of view intrinsically better equipped 
to deal with the modern world, whether it would be the 
flying of a jet plane or operating an X-ray machine 
than Dogrib, Inuit, Hebrew, Japanese, or an Australian 
aboriginal language. If God created anything equal 
in this world, it was language. The basic structures 
of the native languages are perfectly capable of handling 
modern ideas and concepts. The only thing that is 
lacking in the case of the so-called underdeveloped 
languages is the necessary lexicon, the vocabulary for 
dealing with the new material and the technological concepts 
that have been introduced (Krauss 1976, p.29971). 
This, he argues, can develop only after a writing system is in 
use for these languages. 
All of these theses share a common recognition that 
'traditional thought' shares a good deal with 'scientific 
thought'. It can be argued, then, that Native observations about 
the natural environment are just as objective as those of western 
scientists, though they are interpreted within different frame-
works. It is to a comparison of the frameworks which we must 
turn to consider how they differ. 
II.2 Oral Tradition 
The atti-tude of an oral society toward speech is 
similar to the reverence of members of a literate 
society to the written word (Vansina 1971, p.442). 
In recent years historians have shown considerable interest 
in oral tradition. It is no longer a question of whether oral 
t r ad i tion includes historical knowledge but how much is present , 
bow long a time span it cov ers , how valid it is ( Meighan 1960 , 
p.59; Vansina 1965; Vans i na 1971 , p. 464 ). 
The importance of viewing oral traditions within cultural 
- 18 -
contex t has already been stressed. On the following pages it 
may be clearer to talk about characteristics of narrative in a 
specific culture by summarizing both these features which are 
att r active to h istorians and scientists and those wh ich p r esent 
limitations. Examples, then, are cited from northern Athapaskan 
society in the region of the present Yukon Territory; however, 
some of the principles are more broadly applicable to oral 
l iterature generally. 
(a) Attractions of oral traditions as evidence 
(i) Persistence Most aspects of northern Athapaskan 
culture have chan ged enormously during the last century. The 
Klondike gold rush, the intensified fur trade, the construction 
of the Alaska Hi ghway , the introduction of government programmes 
and s chools, the attempts to industriali z e the north : these 
t h ings have affected every aspect of people~s lives . However , 
oral traditions continue to be important to adults, particularly 
ol der people. Stories recorded in Sitka in 1883 by Aurel Krause, 
in Sit k a and Wr angell in 190 4 by J ohn Swan t on , a nd at Dease Lake 
in 1914 by Jame s Te.it are still told by women liv in g i n th e Yukon 
in t h e mi d -1 970' s (se e Kr a u se 1956, p.197 ; Swan ton 1909, Tal e s 
5, 13, 19, 77, 99, 100 ; Teit 1917, p. 446 , 46 4 ). This de ep 
con s e rvatism of Yu kon oral tradition is one of its chief attraction s 
to s cientist s and h i st or ians . 
( ii ) Indiv i du al var ia t ion and consistency Despite t h is 
general persistence, Athapaskan narrator s do not seem t o be bound 
as ri gidly by a 'fix ed' f orm of traditional narrative as are 
narrat ors in some so c ieties . That is, individual narrat or s 
ex ercise considerable fle x ibility in narrative style. McClellan 
- 19 -
recor ded 11 versions of a particular story in the southern Yukon 
Territory and showed how each narrator embellished or developed 
aspects of the story congruent with his or her own life (McClellan 
1970a ) . What does persist in the different versions is the 
structural arrangement of the story elements, and this seems to 
preserve at least some of the essential content. While individual 
narrators ma y all tell sli ghtly different versions of one story , 
the women with whom I worked were most consistent in their own 
versions; that is, the same woman telling me a story at one 
point in time and then repeating it a year or two later told the 
story remarkably consistently, using similar words and phrases 
and insisting on the importance of 'getting it right ' . Again, 
t h is kind of conservatism is important to a historian or scientist 
provided he makes the effort to get as many different versions 
of a tradition as possible. 
(iii) Integration of historical events McClellan has 
documented the tendency of Yukon At h apaskans to incorporate 
historical e vents into traditional nar rative and this is confirmed 
by my own data. Na t ive perspectives on the Klondike gold rush , 
the arrival of . t h e f i r st white s and well-kn own h is t orical fi gu r es 
a r e e mbe dd e d in oral literature ; in fact, the narrativ e sty le 
s eems qu i te r es ponsive to i n corporating new materials using a 
tradition a l s tructur e (see McClellan 1970b ; Slobod in 1975 ). In 
the s ame way, accoun ts of nat ural cata strophes wh ich a r e of 
intere s t to n orthern ge ologi st s , g l ac i ologis ts, archa eologists 
and cl i matologis ts often become part of oral tradition (see 
Sections III and IV below). 
(iv) Oral tradition as technology Anthropologists often 
- 20 -
equate myth and legend with religion or magic rather than with 
te chnical thinking. Yet from the narrator's perspective, 
traditions often contain highly te~hnical information. Surviving 
in a sub -Arctic environment by hunting, fishing and gathering 
requires detailed observations of one's environment and trans-
mission of that ~nowledge from generation to generation. 
of observation are reflected in linguistic categories or in 
narrative. 
Years 
Anthropologist Robin Riddington suggests the hypothesis that 
oral tradition is a critical adaptive strategy for hunters and 
gatherers. He argues that the conceptual ability to recreate, 
through language, a situation for someone who has not experienced 
it directly is a hi ghly adaptive technology carried in the mind 
rather than in the hand, and coded in tradition rather than in 
heavy material encumbrance. Accurate transmission becomes 
critical for survival of the group (Riddington, unpublished paper). 
Such content is often the same kind of detailed observation 
valued by scientists. 
(v) Duration of observations Oral traditions may 
provide detailed observations of natural phenomena over long 
periods of time. Such observations are made over a lifetime 
and in all seasons whereas scientists are often limited to short 
field trips during summer. 
(vi) Absence of documentary sources In an area where 
most written documents date from the be ginning of this century, 
oral tradition is a significant source of historical information. 
With such a shallow historical base for their observations, 
northern scientists may well dispute the validity of evidence 
- 21 -
in narrative but they cannot afford to ignore it. 
(b) Limitations of oral traditions as evidence 
(i) Cultural context Traditions passed on orally 
begin with very different premises from western science and cannot 
readily be interpreted out of_ context. Usually a scientist 
interested in a particular phenomenon will both pose his question 
and answer it within a western frame of reference. Such an 
approach could easily lead to misinterpretation of a story. 
(ii) Language There is a serious linguistic problem 
involved in translation. At the present time, few if any non-
Athapaskans other than a handful of linguists have any fluency 
in northern Athapaskan languages. Consequently we must rely on 
translations provided by bilingual Athapaskan and English speakers 
and have no Athapaskan versions against which to evaluate the 
translations. While I am not qualified to judge the extent to 
which the meaning of a narrative changes in translatibn, it ' does 
place obvious limitations on anyone without linguistic competence 
trying tb learn traditions. 
(iii) Accessibility The limitation most frequently 
cited by scientists is accessibility to oral tradition. There 
is understandable reluctance on the part of Native people to 
discuss traditions unless there is some clear reason for doing so. 
First there is fear of ridicule whi ch is the most common response 
of outsiders to traditions they don't understand. Secondly, 
in some parts of the north (especially on the north-west Pacific 
coast of North America) traditions are considered personal 
property and can only be told by the owner. There is a whole 
area of ethics here which is being redefined by Indian communities 
- 22 -
who want to ensure that traditions are recorded but not misused. 
(iv) Literary Style Each culture has a special literary 
style which cannot be ignored in analysis of oral narrative. 
Narrative style, literary structure, and repeated themes or 
motifs must be understood before it is possible to extract aspects 
useful to science. Like all literature, oral literature may seek 
to transform rather than accurately reflect life, and this poses 
a problem for someone trying to isolate historical data (see 
McClellan 1970b). 
(v) Symbolism Similarly, a subject in any story may 
be treated by allusion, figurative or symbolic languages (Algoa 
1968, p.235). In some of the discussion below, for example, 
stories about giant worms (gJ) may be interpreted as describing 
extinct animals (Harington 1970), surging glaciers (Workman 1978, 
p.60) or thawing permafrost (De Laguna 1969-70, p.19). 
( v i) Time p e rspective One of the most serious limitations 
for scientists is the handling of time in oral narrative. Vansina, 
a student of African tradition, points out that most oral traditions 
do not contain even internal sequence of time and would be 
undatable and unusable if other supporting evidence were not 
ava ilable ( Vansina 1971, p.461 ). For example, 't elescopi n s ' of 
events is common in all oral literature; events occurring over 
sev eral g e nerations may be con densed into a · single generation. 
In t he Yukon, McClellan n ote d t h at Athapaskans hav e high t ole rance 
f or discontinui t y in time so that 'long a g o stories' which took 
place when an i mals and men could freel y communicate can co - ex is't 
with events in the present or recent past ( McClellan 1970b , 
p . 116) . This can be most bewildering to a western listener. 
- 23 -
Scientists, then, should not expect oral cultures to 
handle concepts of time in the same way that they do; this 
lirni ts any possibility of being able to date scientific phenomena 
on the basis of Native traditions. 
(vii) Space Ideas of spatial relationship are similarly 
unfamiliar in oral traditions. A tradition may refer to a 
•universe' which is really quite small (Vansina 1971, p.461). 
In the Yukon, Indians rarely stress spatial relatedness of a 
series of events in their traditions. Henderson (1978) 
documents how Indian concepts of spatial organization change 
under the pressure of culture change to give new spatial 
dimensions to old stories. 
(viii) Quantitative data Native traditions in north-
western Canada do not handle quantitative data in the same 
manner as western science. People may speak of 'hundreds' or 
'thousands' of people, years, moose, or ptarmigan whe.n they merely 
mean 'many'. Vansina considers this to be true for oral 
traditions generally, noting that quantitative data tends to be 
a 'blind spot' in oral tradition (Vansina 1971, p.459). 
(ix) Deliberate distortion Finally, there are clearly 
problems which can arise from deliberate distortion - plagiarism, 
contamination from other sources, fabrication, mixing of traditions. 
Television may contribute to this kind of problem. 
In summary, then , oral tradition tends to be timeless 
rather than chronological, to refer to situations rather than 
events. Oral tradition has a specificity of its own which puts 
limitations on its use. A single tradition cannot be used by 
itself but only in combination with other sources, in comparative 
- 24 -
ways (Vansina 1968 , p.97-98; 1971, p.443). 
II.3 Scientific Tradition 
(a) The Context of Northern Science 
While it is possible to isolate some of the essential 
characteristics of oral tradition, it is more difficult to say 
concisely what we mean by scientific tradition. Scientific 
theories and scientific disciplines have changed radically even 
in this century. Furthermore there are still fundamental 
d ebates in the philosophy of science about what it is that 
scientists actually do (see Popper 1959; Kuhn 1962; Lakatos 
and Mus grave 1970). 
Classical science in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth 
centuries was based on Descartes' and Hobbes' notions that cause 
was unalterably linked with effect, on Bacon's idea that induction 
was the i n tellectual basis o f science, and on Newton's assumption 
that scientists could observe matter without actually affecting 
its motion. I mplicit i n sci en ce was a model which assumed that 
nature was causal and continuous - a s e l f -contained independent 
syste m. 
By t he e nd of the l a s t century it was cl e a r tha t t he class i cal 
model did .no t work : the b e h a v iour o f l ight was anomalous ; the 
orb i t of Me rcu ry d i d not keep time ; radioactivity and t he behaviour 
of electrons could not be explained by the classical models 
(Bronowski 1969, p.16-1 9 ). These problems gen erated an 
unparalleled growth of new con cepts, theories and bra nches o f 
science. Charles Darwin's work gave a who l e new perspective to 
natural history. Einstein's principle of relativity made 
- 25 -
scientists revise their traditional idea that time is the same 
for everyone everywhere, and bound it to the observer's passage 
through space. Research in quantum physics showed that causality 
was not a necessary formulation for the laws of nature (Bronowski 
1969, pp.32, 40). Statistical techniques enabled scientists 
to discuss nature not as a mechanism but as an algebra. Rather 
that continuing to impose man-made scientific laws or logic on 
nature, or hoping that the error of the classical model was small 
and could be corrected by some minor compromise, scientists began 
to try to understand nature on its own terms. 
In the present decade, science is concerned less ~ith 
'events' than with relations, structures, shapes and most of all 
with process. 
Science is experiment; science is trying things. 
It is trying each possible alternative in turn, 
intelligently and systematically; and throwing away 
what won't work, and accepting what will, no matter 
how it goes against our prejudices. And what w·orks 
adds one more piece to the slow, laborious but 
triumphant understanding of our world 
(Bronowski, 1977, p.2). 
A scientific procedure, then, is seen as breaking down 
nature's code to constituent symbols and their laws of arrangement. 
Scientists, like everyone else, are limited by their own concepts 
and their own framework; however, this decoding approach does 
link sciences like physics and biology with what Bronowski calls 
" those interlocking puzzle sciences" like geology, paleontology 
and archaeology (Bronowski 1977, p.53). 
Given this background, the part played by Arctic and sub-
Arctic scientific research becomes clearer . It is generally 
a ckn owledged t h at research in po l ar region s has had spe cific 
- 26 -
benefits for specific physical sciences because the observations 
recorded there are of a kind available no-where else. Detailed 
meteorological observations made in polar regions have contributed 
to our understanding of global atmospheric circulation . The 
relative simplicity of the ecological systems in polar regions 
contributes to model building in the life sciences. Studies 
of glaciers in polar regions have provided the basis for much 
of the science of glaciology. 
If a scientist becomes interested in oral tradition, he 
usually has a particular phenomenon in mind. He might be 
interested in traditions which could help him enlarge a working 
hypothesis. He might see narrative as a source of data. He 
might hope that traditions could be a source of validation or 
verification if other data are uncertain. But these possibilities 
are all based on the conventional western supposition that science 
is the •superior' model of explanation and that oral tradition 
is useful only to the extent that it can confirm views put 
forward by scientists. It is conceivable that native frameworks 
or classification systems could cause a scientist to re-evaluate 
his own framework for viewing a particular phenomenon. 
(b) Limitations of Western Science 
If oral tradition is bound by its own cultural context, 
so is science. When he was working with Gwich'in informants at 
Old Crow in the northern Yukon, biologist La~rence Irving concluded 
that scientists utilize an impoverished framework compared with 
Nat ive informants who have a manifestly richer view of their 
natural world. 
- 27 -
Modern science and technology rely so much on the 
printed word that it is difficult for us to communicate 
accurately with people whose only record of knowledge 
consist of the remembered meaning of spoken words • •• 
To those like myself, who are not familiar with unwritten 
languages, it is surprising to learn that a complete 
category of natural objects, for example birds, can be 
accurately named without the aid of a record in book or 
museum. The transmission of names of objects through 
memory appears to be more conservative than their 
preservation in writing or the taxonomy of science, 
for the latter two processes are provisional, whereas 
memorized naming is definite. Upon reflection it is 
evident that the use of names in the transmission of 
knowledge by speech must be completely conservative or 
the result would be utter confusion (Irving 1958, 
pp.117, 119). 
Hugh Brody cites examples of detailed environmental infor-
mation provided by Inuit hunters who have spent their lives on 
the land while arguing that western scientists are ill-equipped 
to understand such information because their frameworks for 
viewing ecology are narrow: 
The Inuit of Baffin Island have detailed knowledge of 
such (ecological) changes for every species ••• To 
organize such ideas in accordance with southern ideas 
of ecological systems would involve removing them from 
their context - a context that ignores many of the 
distinctions that are fundamental to science - and 
destroy at least one of the focal meanings of these 
details (Brody 1976, p.216), 
An observation made in north-western Alaska is fa miliar 
in the Yukon. Ecologically minded anthropologists have argued 
that physical environmental constraints have significantly 
influenced traditional land use and settlement history. An 
anthropologist working there iri 1969-70 attempted to reconstruct 
demographic and social patterns in the mid-nineteenth century. 
Much of the research involved studying topographic maps with 
men from that area, many of whom were "literate, Americanized, 
- 28 -
well travelled and adherents of Christianity". Nevertheless, 
their description of land use gave a central place to a range of 
non-empirical phenomena. 
Very early in my investigation ••• it became apparent 
that the non-human environment as I perceived it 
constituted only a portion of the external conditions 
which influenced traditional Eskimo settlement patterns 
••• As the cases accumulated, it became increasingly 
obvious that to account fully for the location and 
distribution of traditional settlements solely in 
terms of environmental factors that I could perceive 
would be impossible (Burch 1971, p.149). 
Despite the difficulties involved, it is worthwhile to 
pursue the comparison of such diverse frameworks with a view to 
learning something from the framework rather than just from 
specific pieces of information. This view is central to much 
of the recent thinking in philosophy of science: 
The central point is that a critical discussion and 
comparison of ideas is always possible. It is just 
a dogma - a dangerous dogma - that the different 
frameworks are like mutually untranslatable languages. 
The fact is that even totally different languages like 
English and Hopi or Chinese are not untranslatable ••• 
The difficulty of discussion between people brou ght 
up in different frameworks is to be admitted. But 
nothing is more fruitful than just such discussion; 
than the culture clash which has stimulated some of 
the greatest intellectual revolutions (Popper 1970, 
p.56-57). 
To this one might add the qualifier that such discussion can only 
be fruitful when the western scientist is able to detach himself 
from his own framework and to try to understand the Native frame-
work with the same seriousness with which he would treat his own. 
In the following sections, I will consider specific traditions 
and specific areas of scientific research in the Yukon to see how 
the two might complement one another. 
- 29 -
SECTION III 
CONVERGENCE OF ORAL AND SCIENTIFIC TRADITIONS 
This section considers specific examples of how the two 
traditions, oral and scientific, interpret particular aspects of 
the natural environment. It begins with oral traditions relating 
to glacier movement and impounded lakes, fluctuations in climate, 
detailed knowledge of topograppy, minerals, prehistory, fauna 
and flora and relates them to present day scientific research in 
the central and southern Yukon Territory (see Map 3, p.30). 
A serious shortcoming with this approach must be repeated. It 
extracts references embedded in more general traditions, looks 
at them through a veil of western categories (geology, archaeology, 
biology), evaluates traditions as 'evidence' to be accepted or 
rejected by science and does not do justice to the traditions 
themselves. However, historians and scientists are ·using 
traditions and the aim of this paper is to evaluate the extent 
to which this approach is legitimate. 
I II.1 Glacier Movement and Impounded Lakes 
(a) Oral Data 
One of the most universal oral traditions is that of 
the Deluge, a great flood which covered the earth and from which 
only a handful of survivors escaped (Thompson 1932 , section A1010 , 
A1020-22). Yukon Indians have this tradition and . can point to 
mountain tops where remnants of a raft are said to be visible. 
A geologist who has examined this narrative in various parts 
of the world p o ints out that no universal f l ood coul d have oc curred 
~ 
\ 
' 
Map 3 
The research 
of Alaska. 
- 30 -
area: south-west y 
(A 
ukon T fter D erritory 
e Laguna 1972 , Map 2). 
and Gulf C oast 
- 31 -
by normal geological processes because the amount of water on 
earth is constant. However floods, plural, are a universal 
phenomenon and she suggests the hypothesis that Deluge traditions 
may be related to glacier-dammed lakes which followed the last 
glaciation. 
The number of smaller lakes that were impounded 
temporarily by tongues of ice is impossible to 
estimate, but there must have been thousands of them 
at different times and at different locations. When 
ice dams impounding such lakes fail, they often must 
have failed suddenly, and there must have been many 
local floods which could have wiped out Indian 
villages downstream... (Vitaliano 1973, p.145). 
In this context it is worth considering some narratives from 
the south-west Yukon Territory. The glaciers in the St Elias 
Mountains, collectively known as the Icefield ran ges are active 
remnants of the Wisconsin glaciation. The interval which 
scientists refer to as the Neoglaciation culminated in the mid-
eighteenth century and these glaciers have surged in recent if 
not living memory (see Map 4, p.32). 
The Lowell Glacier is known by the Athapaskan name Naludi' 
or 'fish stop' because its movement across the Alsek River has 
pe riodically stopped the mi gration of salmon from the Pacific 
Ocean to the lakes and tributaries of the upper Alsek. According 
to a tradition told to me by a woman born in 1892, this surge 
first took place when a youn g boy from the Tlingit village of 
Yakutat (at the mouth of the Alsek) visited the Yukon and made 
fun of an Athapaskan shaman because of his balding head . To 
punish him and his Tlingit tribe the sha man caused the glacier 
to surge a c r oss t he r ive r a nd a hu ge lak e f orme d b ehin d the dam. 
Then the shaman broke the dam and the water swept downriver 
I I" 
.. 'J 
'~ ~ 
f/ • 
.,, . 
140" 
,t 
t 
'\" 
"' 
32 -
139" 
(. 
u 1 
-<1 ~ 
1' ~ ~ 
0 
!. ~ 
.. 
... 
,;o 
~ 
Burwash Landing 
~ .,f-... G 
.. ~ 
.. ., 
. ' . 
g 8 
/ ••• • 1 
. I ('. 10 
. i ·,.,,__ .-
.-·- ):. ·'.1'·"" 
-. I / 
. ', -~ .. : (:"~ . 
.. j .,... t . ~."" j' ..... ., ( ~' 
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'°~ ,i, ~ .. 
. 'i ',. -r ~- ' ' \ ~-';£. • ··-··· .~ 
Seward 
,~ .. 
• 
MaLas,.,,·h- · 
,.. ·- · Glacier 
I 
~' 
·---.. '<. __ ., 
CENTRAL 
ST. ELIAS MOUNTAINS 
Map 4 
Glaciers, 
Territory 
south-west Yukon 
(from Bushnell and 
Ragle, ed., Plate 1). 
@Yakutat 
(/ 
l!i 30' 
)-
{ I( I u 
" \ an 
I Ji i I I e 
I} Kluane 8 
C 
30' 
60" 
- 33 -
killing all the Yakutat Tlingit camped at the junction of the 
Tatshenshini and Alsek Rivers. That was the first time Naludi' 
surged, but it subsequently blocked the Alsek several times, most 
recently when the narrator was just a small child (before 1890) 
in her 'grandmother's time'. That summer some people trave l led 
north to Kluane Lake and others stayed to dry meat on the mountains 
above present day Haines Junction. The glacier surged and the 
valley basin flooded in just a few days, killing hundreds of 
ground squirrels, then drained out quickly as the dam broke (see 
Appendix, p.1a). 
In discussing this further, she identified a specific cause 
for recent surges. Glaciers are described as dens of giant 
animals, some of whom emerge intermittently to terrorize people. 
Two stories concern a pair of g iant owls who inhabited a glacier 
near Dalton Post; when they were finally killed by human· beings, 
the glacier melted. Others talk of giant snakes. There is a 
prohibition against frying food near glaciers because if the giant 
snakes smell grease, they e me rge radiating heat so intense that 
people are driven away and any meat left behind is cooked. 
Consequently people always boil rather than fry food when they 
are camping near glaciers , and any infraction causes a glacial 
surge ( Appe n dix, p.1f). Glaciers which have surged under such 
provocation includ e Dad~ik (Donj ek) and T'.anshi I ( Kaskawulsh) 
glaciers as well as Na?ud t (Appendix, p.2a; see Map 4, p.32). 
Ano ther story to which structural analysis could be readily 
I 
applied in a more formal analysis of myth explores the relation-
ship between raw and cooked food and glacial surges (Appendix, 
p.3a). To be fully understood, these traditions would have to 
- 3 4 -
be seen in the context of Athapaskan mytholo gy; however, these 
examples illustrate the nature of the narrative. 
A search of the literature reveals related traditions in 
the same area. 
Working on the Pacific coast , at Yaku tat , Frederica de 
Laguna recorded a story about a great flood which swept away a 
village at the junction of the Tatshenshini and Alsek rivers in 
1852 (De Laguna 1972, p.276). Another tradition at Yakutat Bay 
refers to breakag e of a glacier across the Alsek toward the end 
of the century. Before this, water reportedly flowed under the 
glacier; Tlingit from Dry Bay travelled upriver to trade by 
an overland portage and paddled downstream under the ice. The 
collapse of that tunnel is said to have caused a flood at Dry 
Bay (De Laguna and others 1964, p.17). She compares this with 
reports from the headwaters of the Alsek heard by archaeologists 
Johnson and Raup and anthropolo gist McClellan in the 1940 1 s 
(Johnson and Raup 1964, p.34; McClellan 1975, p.72). 
Oral traditions about glaciers are interwoven with stories 
o f Tlingit-At hapa skan trade. The re are particular references 
t o the dangers of glacier travel . Two stories I recorded revol v e 
around the ~isapp e arance and r e scue o f men who f ell into crev ass es . 
One woman told how her Tagish father rescued his Tlingit trading 
partner from certain death; another described the experience 
f rom the p e rsp e ctive of the victim and g ives supernatural 
explanation s for his survival ( Appendix , p.4a). There is docu-
mentar y ev idence that some India ns crossed dan gerous expanses 
o f glacier t o trade (Seton-Karr 189 1, p.80; De La guna 1972, 
p.81). • 1hen whi tes tri ed to fo ll ow their exampl e, t hey f ound 
- 35 -
the experience terrifying (De Laguna 1972, p.86). 
(b) Scientific Data 
Most of these traditions refer to the north-eastern 
flanks of the St Elias Mountains which rise to peaks of 5800 metres 
and separate the Yukon interior from the Pacific ocean. In the 
interior they drop gradually to the Shakwak trench, a 300-km 
long valley filled with lakes and floored with glacial deposits 
(McConnell 1904, p.15). This valley supports the present day 
human habitation in the area. 
Following the Wisconsin glaciation, drainage of this valley 
to the Pacific was blocked periodically as glacier-dammed lakes 
formed. 
( i) Glacial Lake Champagne The first and largest 
of these was Glacial Lake Champagne which formed following the 
initial retreat of glaciers about 12,500 ye ars ago. This immense 
lake filled the Shakwak Valley and all adjoining valleys (see 
Map 5, p.36). Best estimates are that it drained some time 
between 9,000 B.P. and 7,100 B.P. and that human beings then 
moved into the newly drained basins ( Workman 1978, p.32-34). 
Well developed shorelines can still be seen at 701 metres, 
853 metres and 914 metres above sea level (Kindle 1953, p.15-16). 
It coincided with the formation of other nearby lakes, now 
extinct: Glacial Lake Jo Jo, Glacial Lake Kloo, Glacial Lake 
Fisher. Together with the lakes wh ich followed , these lakes 
may be at the basis of a very ancient Deluge tradition. 
(ii) Glacial Lake Alsek This lake, also called Recent 
Lake Alsek in the literature, was the largest ice-dammed lake to 
form in western North America after the retreat of the Cordillera 
- 36 -
-·- · ·-· - -----·- · ---
GLACIAL 
LAKE 
ALSEK 
Map 5 
0 
L 
15mi. 
• 
Maximum extent of Glacial Lake Champagne and Glacial Lake Alsek 
(After Workman 1978, Fig.6 and Fig.9). 
Glacial Lake Cham p a!;n e ~ Glacial Lake Alsek 0 
- 37 -
ice sheet (see Map 5, p.36). It formed when the Lowell Glacier 
_surged, blocking the Alsek at Goatherd Mountain. At its maximum, 
the ice built up to a height of 200 metres (Clague 1979b, p.63). 
Early studies by a geologist and a team composed of archaeolo-
gists, botanists and geologists in the 1940 1 s concluded that 
there must have been more than one filling of this lake (Kindle 
1953, p.21; Johnson and Raup 1964, p.63). When the ice dam 
broke in the 1850 1 s , the lake drained in one or two days, 
discharging its water through the Alsek valley in an enormous 
flow, comparable to that of the Amazon River (Clarke, unpublished 
report). Traditions reported above by De Laguna and in my own 
notes are most certainly related to this lake. 
Clague's recent assessment suggests that there may have 
been at least five fillin gs during the last five hundred years. 
He documents heights and ages of each lake using such evidence 
as wave cut beaches, driftwood, breaks in density and size of 
lichens, the fact that the oldest trees in the valley are only 
80 years old, and the discovery of a crudely-hewn driftwood 
paddle, shaped with a metal tool, at an elevation of 561 metres, 
2 8 me tres above the Alsek River and 21 km north-east of the 
Lowell glacier (Clague 1979b, p.65). His evidence also suggests 
that the lake drained extremely rapidly. 
Glaciologist Gary Clarke is presently preparing a manuscript 
on this subject and estimates that there may have been even more 
fillings . It is known that the lake rose to 595 metres in the 
1850 1 s and that there were definitely no more recent fillings 
that brought the water higher than this, but it is possible that 
there were one or more fillings after 1850 which could have raised 
I I 
- 38 -
the water to levels below 595 metres. Consequently, eye witness 
reports of Lake Alsek are of considerable interest to scientists 
(Clarke, personal communication). 
In other parts of the world, for example Norway, written 
records are available to assist scientific observations of similar 
phenomena (see Liestil 1955-6); no such records are available 
for this period in the Yukon. 
(iii) Donjek, Kaskawulsh and Steele Glaciers There are 
also traditions about the glaciers Tanshi' (Kaskawulsh) and 
Dadzik (Donjek). A team of geolo g ists from Yale University 
estimates that the Donjek reached its terminus in 1825 and then 
be gan to retreat, and that the Kaskawulsh began to retreat by 
1865 (Denton and Stuiver 1966, pp.587, 590). Two other geologists 
state that the Kaskawulsh was in its terminal position as recently 
as 145 years ago, retreated and stopped in 1870, and retreated 
and s t opped again by 1939 ( Borns and Goldthwait 1966, p .600). 
In 1935, geolo gist Walter Wood led an expedition to the 
Steele Glacier (another surg ing glacier) and reported that local 
Indians would not accompany him there because they were afraid 
of "annihilation from floodwaters and crashing ice". He also 
stated that Burwash Indians believed it was no "good to cook 
with gr eas_e" in the S teele Valley, just as in the traditions I 
recorde d (Clarke, personal co mmunication)~ Given the expansions 
and retractions of glaciers in the last century, it is not 
surprising that Indians regarded them as living things or a s dens 
for animals. 
(iv) Kl uane Lake A related problem for which I have 
no oral data so far surrounds Kluane Lake. The drainage of 
- 39 -
this lake has long been a controversial issue for geologists and 
archaeologists (see Bostock 1952; Johnson and Raup 1964, p.26-28 ; 
Bostock 1969). Recent evidence suggests that the normal drainage 
for Kluane Lake was once to the Pacific via the Alsek River 
(see Map 6, p.40). The pattern was maintained until the Kaskawulsh 
Glacier advanced some four hundred years ago during the 'Neo-
glaciation', blocking the Alsek River and thereby raising Kluane 
Lake to some higher level. The lake's waters then cut a new 
channel to the north-west and presently maintain that drainage; 
however, with continued retreat of the Kaskawulsh the Alsek might 
well 'recapture' the lake (Bostock 1969, p.17). 
The reversal of this lake must have had a significant impact 
on human occupants. It is reasonable to assume that there could 
be very old traditions about Kluane Lake, because unimpeded access 
of Kluane to the Pacific would surely have meant a salmon run 
to that lake. Unfortunately the high present levels pre vent 
archaeological work along the older lower shoreline. 
(v) Scientific Confirmation of Oral Traditions Some 
of the most significant inde p endent confirmation of oral tradition 
comes from Yakuta t Ba y, at the mouth of the Alsek River (see 
Map 3, p.30). De Laguna reports Tlingit traditions which may 
date from 1400 A. D. telling how Yakutat Bay and Icy Bay were 
f illed by ice while people hunted on ice-free coasts to the east 
and west . Another tradition refers to a village on the west 
shore of Icy Bay which was overwhelmed by ice during the Neo-
glacia tion. The name 'Yakutat' means "a lagoon (or bay) is 
already forming" in Eyak, an extinct Athapaskan language. 
These traditions are confirmed by archaeological and geological 
- 40 -
0 
Miles 
15 
0 Kilometres 20 
N 
Cr. 
61°00' 
Map 6 
Drainage routes in the area of Kluane Lake, Yukon Territory 
(After Bostock 1969, Fig.1). 
61°30' 
61°00' 
inn, 
- 41 -
evidence, radio-carbon dates and tree ring dates. Lobes of the 
Malaspina Glacier once filled Icy Bay and Yakutat Bay, then began 
to retreat by 1400 A.D. to positions near or behind present 
limits. Excavation at the village site shows that it was 
established soon after this date, before trees began to grow; 
during the Neoglaciation in the 18th century ice filled both 
bays again (De Laguna 1958). 
A full range of traditions associated with glacier movement 
could give us a clearer picture of the impact of the Neoglaciation 
on human inhabitants of this region. 
III.2 Climate 
(a) Oral data 
Older men and women in the central and southern Yukon 
tell of a terrible year sometime during the last century when 
"two winters joined together" and there was no real summer. 
The imagery in the stories conveys some of the hardship. Young 
moose were stillborn in spring and froze to the ground. Lakes 
froze to the bottom and men had to chisel deep into the ice, 
digging up frozen fish. The snow was not deep, but it formed 
a hard crust so that people could not see animal tracks. People 
ate snow in desperation and died. Women gathered stoneberries 
for soup. Men were so weak that they could scarcely hunt and 
when they did kill game they were too weak to carry it home. 
There were rumours of cannibalism. According to one older woman 
"bodies of children were stacked like cordwood11 (see Appendix, 
p. 5a). 
It is difficult to locate this summer in chronolog ical time, 
- 42 -
bearing in mind the different manner in which oral tradition 
handles chronology. Two women who discussed the story in 
detail propose that it occurred when their parents were small 
children (about 1875); however, anthropologist Catharine 
McClellan heard similar stories in the 1940 1 s and estimated then 
that they referred to the middle of last century or earlier 
(personal communication). 
(b) Scientific data 
Arctic and sub-Arctic temperature records date only 
from 1930 in most parts of the Canadian Arctic (Barry and others 
1977, p.201) and from slightly before the turn of the century 
in Alaska (Hamilton 1965, p.106). Hudson's Bay Records are 
available only for two locations in the sout~ern Yukon, Fort 
Pelly Banks and Fort Selkirk, and then only sporadically between 
1840 and 1852. My research at the Hudson's Bay Archives suggests 
that there were unusually cold summers in the mid-1840 1 s; 
however, without comparative data for other years, this can only 
be impressionistic at this time. 
Considerable evidence from temperate parts of North America 
and Europe suggests that the summer of 1816 - the year after 
the volcanic eruption of Tamboro - was exceptionally cold. 
Records from Connecticut, southern England and Switzerland show 
that it was the coldest year for which reco~ds exist. While 
there are no comparable records for Canada, evidence is cited 
that: 
The cold was still more severe in Canada. The small 
lakes to the north of Baie St. Paul on the St. Lawrence 
River were still covered with ice in the middle of 
July. In Canada even wheat, which along with other 
grains except corn had done well in the United States, 
perished (Stremmel and Stremmel 1979, p.137). 
- 43 -
At higher latitudes, the impact of volcanic dust could have been 
even more extreme. The idea that dust in the upper atmosphere 
can result in lower temperatures on the ground has been confirmed 
through long records of temperature and fairly complete records 
of volcanic eruptions from many parts of the world. However, 
this date may be too early to account for the Yukon tradition 
about the year summer did not come. 
A dendro-climatologist at Columbia University is currently 
reconstructing June-July temperatures for the northern Yukon 
based on tree ring chronologies dating back to 1550. These 
are taken from a station on the upper Peel River, considerably 
north of the research area. He estimates that in the 19th 
century the lowest tree ring growth at this station occurred in 
1845, 1849, 1850 and that this low growth period in the 1840 1 s 
occurs in other chronologies in the Canadian north (Jacoby, 
personal communication). Interestingly, La March and Fritt show 
frost damaged tree rings in the Swiss Alps for similar years: 
1835, 1841, 1847 (La March and Fritt 1971). Jacoby's 1840 1 s 
data seems consistent with information in the Hudson ' s Bay records 
which I have seen, but the su ggestion that it is the time of the 
story is contradicted by Blasing and Fritts' reconstructions, 
also based on tree ring data. They show that while the northern 
Yukon was extremely cold between 1837 and 1851, the southern 
Yukon, where the story is told, was warmer than usual (see 
Blasing and Fritts 1975, map on page 54). 
Jacoby also suggests that for the second half of the 19th 
c entury, 1887 was the coldest year in the n or the rn Yukon ; 
however, a Geolo g ical Survey of Canada party travelled to the 
- 44 -
upper Yukon River in 1887, and their recorded descriptions of 
that summer do not indicate undue hardship (Dawson 1898). 
Temperature records for northern Yukon may not tell us a great 
deal about conditions further south. In this case we ~learly 
need both more versions of this narrative with attempts to tie 
it to specific genealogies, and also more climatic and ecolo g ical 
data. 
III.3 Cartography, Geology, Landforms 
Indian traditions about what we call landscape, landforms 
and geology are of interest to a student of oral history at two 
levels. First, they can be seen as a source of 'objective' 
knowledge of a kind valued by western science. Early traders, 
geologists, prospectors and travellers all depended on this 
detailed knowledge of when and how to travel. The same kinds 
of observations have contributed si gnificantly to primary 
knowledge of minerals in the Yukon. Indian observations were 
invaluable in the history of northern mapping before the develop-
ment of aerial photo graphy. 
Se c ondl y , I ndian observat ions are a rich source of etiolo g ical 
literature expl~ining origins of specific landforms in what non-
Indians would call symbolic terms. These latter traditions 
provide a window on perception, giving a tot.ally different, non-
western view of the natural environment. In oral tradition 
'symbolic' a nd 'objective' aspects are interlocked and any 
separat ion come s only via western analytical procedures. Indian 
accounts of the in itial discovery o f go ld which touched off the 
Klondike gold rush, f or example, include a strong supernatural 
- 45 -
element. The original claim was staked (pegged) by a Tagish 
Indian, Skookum Jim, but tradition explains his good fortune as 
attributable to the assistance of his Frog Helper and also to 
.. / .. 2 ( the fact that he heard Klenahidak, or Good Luck Lady see also 
McClellan 1963). 
My own data about mapping are relatively limited, probably 
because women were less involved in exploratory travel than were 
male hunters. Women's descriptions of journeys emphasize events 
tied to locations rather than locations themselves; for example, 
descriptions of annual travel are filled with information about 
who was born, who became ill, who died as they travelled. 
Similarly, on Southampton Island Edmund Carpenter found that 
Inuit hunters drew detailed accurate maps of their physical 
environment while women's equally accurate maps were location 
maps, made up of points each indicating a settlement or trading 
post (Carpenter and others 1959, p.5-6). 
In this section, I rely more on secondary sources; a gain, 
examples are taken primarily from the south-west Yukon. 
(a) Cartographl_ 
Until the late 1880 1 s, the coastal Tlingit monopolized 
trade with the · jnterior of the Yukon. Their control was not 
difficult to maintain; they alone knew the location of the three 
passes from the Pacific coast to the interior and they easily 
limited access to them. 
In 1869, an American scientist, George Davidson, travelled 
to the Alaska panhandle to observe a total eclipse of the sun. 
While there he prevailed upon a Tlingit chief named Kohklux to 
draw a map of the region beyond the mountains. This same chief 
I 
I 
- 46 -
had led a raiding party of Tlingits to the upper Yukon River 
in 1852 to loot and drive out the newly-established Hudson's 
Bay trading post at Fort Selkirk, wpich appeared to threaten 
Tlingit hegemony over southern interior trade. Kohklux drew 
the map and the routes taken by the Tlingits there and back. 
This first map of what is now the southern Yukon Territory is 
remarkably accurate and shows locations of villages which were 
abandoned by the turn of the century. Davidson published the 
map, with notes, in 1901 (Davidson 1901) (see Map 7, p.47). 
The reliance of early travellers on Indian knowledge of 
the land is well documented in the literature. One of the 
first visitors, a journalist sponsored by an American newspaper, 
wrote: 
"Throu ghout my letter I have retained the native 
names of geographical points whever I could learn them. 
In my opinion this should always be studied. The 
Indian names of the mountains, lakes and rivers are 
r.atural land marks for the traveller, whoever he may 
be; to destroy these by substituting words of a foreign 
ton gu e is to destroy the natural guides. You ask 
for some point and mention its native name; your 
Indian guide will take you there. Ask for the same 
place in your substituted English and you will not 
be understood. Travelling in Alaska has already 
sufficient difficulties, and they should not be 
i ncreased by changing all the picturesque Indian 
names. Another very good reason why these names 
should be preserve d is that some tradition of tribal 
i mportan ce is always connected with them. These 
p eo ple have no written language, but the retention 
of their native names is an excellent m,edium through 
which to learn their history" (Glave, 1890: 
November 22). 
Despite Glave's advice, those who followed him were often 
more interested in assigning their own names to the mountains, 
lake , rivers and glaciers they encountered. Somet imes they took 
Indian names and applied them to other feature s. Many of the 
c., 
-"'c 
Map 7 
- 47 -
134' 
I'). • 
ll i 
~( .... ~~~ 
IM' 
Map after drawing by Tlingit Chief Kohklux, 1869 (Davidson 1901) 
- 48 -
new names were incorporated into the first official map of the 
region prepared by a Canadian government surveyor in 1897 
(McArthur 1898). Attempts a few years later by another surveyor, 
George White-Fraser, to reinstate Indian names were unsuccessful 
(White-Fraser 1901). 
Not surprisingly, Indian place names in this region do 
reflect certain characteristics of the natural environment. 
The Indian name for the White River, near the source of native 
copper, was recorded as Erk-heen-ee meaning 'Copper River' 
(Glave 1892, p.878). Tinx kayani on the Tatshenshini River, 
where Tlingit people came for meat and berries means "Kinnikinik 
leaves", a common plant in the area (De Laguna 1972, p.87-9). 
Cawuce tcu' is the Southern Tutchone name for Tatshenshini River, 
meaning 'salmon running water' (McClellan 1975, p.32); Klukshu 
means "end of the silver salmon" in the same language (McClellan 
1975, p.33); 
1975, p.34). 
Kluane Lake means "big whitefish lake" (McClellan 
• · I Siman (Mush Lake) means "red paint lake" referring 
to red ochre found there. The establishment of a National Park 
in this region has initiated research into the complexity of 
Athapaskan and Tlingit place names in the region which will 
provide a much . broader understanding of traditional land use in 
the area. 
(b) Geology 
Indian reports of minerals are part of the lore of 
northern prospectors, with good reason. Indian reports of 
native copper on the White River inspired early expeditions to 
this remote area (Hayes 1892). In oral tradition, the power 
of the Copper Chiefs who controlled access to the copper is 
- 49 -
repeatedly stressed. 
The discovery at Bonanza Creek which led to the Klondike 
gold rush was made by Skookum Jim • . The present Anvil lead-zinc 
mine grew from a discovery by an Indian man, Joe Ladue. Cassiar 
asbestos mine at Clinton Creek (now closed) was the result of 
a discovery by George Wood, a Han Indian. 
Other geolog ical resources of interest to Indians were part 
of tradition: obsidian in the upper Aishihik valley, red ochre 
on the Nisling and Donjek rivers, flint at several places on 
Kluane Lake, schist for skin scrapers at various locations 
(Workman 1978, p. 28). All these items were used in trade with 
the coastal Tlingit ( Workman 1978, p.93). 
(c) Landforms 
Landform lore is richly symbolic and gives the natural 
world a dimension totally absent from western approaches to 
' landscape' . Three rocks on the Stikine River are said to be 
a woman, her mother and her brothers, turned to stone when the 
woman violated a taboo. The four mountains surrounding the 
v illage of Carcross supported the trampoline which Animal Mother 
hung when she created animals; the same is said of Three Aces 
Mountain above - the v illage of Teslin . Spec i fic lakes l ike 
/ "' 
.. ' ) ;' / .. ., ( ) S iman (Mush Lake and Tashal man Bates Lake are homes of 
monsters which ei t her rise up to snatch victims or suck them 
in to a whirlpool (Appen dix , p.6 a ) . McClellan reports other 
s outhern Yukon lakes known to be the homes of monsters ( McClellan 
1975 , p.183). A dri v e alon g an apparently undistin guished 
section of the Alaska Highwa y with s omeon e kn owl e d geable i n 
these traditions reveals a rich new source of geo graphy , a 
'l 
- 50 -
'mythography' giving the land depth and resonance. 
examples like these could be mapped with accuracy. 
Countless 
While these traditions may be of little interest to physical 
scientists, they do give a broader perspective to northern 
landscape and cultural aspects of land use. 
(d) Athapaskan 'cosmos' and western 'landscape' 
Research into differing perception of space is of growing 
interest to cultural geographers (Tuan 1974; Robinson and 
Petchenik 1976; Henderson 1978). Writing about changing 
perceptions of landscape, Yi Fu Tuan suggests that in Europe 
between 1500 and 1700 A.D. the medieval world view of 'cosmos' 
yielded to a new, more secular conception of nature which we 
call 'landscape'. With that may be traced changing meanings 
of such words as 'nature', 'landscape', and 'scenery'. Now 
they are often used interchangeably, but this has happened at 
a price: 
Nature keeps company with scenery and landscape by 
ceding most of its semantic domain and the last two 
words are nearly synonymous through the loss of 
precision in meaning (Tuan 1974, p.132). 
The relationship with western science may seem oblique. 
Scientists can locate features of landscape precisely with three 
measurements: latitude , longitude and elevation above sea level. 
In an area without human populations (such as Antarctica) this 
may give as much information as can reasonably be expected. 
In the north where a small population has lived for centuries, 
the natural environment has historical, social, econ omic and 
intellectual dimensions as well as physical aspects. 
Ironically, although the population of an area like the 
- 51 -
Yukon has grown in recent decades, actual land use and perceptions 
of land have shrunk through constraints of transportation routes 
and settlement clusters. Traditional narrative describes a 
geography unrelated to present day roads. Ongoing linguistic 
research, place name research, oral history research and land 
use and occupancy studies may provide additional data about 
perception of landscape which may be of long-term interest to 
scientists working in the north. 
III.4 Fauna and Flora 
(a) Oral Traditions 
Oral traditions involving fauna and flora convey 
information of two different orders. On one hand, there are 
the detailed stories central to Athapaskan mythology; at another 
level there are precise observations about animal and plant life 
made in all seasons and over generations. 
In mythology, the majority of animal stories deal with the 
underlying relationship between human and animal worlds. 
Narratives describe symbolic voyages of human beings to animal 
domains and the reversal of ordinary reality found there. 
Indirectly thes~ narratives address the uneasy balance between 
animals and men who must share the world. They are more akin 
to literature than to science, but scientists must be aware of 
the underlying narrative patterns in any attempts to evaluate 
historical reliability or 'objectivity' of a tradition. 
Historical observations about flora and fauna and the 
linguistic classifications used by Athapaskans may have consider-
a ble si gn ificance fo r studies in northern ecology. Some of 
- 52 -
the ways in which traditions could relate to specific problems 
in biology are outlined below. 
(b) Biology 
(i) Faunal histori The most important questions 
facing northern biologists relate to past, present and future 
interrelationships of man, animals and environment. Palae-
ontologists and biologists have only incomplete knowledge of 
changing faunal history in the north because data are only 
available for relatively short time spans. The contemporary 
biological model of maximum sustained yield harvesting is 
proving inadequate as the large number of variables and increased 
human interference show how inadequate are our attempts to 
'manage' the environment. 
Research into faunal history has proceeded rapidly 
in the past decade with cooperation of palaeontologists, 
archaeologists and other scientists. Sometimes clues come from 
local Indians who are interested in the research. Palaeontologist 
C.R. Harington reports that he was led to discover a mammoth 
cranium and mandible on the Whitestone River (northern Yukon) 
by an old tradition of monsters in that region. 
about monsters _may be difficult to disentangle. 
Traditions 
For a palae-
ontologist they suggest Pleistocene fossils, but De Laguna has 
shown how traditions of giant worms near Copper River, Alaska, 
refer to slumping permafrost on river banks (De Laguna 1969-70, 
p.19). Workman links stories of large worm-like burrowing 
creatures (gJ) with dangerous areas, for example surging glaciers , 
_, 
and the traditions I have recorded support this hypo t h esis. 
Although woodland bison are presently unknown in the 
- 53 -
Yukon, Khaus (Bison bison athabaskae) is a figure in Yukon myth. 
The archaeolo g ical record confirms the presence of this animal 
in the southern Yukon, hunted in Holocene times (Workman 1978, 
p.55-59). The oldest men in the southern Yukon told McClellan · 
in the 1940 1 s that bison had been hunted in the extreme eastern 
Yukon during the last century (McClellan 1975, p.120). 
(ii) Recent faunal changes In modern times, the Yukon 
provides a habitat for a wide range of mammals. There have 
been significant fluctuations of game even in the last century 
and evidence for this comes almost entirely from oral accounts. 
Moose and caribou, for example, seem to have shifted their 
habitats. Caribou are now largely confined to the northern 
Yukon while moose are the major mammal in the southern Yukon; 
in the mid-nineteenth century, there were no moose in the southern 
Yukon. Biologists are not sure of the reasons for appearance 
and disappearance of these animals. 
Two sub-species of Barren Ground Caribou formerly 
ranged in the southern Yukon - the large herds of Stone Caribou 
(Rangifer arcticus stonei) and the less gregarious Osborn Caribou 
( Rang ifer arcticus osborni). Herds of Stone Caribou have been 
seen in histori_c times around Whitehorse, Carcross ( short for 
"Caribou Crossing"), Kl uane Lake, and near the upper reaches 
of the Alsek River. Indian tradition describes them as blackening 
the ice at Kluane Lake and Aishihik Lake and this is confirmed 
in the archaeological record though they have not been seen there 
in recent me mory (Workman 1978, p.16; McClellan 1975, p.108). 
These caribou have presumably been absorbed into the more northern 
Yukon herd , but their virtual disappearance makes oral accounts 
- 54 -
particularly provocative. 
Moose, on the other hand, were extremely rare in the 
southern Yukon during most of the 19th century, though their 
appearance in the archaeological record and in at least two 
Tagish myths which I have recorded indicates that this was a 
temporary fluctuation. In the south-eastern Yukon, older men 
reported that when moose disappeared, men forgot how to hunt 
them and had to learn again when they returned almost a century 
later (Honigmann 1954, p.15). Earlier reports also confirm 
this; writing in 1896, Warburton Pike reported: 
"Twenty-five years ago there were very few moose 
along the Liard and the animal was unknown to Indians 
hunting westward of Dease Lake ••• Today the little 
known region drained by the Dease, the Upper Liard, 
the Frances and the Pelly is probably the best moose 
country in the continent of North America" 
(Pike 1896, p.89-90). 
In 1911, anthropolo gist G.T. Emmons wrote: 
"The history of the occurrence of moose in this 
section can not well be accounted for. It is 
believed to have been a habitant of all this region 
in early days, but for some unexplained reason the 
animal entirely disappeared early in 1800, to make 
its appearance again in 1877, when several were 
killed in the Dease country" (Emmons 1911, p.77). 
Pool~ Field was a trader on the upper Pelly River 
from 1903 until 1913. He was told by the oldest men that when 
they were young there were no moose in the region, only caribou. 
These men had hunted them with bows and arrows, spears, snares, 
deadfalls and large fenced caribou surrounds which they built 
collectively (MacNeish 1957, p.52). Yet when the big game 
hunter Charles Sheldon visited the upper Pelly in 1904 and 1905 
he found no traces of caribou and was told by the oldest Indians 
- 55 -
that caribou did not range in the Pellys (Sheldon 1911, p.245). 
Biologists in the south-west Yukon during the 1940 1 s 
and 1950's reported that according to local tradition there had 
been no moose there before the last century (Rand 1945, p.76-79), 
and that some residents had seen their first moose in 1910 
(Cameron 1952, p.183). 
(iii) Fish and plants Only indirect evidence is 
available for the Holocene history of fish in the south-west 
Yukon and this has been compiled by an archaeologist (Workman 
1978, pp,25, 60-61). The damming of the Alsek must have 
periodically prevented salmon from ascending that river. The 
presence of land-locked salmon in Kathleen Lake indicates that 
salmon once ascended the Alsek further than they do today to 
spawn. Despite evidence that Kluane Lake once drained to the 
Pacific there are no land-locked salmon known in that lake; 
however, if they ever did come that far there may be oral tradition 
to this effect. A full inventory of fish used in the present 
and past, recorded and classified in Athapaskan languages could 
provide additional information for fisheries scientists, but 
that information has not been compiled. 
Women•·s knowledge of plant life is detailed and exact. 
Nutr itional and medicinal values, spiritual properties, value 
as dyes - all these are regularly included in women's accounts 
of their lives and in my field notes (see also ~cClellan 1975, 
p.223-229). Oral traditions contain suggestions abbut plant 
history, for example that spruce blight was introduced into the 
Yukon up the Alsek River in the mid-nineteenth century ( Mc Clellan 
1975, p.96). Indians also have traditions about how fire-burning 
1
11 
- 56 -
was used as a technique to extend moose browse, a subject 
difficult to discuss because of severe penalties for setting 
fires in this century. Again, an inventory of plants, their 
classifications and uses recorded in the Athapaskan languages 
could be valuable. In the Yukon, this kind of research is 
beginning under the auspices of the Yukon Indian Languages Project. 
III.5 Prehistory 
(a) Oral Data 
A significant number of Yukon traditions concern 
events which occurred in the last century, often involving aspects 
of aboriginal trade, travel and warfare. These are stories for 
which direct documentary information is often lacking, but which 
are not inconsistent with ethnographic and archaeological data 
for the period. Such narratives include the 'War at Dezadeash' 
at which a large number of Dalton Post people were killed by 
Indians from the north-west, probably over a trade agreement; 
this war still affects social relationships in the southern 
Yukon. There are oral traditions about the extensive trade 
in perishables carried on between Tlingit and Athapaskans for 
at least a century before whites arrived; such perishables, 
of course, do not survive in the archaeological record. Clan 
histories are described in narrative - complex movements of 
people between the coast and interior and resulting social ties. 
Tales of the 'coming of the first whites' convey somi of the 
cultural disruptions felt around the turn of the century. 
Traditions refer to major trading centres like Dalton Post, 
Hut shi, Aishihik, Wellesley Lake - places scarcely mentioned in 
I 
I 
!11 
- 57 -
written records because they were not on the travel routes taken 
by white travellers~ 
(b) Archaeology 
Over the years, the relationship between oral narrative 
and archaeology has been an ambivalent one. Lowie's influential 
paper arguing against the reliability of oral tradition (Lowie 
1917) strengthened the tendency of early archaeologists to work 
quite independently of native populations. As the limitations 
of such isolation became clearer, archaeologists in the next 
generation began to report scientific confirmation of traditions. 
Some of the examples were quite spectacular: Pendergast 
I 
and Meighan reported Pauite traditions dating from 1150 and Hopi 
traditions from 1125 which had been confirmed by independ~nt 
archaeological investigation (Pendergast and Meighan 1959). 
De Laguna reported a tradition referring to an old Tlingit 
village established after 1400 and overwhelmed by advancing ice 
during the Neoglaciation (D~ Laguna 1958, p.434). More recently, 
archaeologists have qualified their remarks about reliability 
with reference to specific traditions in specific cultures. 
Yukon archaeology began relatively recently and after 
inauspicious beginnings some archaeologists have established good 
relationships with Native populations and have involved them 
in the research (see especially Johnson and Raup 1964, and 
Workman 1978 in the southern Yukon). 
The fortuitous discovery of an ancient mandible near Old 
Crow, Yukon, by Gwich'in Indian Peter Lord has led to some of the 
mos t si gnificant archaeological research now in pro gress in North 
America. The bone which he found was identified by archaeolo gists 
- 58 -
as a 29,000 year old tool, and subsequent investigations have 
recently pushed the possible date of human occupancy in the 
region back to 60,000 years. The community of Old Crow is very 
much involved in early man research taking place in the northern 
Yukon (Irving 1975, 1976). 
The interest of Yukon archaeologists in oral tradition is 
summed up by Workman: referring specifically to the 19th century 
trade which dominated Tlingit-Athapaskan relationships, he points 
out that oral tradition contributes more evidence than does the 
archaeological record: 
It is humbling to realize how much this transforming 
trade was carried on in perishables and how scanty 
the archaeological record for it is in view of its 
documented significance. Almost invariably we will 
underestimate the volume of trade in the prehistoric 
record of this area, given the likelihood that much 
of it was also in perishable items ·and the incomplete-
ness of our present knowledge of the content of local 
inventories, which alone can help us recognize trade 
items. We must adjust for this underestimation and 
remind ourselves that perhaps the most important 
consequence of trade is the opportunity it affords 
for social contacts and diffusion, which leaves only 
the most indirect archaeological traces (Workman 
1978, p.94). 
Archaeological research will continue during the next decade 
together with other interdisciplinary research. 
will have a part to play in such investigations. 
III.6 Volcanoes 
Oral tradition 
While I have recorded no traditions about volcanic activity 
in the Yukon, this may be a fruitful area for research in the 
north. In Alaska, Wilcox reports that more than 250 volcanic 
eruptions from 39 volcanoes have been reported in less than 
- 59 -
200 years, and that many more have passed unobserved (Wilcox 
1959, p.400). Some of these may be incorporated into oral 
traditions; for example, De Laguna mentions that the Atna Indians 
on the Copper River have traditions about a volcano in the 
Wrangell Range, but she does not elaborate on these3 (De Laguna 
1969-70, p.19). 
Souther reports Tsimshian Indian traditions about relatively 
recent eruptions of the Aiyansh and Mount Edzidza volcanoes in 
north-western British Columbia, dated at about 220 B.P. ±130. 
He also discusses the impact of these eruptions on Tsimshian 
culture (Souther 1970). Vitaliano gives detailed descriptions 
of . volcanic lore from Iceland associated with Hekla, as well as 
traditions from other volcanically active parts of the world 
(Vitaliano 1973, p.104-40). 
Earliest scientific travellers to the upper Yukon River 
commented on the widespread layer of volcanic ash deposits they 
encountered - Schwatka in 1883, Dawson in 1887, Hayes in 1891, 
Brooks in 1899 (Capps 1916, p~59). Over the years, geologists 
and archaeologists have tried to reconstruct the date, size and 
magnitude of the eruption and the distribution of the ash using 
a variety of te~hniques (Bostock 1952, Figure 1; Fernald 1962; 
Johnson and Raup 1964, p.17; Stuiver and others 1964; Lerbekmo 
and Campbell 1969; Lerbekmo and others 1975). It is of some 
interest that the only references to oral traditions of volcanoes 
in this region were reported by Hayes in 1891 when he approached 
the Klutlan Glacier with Indian guides (Hayes 1892, p.145). The 
most recent research locates the vent of the volcano under that 
same glacier. 
- 60 -
As mapped, the ash deposit covers 125,000 square miles; 
the total volume of ejecta is conservatively estimated at six 
cubic miles (see Map 8, p.61). Evidence suggests that the two 
lobes were deposited several centuries apart, the most recent 
information dating the larger east lobe at z 7 00 A.D. or 1300 years 
ago. While it seems unlikely that traditions of even so enormous 
an event could last that long, it may be useful to consider 
Workman's hypothetical reconstructions of its impact on human 
life (Workman 1973). He suggests that the second lobe was 
deposited at a time when climate was deteriorating badly (the 
post-Hypsithermal) and that the likely accompaniment of acid 
rain, torrential rains or hailstorms, darkness caused by the 
cloud, noxious fumes such as sulphur dioxide, fluorine and 
chlorine must have put enormous strains on the human population. 
The season when the eruption occurred may never be determined, 
leaving this crucial variable unknown. Nevertheless the long-
term chemical effects on animals, fish, vegetation and human 
populations together with the floods and erosion which must 
have followed probably rendered the area uninhabitable and must 
have created a refugee population. 
Lin guis ts place the original centre of pro to-Athapaskan 
populations some where near the Alaska Yukon border, near the 
site of the volcano. About 1200 years ago, Athapaskans began 
to disperse widely . Some moved as far afield as northern Cali-
forn ia (Pacific Coast Athapaskans) while the Navaho and Apache 
and Hupa moved to the south-western United States. Linguistic-
ally, it is interesting that the far-flung southern Athapaskan 
languages such as Navaho and Hupa retain considerable affinity 
- 61 -
Map 8 
Distribution of White River Ash 
(After Workman 1978, Fig.11). 
~'i 
~I 
I 
I 
I 
I 
/ 
/ 
--, ........... 
' 
' 
WH ITE RIVER l ASt< V[NT 
-...,......,., - 7 
\_ 
" 
' 
' \ 
' \ \ 
\ 
0 
MIL E S 
-
"" \. 
- 62 -
with such northern Athapaskan languages as Sarsi and Chipewyan; in 
fact there is greater linguistic diversity between longstanding 
Alaskan neighbours like Koyukon and Kutchin (Krauss 1973, p.904). 
Workman makes the hypothesis that the initial movement may 
have been triggered by this event (Workman 1973, p.253-54). It 
is unlikely that narratives about this event could have survived 
so long; however the whole issue of proto-Athapaskan language 
is the subject of considerable research and may ultimately 
provide indirect oral evidence about the impact of this eruption 
on human populations. 
III.? Earthquakes 
Traditions about earthquakes indicate that they were of some 
concern in the southern Yukon. Narratives describe the earth 
as a flat plate supported by an old woman who balances it on a 
pole. When she becomes annoyed, she moves the stick and the 
earth shakes. While I recorded no traditions about specific 
earthquakes, this may be because I did not ask. 
Plans to build a natural gas pipeline from Prudhoe Bay, 
Alaska, through Canada to the mid-western United States have 
initiated research to determine the ~uaternary displacement history 
of the proposed pipeline routes. Studies have been conducted 
along the northern Yukon and Mackenzie Valle! (Stevens and 
Milne 1974) and along the Shakwak and Dalton segments of the 
Denali Fault system in the south-west Yukon (Clague 1979a). 
The Denali Fault is now the focus of greater interest because 
this appears to be the more likely route i n 19 79 . I t is a majo r 
intercontinental crustal breR.k which has been active in south 
- 63 -
central Alaska. Although there is no evidence of large Holocene 
displacements in the Yukon, the region is characterized by high 
seismicity. 
Earthquake collection data began in 1899 in the Yukon. 
Since then there have been at least two high intensity earthquakes 
in the Shakwak Valley and Kluane Ranges (Clague 1979a, p.177), 
and several in the northern Yukon and Mackenzie Valley (Stevens 
and Milne 1974, p.151). 
Conceivably, Indian traditions about intensity and duration 
of earthquakes both prior to and after 1899 could make a contri-
bution to scientific data. Vitaliano provides considerable 
comparative data about earthquake lore elsewhere in the world, 
including an example of how Japanese seismologists integrated 
information from ancient traditions into their research (Vitaliano 
1973, p.83-103). 
- 64 -
SECTION IV 
CIRCUM-POLAR RESEARCH IN ORAL TRADITION 
IV.1 Oral Tradition and Northern Science 
The use of oral tradition to reconstruct the past is, of 
course, not unique to the north. African history, compiled in 
authoritative volumes by British historians throughout this 
century has been significantly re-interpreted in the last decade; 
as oral history has become methodologically more acceptable to 
historians, a new light has been cast on historical •truth' 
(Prins, personal communication). 
In this section, I will summarize ways in which oral 
narrative has been used in other parts of the circum-polar north, 
particularly as it affects scientific research. 
(a) Inuit traditions 
Inuit traditions are extremely conservative and anthro-
pologists have frequently expressed surprise at the long retention 
of historical facts in traditional folklore (Boas 1904, p.9). 
Arima has made an assessment of the reliability of Inuit oral 
tradition in which he cites such factors as their linguistic 
conservatism across northern North America, persistence of 
technology, retention of Inuit names for extinct animals and, 
most important for assessing historical accuracy, accounts of 
early explorers ' voyages. Narratives describing these visits 
have been recorded three centuries after the initial visit. He 
concludes that by conservative estimate Inuit traditions are 
extremely reliable for fifty years and probably accura'te for at 
least a century (Arima 1976a, p.35-56). 
- 65 -
Greenlandic stories and styles of narrative show similar 
conservatism. Peterson showed consistency of accounts about 
a migration from Canada to Greenland in the mid-19th century 
recounted by Inuit from different geographical locations in 
1865, 1905 and 1952 (Peterson 1962)~ Other accounts stress the 
importance of local idiom in attempting to interpret tradition 
(Gilberg 1969-70; Egede 1971). For example, Peary brought 
six Polar Eskimo from Greenland to Manhattan in 1897. The 
only one who returned described what he had seen: 
People lived up in the air like auks on a cliff. 
The houses are as big as icebergs on a glacial bank 
and they stretch inland as far as you can see, like 
a steep chain of mountains with innumerable canyons 
that serve as roads ••• streetcars as big as houses 
with masses of glass windows as transparent as fresh-
water ice. They raced without dogs to haul them, 
without smoke, and full of smiling people who had 
no fear of their fate ••• moved by a man pulling a 
cord... (Gilberg 1969-70, p.86). 
He also spoke of the 'distance shrinker' by which he had been 
able to converse with Peacy in another town without shouting. 
Even in idiom, this account was too outrageous for Polar Eskimo 
to accept, and the narrator was nicknamed 'the Big Liar', 
banished and ultimately killed. 
One atte~pt to link oral tradition with a specific scientific 
problem in the north revolves around the question of isostatic 
r ebound. During the last glaciation, the earth's surface was 
depressed; when the load was removed~ the land began to rise 
and the readjustment has been called 'isostatic'. The most 
dramatic movements have been off the west coast of Norway with 
a rise of about one metre a year at Bergen and two metres a year 
at Karm~y Island for the last millenium (Vitaliano 1973, p.28). 
- 66 -
The rate of uplift is less in Canada, the greatest amount on 
the west coast of Hudson's Bay being about one-half metre per 
century (Bird 1967, p.145). 
A geographer, John Spink, has compared accounts of floods 
recorded by Hall in 1865, Boas in 1888, Nelson in 1889 and 
Mathiassen in 1933, suggesting that they may be indirect accounts 
of isostatic rebound. He cites two kinds of reports, •neluge' 
traditions about a great flood covering the earth, and specific 
accounts about historical changes in the shore-line (Spink 1969a). 
J.B. Bird is sceptical about the use of traditions which imply 
that uplift has occurred within man's memory (Bird 1967, p.144-45) 
but given other evidence of traditions accurately transmitted 
for a century or more, some accounts may indeed be reliable. 
On the other hand, it may be rash to attribute a universal 
tradition, like the Deluge to such a slow geological phenomenon 
as Spink does. The context of oral tradition must be considered 
as well as the content • 
. In related research, Spink has compiled a number of historic 
Inuit maps of the eastern Arctic, and this kind of work contributes 
substantially to any studies of perception of landscape (Spink 
1969b; Spink and Moodie 1976). 
Ethnobotanical work undertaken on St. Lawrence Island 
provides a useful model for scientific research. It has been 
argued that Alaskan Eskimo were meat-eaters who paid little 
attention to vegetable resources. Collaboration by a botanist 
and anthropologist showed that despite impoverished flora on 
St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, Eskimo have used at least 17 species 
f or p l an t f ood, three for medicines and 1 0 fo r fuel. They 
- 67 -
conclude with the suggestion that the full extent of the relation-
ship between people and their environment can best be understood 
by learning how they categorize the flora and fauna in their 
world (Young and Hall 1969). This kind of research is more 
typical of work being done with Athapaskan and Algonquian 
Indians in northern Canada and Alaska, described below. 
(b) Northern Indian Traditions 
Northern North American Indian traditions are usually 
considered to be less conservative than Inuit traditions. 
Research tends instead toward recording of names for animals, 
plants, fish and other environmental phenomena. 
It has long been part of conventional anthropological wisdom 
that Indians are likely to make detailed classifications of 
economically important flora and fauna and to ignore the rest. 
Even Lowie, with his aversion to oral history conceded this point 
(Lowie 1917, p.103). This limited hypothesis was challenged as 
early as 1923 when Speck showed that Algonkian Indians had a 
complete herpetology of snakes in their language, including both 
generic and specific classifications, despite the fact that they 
made no economic use of them (Speck 1923). Similarly, biologist 
Lawrence Irving recorded names for 91 species of birds in the 
Kut chin Indian language at Old Crow, noting that the birds named 
were not just birds used and that naming had a social as well as 
economic purpose (Irving 1958). 
In northern ~uebec, a biologist and linguist have collaborated 
to record Cree names for fish species, noting the differences 
between biologists' and Cree classifications. This work has 
particular immediacy because some fish species have elevated 
- 68 -
levels of mercury and it is impossible to issue warnings without 
knowledge of local fish names as well as the way fish are 
classified (Eerkes and Mackenzie 1978). 
In the Lake Athabaska area, in Canada's Northwest Territories, 
Hohn published a list of mammal and bird names in Cree and 
Chipewyan languages, though his Chipewyan information seems rather 
incomplete and his assessment of their classification abilities 
somewhat short-sighted, given the work of Athapaskan linguists 
(Hohn 1973). 
Anthropologist Cornelius Osgood has recently published an 
ethnographic map of the Great Bear Lake region, based on his 
field research of forty years earlier, illustrating the detail 
in which people know their environment (Osgood 1975). Extremely 
detailed work of this kind is being done in the Yukon Territory 
by linguist John Ritter, under the auspices of the Yukon Indian 
Languages Project. 
A geographer working with northern Algonkians, in north-
eastern Canada has discussed their cartographic concepts - style, 
levels of abstraction, areas mapped - comparing their maps both 
with medieval European maps and with modern maps. He argues 
that what we choose to include on maps is dependent on our 
culture. Modern maps depict natural features (mountains, 
rivers) with great accuracy and symbolize cu~tural features 
(buildings, bridges). Indian maps (and medieval maps) do quite 
the opposite, symbolizing natural features and depicting cultural 
features like camps or food caches more accurately. He also 
notes that Indians living on the west coast of Hudson's Bay, 
like Inuit, have speculated about isostatic rebound: 
- 69 -
One of the trappers from Moose Factory explained to 
me that the shore of James Bay must be rising since 
he had found sea shells at the top of a seventy-five 
foot high ridge fifteen miles from the coast. No 
one had ever told him about isostatic rebound, but 
he knew what was going on, if not why (Pentland 
19 7 5 , p. 1 54) • 
There seems . to be relatively little analysis of the content 
of Athapaskan and Algonkian oral narrative. However, Rooth 
discusses the importance or oral tradition as a medium to transmit 
the "accumulated knowledge [fishing and hunting lore] embedded 
in the legends and myths" in her monograph about Alaskan Athapaskan 
narrative (Rooth 1976, p~12). McClellan has made an excellent 
a s sessment of the historical reliability of southern Yukon, cited 
elsewhere in this paper ( McClellan 1970b) • 
. It seems that linguistic research will occupy an increasingly 
larger place in any future work of this kind with northern Indian 
groups and that throu gh study of language and linguistic classifi-
cations, we may obtain greater understanding of ethno-botany, 
ethno-zoology and 'ethno-science' generally. 
(c) Scandinavian, Icelandic and Northern Asiatic Traditions 
Research in both linguistic mapping and mythology is 
also being done in northern Europe, though it is less accessible 
to English-speaking researchers. 
A Scan·d inavian linguist recorded 1600 Skol t Lapp place 
names and s howe d how they provide a g uide to culture history, 
land use and environmental perception (Nickul 1964). The names 
also provide useful information for biologists because they mirror 
fish ing and reindeer herding locations, activities and techniques. 
They also provide valuable evidence for archaeolo g ists about 
- 70 -
loc a tions of ancient sites and nomadic cycles. 
One of the richest sources of oral tradition is the Icelandic 
sagas, recorded in the Islendingbok (Book of Icelanders) and 
Landnamabok (Book of Settlement) in the thirteenth century. 
Scholars like Turville-Petre argue that carefully read, these 
can provide reliable historical information (Turville-Petre 1953, 
pp.7, 88-108). More recent scholars have been cautious and 
have stressed the limitations of the Norse epic (Ciklamini 1973). 
Two geographers argue that the sagas can be used to recon-
struct the process of deforestation which occurred in Iceland, 
because they contain references to woodlands where none previously 
existed (Ashwell and Jackson 1970, p.161). They propose that 
deforestation was already occurring by the 13th century when 
these sagas were written down. 
The University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit is 
reconstructing early climates of Iceland with assistance of a 
historian who correlates information from a variety of early 
Icelandic records with dendro-chronology, pollen analysis, ice 
and sediment cores. She emphasizes the problematic nature of 
the sources, such as telescoping and inclusion of spurious or 
inaccurate information. The main difficulty, as with more 
direct oral tradition, is evaluating the reliability of each 
individual source, each genre, each work. , However, those sources 
which can be proved reliable do provide useful evidence about 
climate (Bell and Ogilvie 1978; Ogilvie 1978; Og ilvie, personal 
communication). 
In a different kind of paper, a Soviet ethnographer compared 
Asiatic and Alaskan versions of the Rav en my th, suggestin g that 
- 71 -
the comparison provides good evidence to substantiate the hypo-
thesis that Athapaskans mi brated from north-east Asia. The 
Alaskan version has Raven travelling over water, creating a rock 
on which to rest, throwing a spear to create more rocks, then 
4 travelling in a whale to a new shore · (nzeniskevich 1976, p.82). 
While this interpretation implies a conservatism to Athapaskan 
which may not exist, requiring persistence of tradition for 
thousands of years, the interpretation is interesting. 
(d) Related Research Possibilities 
A number of northern scientific research problems lend 
themselves to the study of oral tradition. Psychologist Judith 
Kleinfeld has suggested that Alaskan Eskimos may have unusual 
cognitive strengths which are rarely recognized, used to advantage 
or rewarded in our society. When she administered tests which 
involved analysis of spatial relationships and ability to recall 
complex patterns, they scored significantly higher than their 
American peers. These strengths in perceptual analysis and 
image memory, she suggests, could lead to high performance in 
such fields as engineering, biology and physics (Kleinfeld 1970, 
p.1-2). Such intellectual abilities may also be reflected in 
narrative style _and may once have been taught and reinforced 
in oral tradition. 
Another research possibility exists in the field of hazard 
research. The growing field of hazard research often focusses 
on Third World countries and treats 'progress' as the solution 
to drought, famine, flooding and other disasters; yet traditional 
strategies are often quite well adapted to such potential disasters 
and should be investigated rather than dismissed as 'backward' 
I 
I 
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(see Waddell 1977, p.74-75). This could be done in part by 
investigation of traditions about past disaste~s. 
Oral tradition could even have a contribution to make to 
atmospheric physics. Anthropologist Dorothy Jean Ray discusses 
myths and legends associated with aurora. Creek Indian, Cheyenne 
and Penobscot Indian theories about the relationship between 
aurora and weather foreshadowed contemporary scientific research 
on the subject (Ray 1979, p.18). Conceivably other relationships 
between natural phenomena expressed in traditions may warrant 
scientific study. 
- 73 -
CONCLUSION 
The material presented in this paper suggests ·only preliminary 
conclusions and general observations. The narratives cited from 
the Yukon were recorded as part of a larger, more general oral 
history project and no systematic attempt was made at the time 
to learn traditions related specifically to scientific questions. 
Instead, the link between the two perspectives on the natural 
environment has been constructed here after some reflection. 
The need for more systematic research on the topic seems apparent 
from the data presented. 
However, it is clear that scientists are interested in oral 
traditions and that some are using them in their work. A number 
of books and papers have appeared in recent years assessing the 
historical reliability of oral tradition, many of them cited in 
this paper (see also Dorson 1964, Dorson 1973, Vansina 1965). 
Yet only two works I consulted, one by an anthropologist in 
Africa (Horton 1967) and one by a geologist (Vitaliano 1973) 
look specifically at the general relationship between oral 
tradition and science, and they address the problem only in a 
preliminary way. 
It is possible, though, to state some general observations, 
first about the cultural dimensions of knowledge in the north 
and secondly about the practical possibilities for an 'anthro-
pology of natural history'. 
1. Cultural Dimensions of Oral and Scientific Traditions 
Science and oral tradition are two distinct approaches to 
I: 
:I . 
'I 
I 
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knowledge, developed in two different institutional settings 
and based on markedly different premises. One combines the 
written contributions of different individuals: each generation 
of students can consult vast libraries and build on past theories. 
The other is more selective: what survives is the collective 
social thinking of the group rather than discrete individual 
contributions. The fact that they overlap in specific instances 
does not mean that one should subsume the other, but rather that 
there is a possibility for further, cumulative exchange. 
Any attempts to reduce oral tradition to 'primitive science' 
do it a grave disservice: 
The contents of folklore cannot be viewed in the same 
way as the contents of a box of sardines or a scholarly 
scientific paper. A treatise on metallurgy, botany 
or geo graphy clearly and accurately contains all the 
data it wishes to present; and the limited number 
of inferences it allows are available to anyone with 
a somewhat flexible intelligence (Heuscher 1979, 
p.251-52). 
Oral tradition does not provide us with a series of data which 
stand by themselves. It is more like a prism which becomes 
richer as our ability improves to view it from a variety of angles. 
The question is not whether a particular tradition reflects the 
way a particul'ar individual v iews the world, but whether it 
broadens the world-view of the listener. 
Evaluations of the reliability of oral , tradition usually 
refer to historical accuracy, and here a distinction should be 
made between history and science. In assessing historical 
reliability, free interpretation would be considered a disadvantage 
because it distorts events. In evaluating scientific value, 
f ree interpre ta t i on may well be an advantag e if, a s Alber t Einstein 
11' 
I I 
I 
I, 
ii 
'i 
I 
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- 75 -
asserts, scientific theories are "free creations of the human 
mind" (Bernstein 1973, p.24). The germs of such creations are 
as likely to arise from non-western as western interpretations. 
Members of each tradition are more likely to perceive the 
limitations of the other. This distinction becomes clearer 
when we consider a specific problem such as interpretation of 
landscape. Scientists, for example, might consider a specific 
problem inductively by looking at what they consider to be objective 
empirical facts which can be distinguished from a general background 
of landscape. Anthropologists have shown that for Indians and 
Inuit empirical and non-empirical phenomena are often inextricably 
interwoven (Arima 1976b; Brody 1976; Burch 1971). 
Scientists might well consider Athapaskan tradition to be 
full of fantastic, imaginative episodes, at best a sort of 
'primitive science' or 'symbolic literature'. Athapaskans, on 
the other hand, would consider the scientist culturally 
improverished because his view encompasses only half of reality 
(Irving 1958; . Burch 1971). Scientists might argue that me mbers 
of traditional societies are 'prisoners of tradition' whereas 
science encourages creative exploration. This assumption has 
been called into question by Thomas Kuhn who has observed that 
science is a human activity like any other and that scientists 
are socialized to work within limited parameters (Kuhn 1962). 
Physicists are aware of the limitations of Indo- European 
languages and move to mathematics when they have to . convey precise 
information. As a result of Einstein's axioms, we have had to 
revise our traditional idea that time and space is the same for 
everyone . Relativity binds time and space to gether so that 
- 76 -
II there is no judgment of time which can be separated from an 
observer's passage through space and [it follows] no measurement 
of space which can be separated from time" (Bronowski 1969, p.22). 
Significantly, at the same time that Einstein was exploring his 
concept of relativity, anthropologists were looking at the cultural 
relativity of time, space, cause and force (Durkheim 1912). 
At a philosophical level, then, it can be argued that oral 
tradition and science are each capable of contributing to an 
overall field of knowledge, that knowledge has both linguistic 
and cultural components. The intellectual value of understanding 
other lin guistic and cultural forms, and the kinds of distinctions 
which they make ma y be important to the development o f knowledge 
generally. The question then becomes whether there are practical 
possibilities for combining the two frameworks in northern research. 
2. Practical Possibilities for an Anthropology of Natural History 
Any realistic attempt to combine the two frameworks must 
begin ~ith interdisciplinary attempts to discover terminological 
and classification systems used by other (oral) societies, the 
development of ethno-biology, ethno-history, ethno-science. 
However, simply .trying to learn these categories as an adjunct 
to western science without a practical commitment to provide a 
basis whereby they can be developed within the culture is short-
sibhted, if not exploitative. The most effective and continuing 
interdisciplinary programmes in the north seem to be in areas 
where Native communities are very much involved in the projects. 
Such an approach goes some distance toward narrowing the gulf 
between local people and 'outside experts'. If orthographies 
, I 
I 
- 77 -
and traditions can be recorded for a particular culture, future 
generations may have a basis on which to build their own 
intellectual tradition. Both anthropologist Jack Goody and 
linguist Michael Krauss stress the intellectual freedom permitted 
by recorded information which can then become a basis for cumula-
tive knowledge and can grow, expand, and change. At the present 
time, western education systems are heavily weighted against 
indigenous systems of knowledge, thou gh there have been recent 
attempts to change this in some parts of the circum-polar north. 
This raises a major objection to the entire question, "Can 
oral traditions contribute to science?" because it so clearly 
fits the universal pattern of exploitation of Native peoples 
whereby professionals (anthropologists, linguists, and archaeolo-
gists) build careers on the basis of information solicited from 
Native groups with no benefits to those groups. 'Knowledge' 
becomes re-interpreted to fit the dominant scientific framework. 
Practital questions should focus not on ''getting information 
before it is too late" but on developing mechanisms for returning 
it: school curriculum projects, local museums, usable ortho-
graphies and training for Native people who want to work with 
and develop those materials. There is also a need to provide 
training in science-related fields for northern Natives interested 
in such areas as forestry, biology, zoology, lingu istics or 
fisheries. The fact that there are few if any Indian ~r Inuit 
scientists in the north is regrettable for both northern residents 
and northern sciences. 
Interdisciplinary research is playing a sign ificant part 
in contemporary northern research. This could l ead to theoretical 
ii/ 
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model-building in the north for both past and future environments, 
a subject of interest to both scientists and northern Native 
populat~ons. It has been argued that the north provides an ideal 
setting for studies of long-term physical and social change since 
the time of the last glaciation. If a model can be developed 
for the north, using data from ethnography, oral history, 
climatology, archaeology, palaeontology, it can be applied to 
more complex ecosystems further south (Burch 1979, p.73). 
Model building also occurs in the study of contemporary 
environments. At the present time, there is great concern about 
the impact of industrial development on northern ecology, yet 
northern biologists, zoologists and other life scientists have 
only relatively short chronologies on which to build their 
predictions and management plans. In the Yukon it is still 
possible to record traditions about areas inaccessible to 
scientists except during short field seasons and for time 
periods before records were kept. 
In summary, then, considerable attention has been paid in the 
literature to ways in which historians can make effective use of 
oral narrative. No comparable analysis has been made of its 
potential value to scientists even though scientists make 
assumptions about how it can be used. Oral ,tradition may contain 
unique information in the north, where other documentary sources 
are lacking. A systematic study of the two approaches, oral 
tradition and sc i ence, in a specific geographical area like the 
Yukon, might be able to make an essential contribution to an 
' anthr opology of natural history'. 
I [ 
- 79 -
Notes 
1. Because of the linguistic complexity of the Yukon, the nin~ 
women with whom I worked during those years spoke seven 
different languages - Tagish~Tutchone, Southern Tutchone, 
Tanana, Han, Gwich'in (Kutchin) and Tlingit. In addition, 
they all spoke English. This clearly complicates the 
problem of recording 1n original languages; while I know 
words and phrases from each lan guage, I speak none fluently. 
Consequently in all cases but one we relied on English for 
recording, and in the one exceptional case a Tutchone woman, 
with linguistic training, transcribed the story in her 
language and then translated it to English. With the 
development of Athapaskan ortho graphies, the possibilities 
for recording and transcribing stories in both Athapaskan 
languages and English will increase. 
There are serious objections to recording in English, 
one being that English provides no material for the study 
of linguistic form (Boas 1940, p.452), another that certain 
ideas cannot be translated from one lan guage to another 
(Whorf 1956). However, with certain limitations which 
are discussed elsewhere in this paper, the stories recorded 
seem to provide material for preliminary discussion of 
Athapaskan oral narrative. 
2. Skookum Jim once saved the life of a frog and she later 
appeared to him in a dream and guided him to the discovery 
.. /_ - . . 
of gold. Klenah idak and her child were sole survivors of 
a village attacked by two wild children. From that time, 
she has wandered with her baby and when a human being hears 
her he should follow a certain ritual after which he will 
obtain wealth. Skookum Jim heard the baby, and followed 
the woman; however, he did not actually catch her and 
consequently his fortune did not last. 
3. This is the same volcano discussed by Dr Carl Benson in a 
recent lecture at the Scott Polar Research Institute, 
February 23, 1980, and in a paper where he alludes to oral 
tradition ( Ee n son 1 978 , p.2). De Laguna is preparing a 
manuscript on Copper River Atna to be published iri the near 
future and it may deal further with volcanic traditions 
in this region. 
4. Transl"ation of relevant parts of this article was kindly 
provided by Dr Terence Armstrong. 
- 80 -
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APPENDIX 
/ 
Na~udi\ Story of the Lowell Glacier 
(Mrs Kitty Smith) 
This glacier's name is Na!udi' This is the 
story of how it came across the river and made a lake. 
/ 
One man lived way·down there, Yok'dat{Yakatat) 
they call it, way down there. People lived at that 
place, near salt water. Klukshu River goes down to 
that place. From there, people came up to this Yukon. 
One old man is coming and a little boy about so big. 
{When they got here, they met an old man, a Yukon 
Indian.) That old man had · no hair on his head, nothing. 
/ 
The little boy who came from Yok'dat told him. 
"Ah, that old man! The top of his head is just 
like the place gopher plays, a bare stump". That kid 
laughed at him. 
The old man who was with him said: 
"Don't say that. You don't know that old man. Why 
do you say that? That old man is your grandpa~ When 
you're old your hair is going to be that way too." 
1a 
Well, that old man comes from Yukon, you know. 
After that, they went back. 
/ 
Summertime, that old (Yukon) man went to Na~udi' 
He's medicine man, you know, big doctor. That ice was 
coming right down from the mountain. At the end of the 
ice, a creek came down. Right there, he sat down. 
He said to himself, "What am I going to do?" His 
doctor talks to him. "You think I'm going to bring that 
glacier to this mountain? It's going to be flooded, that 
side." 
His doctor told him, "You try it. It's going to come." 
That old man lay down, right there. His doctor's 
working now on that glacier. It comes down, comes down .... 
glacier .... glacier .... comes down .... comes down .... until 
it's all level with this mountain. 
That's the first time (the glacier crossed) that 
Indian doctor did that. 
1b 
• ' ' • • • o ' - ; •. ~ ", • - • I 
After he did that (another time when it crossed the 
river) my grandma told me it was like that one time, in 
her time. All flooded again, that 1016 (Haines Junction), 
that way. Talk about gophers die! she said. Before, 
that glacier didn't do that. But after he did that, first 
time, from there it started. (The barrier was formed and 
broken several times). 
That man stayed there on top that glacier until 
that water is filled up. Champagne landing, everywhere 
is all full with that water. There's a water place 
shows that yet. 
"All full now" his doctor said. "You know how far 
I'm going to clean them? Pretty near to the middle of 
the mountain all I'm going to wash down." 
"Alright. Break it down now" he said. 
down, that ice. Water goes now. 
It broke 
Peqple were staying at a flat piace where Champagne 
Creek (Alsek River} and Klukshu River {Tatshenshini River} 
meet. Some kind of coast Indian people. All died there 
people. All washed down to salt water. Just that one 
1c 
. I 
man saved, that one who told the boy not to make fun. 
That's the one he saved, that's all. 
All cleaned right out. They say they saw water 
coming half way up the mountain. 
That happened before my grandmother's time. But 
{in her time) that ice still goes, touches that mountain; 
that time the water was still full. 
/ 
I've been there, Narudi' That's the one that 
broke. 
It's a long time since that ice met that mountain. 
When my grandmother was a little girl, she stayed 
at Dalton Post all the time. That's the time she said 
all the time they cook, they don't use cooking stick. 
They boil food. They don't let that soup run over too 
because there is danger in that ice. If that ice smells 
grease , he don't like it. Should be people just boil 
meat. (If he smells grease) that's the time he started. 
Just goat and sheep there, no moose, no caribou. 
1d 
There was a flood in my grandmother's time, though. 
But not as big as when the old man did that. · It's 
after him. In his time that ice came just up to that 
/ 
mountain - that's why they called it Nalun.i' .·, "flat 
right there". Right there, there is a big creek coming, 
bigger than the Klukshu River. That creek came from the 
mountain. 
That was before me, in my grandmother's time. 
Maybe I was just born then. August, they go to Kluane. 
Indians walk around like that. Kluane people, Big Lake 
people. They're friends together. They're going to 
Kluane, I guess . . They stay there, come back. Flooded! 
Bear Creek is all full of water. They stay on the other 
side. 
That's when one old lady told me, "Talk about 
gophers" she said, that flood. Lots of gophers there. 
No trees, I guess, just gravel, willows. Just a little 
while, that flood. That flood was just a little while, 
just to Bear Creek, then he broke down again . Dry. I 
don't think this time it does that for a long time. 
1e 
(Later, discussing glaciers again, Mrs. Smith summarized): 
Glaciers don't like to smell grease. If it smells 
grease an eye (of the animal living under it?) comes out 
on top. It becomes so hot that it is just like being in 
a stove. Lots of people know about this.· 
I asked Jimmy Kane just a little while ago, 
"How is that glacier. Is it still like that?" 
"Oh, I don't know. I don't hear anything". 
I guess it should be yet. If something (the animal) 
is gone, that ice is going to melt out. There is some-
thing inside. That's why that glacier is there. That's 
the one where his eye came out, people say. If he comes 
out, if there is nothing there, that glacier is going to 
melt. 
That owl they killed, I told you, they came from 
that ice.· It was just full (of ice) they say. Big 
glacier. One of those owls choked on a bone. One 
/ 
burned. See? There is no more ice there (at Nt.Jkwa'ik) 
now. Before there was ice there, as wide as Marsh Lake. 
1f 
When that owl was killed, they all melted out. 
/ 
There used to be a glacier at Nukwa'ik people. say. 
But people cook bacon, everything this time and 
nothing is wrong, they tell me. Jimmy Kane told me. 
But something is in there yet. If they cook gopher 
grease or something, it's going to start again. 
I don't believe that it is over. Hy grandma told 
me too, my Daddy's mother. But she's got husband 
already, that time she sees them, those eyes. They run 
away. Too hot, they say. Everything started to talk: 
groundhog, gopher, geese. You can hear everything talk-
ing. That time they ran away. They packed up - I guess 
they didn't have much meat. They got a good place, got 
saved. That meat is just like it is cooked. 
. / -!k That's Dadz1 _, down Dalton Post way. 
------
/ 
.. . 
Another ice, Tanshi closed Mush Lake, my grano..mother 
, 
told me . That ' s -the one my grandmother said, " Two came 
out . That's why we started". 
grandma. 
She doesn't lie, my 
1g 
That time (recently± 1900) when Na~udi' · came 
across that time the lake was full all the way to Haines 
Junction. That time two sisters with one husband were 
staying pretty near 1016 drying meat. They went up the 
mountain: they had a camp there. It all flooded down 
there. Yes, it broke down after a while. One of those 
ladies told me there were lots of gophers there, dead 
ones. Just full of gophers. They packed them in.''Talk 
about gophers! I wish you were coming that time~ she 
told me. "That water dropped down in the morning when 
the glacier broke. My husband packed in a big bag of 
gophers. Then we started, dogs, everything, lots of 
gophers~ 
Since the doctor did that the first time, it happens 
again. 
Some young people don't believe me when I say that. 
But I don't say that, people say that. 
1h 
/ v 
Dadzik 
(Mrs Kitty Smith) 
That's the name of another glacier, I'll tell you. 
Bad place, t~at place, they say. 
One time when Mary Kane's father was a little · boy 
he went hunting with his Daddy. Later, when they told 
that story he said, yes, I was there. Lots of people 
hunted that time. It was just goats they hunt; they 
shot lots of things. No caribou or moose there, though. 
One old man said, "Take good care of that grease. 
The wind is blowing that way (across?) the ice. I 
smell grease strong when I walk around. Look there, 
at thai grease". He takes off from that ground. 
The creek went down that way to Dalton Post River. 
My, some people were getting excited. Already it's 
getting dark now. 
Somebody left for a few minutes, go to toilet. 
When he came back he said, 
"Gee I hear groundhog whistle up there". 
2a 
Funny how game talks that way just at nighttime -
gopher, geese, just for nothing they talk. 
Then it started getting light on top of the ice; 
the side was just getting warm. People start to sweat. 
"Well", that man said, "we got to get away". 
They started. 
That little kid, his dad held him. Meat, blankets, 
everything they left, just get away. When they begin to 
move down, they see eyes, just like a sun , on top of the 
ice. Two eyes came up when they went down there. 
Getting hot now. Too much heat, just like a stove. 
So they went in the water, shallow water. They went away 
down there (downriver} about five miles. They got over 
there . Over there they camped. 
Gee whiz, day time now. Sun all come out, now 
everyplace~ So they went back again. That meat is 
pretty near cooked, they say . I don't know what did 
that . 
They told Jack Dalton about that story. He 
married an Indian woman, used to be, at Dalton Post. 
He went down there, took a horse. But it was too hot, 
too much. That hor$e fell down j~st like he was 
sleeping. Then he went in the water, him. He let that 
horse go - dead. Too much heat. They say he came back 
without his horse, nothing. 
/ ../ 
Dadzik 
------
, they call that place. 
glacier, that one. 
It's a big 
Below Dalton Post, on Dalton Post Creek. Everybody 
see that. I guess my grandma too see that, run away, 
when my Daddy is a baby. 
That place they made grease was bad. 
There's . another glacier, Tanshi' same, down from 
Dalton Post. 
That Tans~i' ; that's the one Jack Dalton tried. 
, 
/ -./ 
That one·'s different from this Dadzik , that story 
I tell you. I've been at that Tinshi' too. No good, 
that place, used to be. Not far from Dalton Post. 
2c 
Woodpecke~ Got His Snake 
( Mrs Kitty Smith) 
/, .. 
This is story of echuch ' _ia gyukinshan - "Woodpecker 
got his snake". 
This is a story from along time ago, I guess, from 
the time when Crow made people, that's the time. 
This is a story about Woodpecker. 
Wolf, he married Woodpecker's daughter. 
One time Woodpecker said, "My, I see moose tracks. 
I see fresh moose track going that way." 
"Where?" asks his son-in-law. 
"Up there. You see that tree? That's cow moose". 
Wolf knows that's not cow moose, but he goes there. 
Gee , he sees no track, no track, just owl, and that owl 
flies away .. Finally he looks around all over and he 
comes back. 
"Where does your daddy see moose track?" he asks 
his wife. 
3a 
She asked her daddy, "Where do you see moose track?" 
"That place". 
"Well, nothing there. My husband has been there 
' ,, 
and he saw nothing. Just owl too - Nada. That's all he 
sees. It flies away too." 
' '' That Wolf man is mad about that - just Nada there. 
"No" says Woodpecker. 
over there." 
"That's cow moose and calf 
So, he went again, that son-in-law, and he killed 
' ,, 
that Nada, brought it back. 
"Daddy " that daughter called. "He got all two". 
She carried that owl around - not heavy, you know. 
She put it there, wood pile place. 
say. 
".My goodness, she pack around cow moose", her father 
"Ah, that's heavy". 
Well, they start now. Woodpecker kids too. They 
cut up the owl, hang up head, just like moose head. 
Cook it. 
3b 
',Give the best head part to your brother-1n-1.aw- , 
Woodpecker tells his sons. 
They cut off the nose and give it. He laughed, I 
guess, that Wolf. Just like he eat for nothing. They 
all eat, but they say they gave the best part to Wolf. 
I guess he threw it away, pretended to eat. 
Then, after, he hunted. That Wolf got cow moose-
real moose. He brought in the fat, told his wife. 
"Ah .... " he said. It's heavy. He told his wife, 
"Hey, I got in a glacier and my snowshoe froze. See? 
"Bring them here". 
He brought them. She put them near the fire to make 
them dry. That old man, her father, Woodpecker, is 
watching. 
"Ah .... my daughter, that's bear den. Bear owns 
that glacier ice, that ice frozen on snowshoes" . 
She doesn't know what he's going to say, that Wolf. 
3c 
'rhat Wolf said , "What does your Daddy mean? I got 
in water. That's what's on my snowshoe. What kind of 
bear stays in t hat kind of place?" 
"Well, I don't know that", said his wife. 
In the morning, that Woodpecker tied up everything, 
sharpened weapons for his kids. They're going to go 
there. They're going to try that bear den. But he doesn't 
see bear den, that Wolf man. He just sees glacier going 
that way. 
"My son-in-law, you come too", Woodpecker tells him. 
He comes, looks around. 
"Yes, he ' s sitting there, { that bear) ". 
That man doesn't know what he means . 
Woodpecker bangs his stick on the top of that ice .. . . 
bang .... bang .. . . bang . 
"I don't know why he won't come out", bang ... . bang .. . . 
bang. 
3d 
Woodpecker does that. Wolf man, though, he just 
stand there. 
Woodpecker stopped: 
"My packsack. There is something inside will bring 
that bear on top this way. Get your husband, my daughter. 
Send him to your Mama. She knows that sack. Tell your 
husband to get it from my packsack, my daughter . Your 
,, 
Mama knows my sack. 
Wolf ran back: 
"Bear doesn't come. Get that sack your husband wants." 
"Oh" , that lady looks around. She gets some kind 
of thing, gives it to him. He takes off, that Wolf. 
"This one?" 
"Yes, that's the one" said Woodpecker . 
That Woodpecker tied it on a stick and put it on 
top of ice . I don't know what it is - he sent for his 
doctor {medicine ) I guess . 
3e 
Crack. He bust that ice. Something came out of 
that ice - big snake. They poke it, Woodpecker's kids 
and Wolf man. They kill him. 
My, lots of fat. They cut it up, pack it home. 
Wolf doesn't eat though, just his wife eats. 
"I don't want it", he said. 
Woodpecker said, "Don't you kids leave any cooking 
stuff (cooked food). Don't save any cooked food. Eat 
it all." 
Wolf thinks, "I don't know what he means. He takes 
a little bit of his wife's cooked food, hides it away. 
Just a little piece of cooked fat. It froze there, I 
guess. 
They left the rest of that raw fat to lie around 
'til tomorrow. Fix it up tomorrow. 
Next day, they wake up. 
"Ah •... ". · All that fat turned to ice. Just that 
little piece of meat he saved, that's all. They should 
not have saved that little piece of cooked meat. That's 
why it turned that way . 
3f 
, I 
: I 
I I 
I 
That old Woodpecker got mad. "Who did that. We 
wanted to eat that good bear meat!" 
Wolf went hunting. He got bear, killed it, brought 
in the fat. He brought it to his father-in-law: 
"This is bear. You say bear for nothing". 
That Woodpecker wants to even up. He saved a little 
bit of that cooked bear fat. They eat that fat and 
tomorrow they go to get that meat. 
But that next day, nothing wrong. He didn't even 
up, that Woodpecker. 
/, .. 
Echuch'ia gyukinshan they call it. From Dalton Post 
, 
way down, a little way. "Woodpecker, he got snake " . 
Long time ago, it's like that, I guess , when Crow 
turned animals to people , that ' s the time. 
3g 
Falling Through A Glacier 
(Mrs Angela Sidney) 
You know people used to go down to sell their furs 
on the coast? One time my father was going to come back 
and his trading partner, the one who buys furs from him 
all the time, is going to come with him. Here they 
started from ?kut (Chilkoot) lake, between Haines and 
Skagway. At the end of .-3:kut, they started coming back 
that way. They came out at Robinson or some place like 
that. And here there's a glacier they have to cross. 
My daddy got across but there was a crack in the glacier 
and that man behind him fell in. I don't know how he 
did it. 
My daddy didn't know what to do. If he died there, 
he thought, they're going to blame him for it, think he 
killed him or something. So he hollered at him, and 
here he answered. 
"Are you okay?" 
"Yes, I'm okay". 
"I'm going to try to get you out. I'm going to 
untie my pack and I'm going to send the string of my 
4a 
pack rope down to you. And you tie it around your waist 
and climb . up. I'm going to keep pulling it too. Put 
your elbows against the glacier wall and climb up. So 
he did. He untied his pack, my daddy, and he tied a 
string around a stick and let it down to him. 
jerk. 
"You jerk it when you got it", he said. He felt it 
"Put your elbows against the glacier and try to 
pull yourself up. I'm going to keep pulling you too." 
He kept doing it, and finally he got himself out of the 
glacier. Finally he came out. 
They came out of the pass around Robinson or some-
place around there and they went over the mountains this 
way to Tagish. That pass is between Robinson and ~kut 
There is a valley there - I heard them talking about it. 
That man's wife said that her husband talked about 
. .,, 
it all the time; Kodenaha is his name. My father was a 
young man. He never stayed with my mother yet. That 
man stayed with my father quite a while and then he went 
to Dyea . 
4b 
Falling Through A Glacier 
(Mrs Kitty Smith) 
This is a story about coast Indians, story of ianakb . 
This happened at glacier in the way from Klukwan to Lake 
Arkell (Kusawa). 
Two coast Indian men went from Klukwan to get fur, 
skins. They got ready, took guns - guns already that time 
too, I guess. 
One of those men told his wife, "We're going to stay a 
long time there, Yukon. We'll come back in August. We're 
going to stay there all swnmer." 
That's what they said. They're going to trade some 
things. (Yukon) Indians got fur all the time. There's 
no store that time. 
They're gone. Two people - a man and his brother-in-
law. One married the other one's sister. They stay Yukon. They 
4c 
buy fur - trade them, you know. That man has got lynx 
skin blanket he buy. 
They're going to go back now, to Klukwan. They started. 
They got lunch, I guess. One woman tells them, "I'm 
going to fix some lunch for you. You give me this chew 
(tobacco} for nothing." 
She smash dry meat, make grease, put it in a big bag, 
that lunch. Lots of meat - just smash like flour. 
That man thinks, ''When I come back to Klukwan, me and 
my wife are going to ~at this". Some dry meat they got, 
some fat too. 
They go back now. They follow foot trail that way used 
to be. Glacier there, used to be. They go across this far 
(to the top}. That glacier goes across to - the mountain. 
They eat lunch there, start to go now. 
They walk now. Just in the middle, he falls down, his 
partner. Down the crack in that glacier. 
The other one is scared now. Just like smoke come out. 
His partner is gone. I guess he holler, he pokes in that 
4d 
4e 
(on a rope). He's going to look for the body._ If he finds 
the body, and if my uncle is dead, we're going to kill him 
so that slave will be his partner. 
They go now. Just those who are going to carry the 
body go. 
That man is still there, over a month. Sometimes that 
man sleeps, he sleeps warm, I guess, warm fur blankets. 
Sometimes they bring dish there and he eats. I don't know 
who brings that dish: when down in Klukwan they make potlatch 
I guess they call out names and throw that grub in the fire 
and I guess it comes to that man down there. 
Well, people go to that place now. They're going to 
find him now. That man's partner put post there, marker, 
his walking stick he put there to mark. 
"Right there, right there he fall down." 
His brother old man too, coming. 
"Ayyy ..... " he call "You die right there my brother." 
That man he hear down there. 
"Ayyy ... 11 he holler back. 
> 
"Somebody holler down there". 
"Who hears him?" 
"I hear too." 
"Who hears him?" 
"I hear him. Somebody hollers." 
"Aye .... Aye ...... " they holler 
"I'm living yet. 
there. Oh my! 
I'm livi~g het", he say that down 
"There're going to put string down there. Look for 
it" they tell him. Put little rock on that. 
"I got him" he holler. He ties up his stuff. 
They P.Ull up. His stuff comes up! His pack, fur, 
everything come out there. Now his body going to come. 
They send down wide belt. Going to tie up (around his 
waist). He tie up. Strong rope. Now they pull him. He 
4f 
come ·up - he's fat! He's alright, one month. 
"You alright? You starve? " 
"No, I'm alright." 
That woman who fix him lunch, she smash that grease, 
that meat. He eat that good. 
That slave is saved. They give him to that man. 
"This is going to be your .own. I give it to you uncle. 
He's going to take care of you. I was going to kill him 
right there where you died. He was going to stay here too . 
You're saved. 
They walk now. From there, they make boat, go down 
creek . 
Two men got in one boat. They will go fast, go to 
tell people down there the story. 
Down there, people talk. Those two men came to Klukwan. 
They holler: 
4g 
"Ah .....•. Ka nakh comes back. He's not dead, he's 
coming down." 
My goodness . His wife jump in the water. He's got 
two wives. 
Boat is coming now. 
bought from down Yukon. 
"Ka nakh? You?" 
"Yes. I'm living." 
He's wearing skin clothes he 
Ah, fancy clothes. Everybody comes. 
My, every body is surprised. Big potlatch, they paid 
for him, but he's come back again. 
4h 
-- - --~----------------------111!!!!!!!!1-------
The Year Su:rrner Never Came 
told by Mrs. Rachel Dawson, Whitehorse 
I told you al:out that year surmer never carre? 'Tuo winter 
together. It was like this (v.Bather now) only heavy 
frost, just thick they said. :t-b srDW, but just like ice 
all over, and they're joined together. Just al:out little 
better than a hrmdred years now. Young noose oom in 
springtirre, they just freeze right onto grormd. I guess 
they're wet. 'Ihe Indians, they look all over in the w::xx:is 
they say for that kind. When they find young noose frozen 
they cut it up and they eat it. 
My young grandfather's father dig up lake. 'Ihat's not my 
real grandfather, that's his nephew (whJ) was given to my 
grandrrother after my grandfather died. 'lhey do that, you -
krow, Indian. Like if sorrething wrong with my old rran, 
his people got lots of relations down there. His rela-
tions got toys, she rould tell one of her ooys ''You look 
after your grandpa's wife. Live with her. Lcx::>k after 
her." 'lliat's what he did. He stay with her just like 
he's rrarried to her. He was raby then. (when tw::> winters 
joined) 
It was s:> rold that lake just froze right cbwn to the 
oottom. Ice right through, no water. So my grandpa's 
father tx:x:lk a chisel, tanda they call it Indian way. He 
dug a \okDle lake up, row big that lake. Sorretirre he get 
to fish. He take it rorre and they rrake soup out of it for 
kids, they got lots of kids. Like rre I got lots of grand-
children dovm there. (That lake just be after Minto on 
right hand side as you go up Taye Lake (?) 'lhetso Lake. 
'Ihere' s lots of jackfish in that and they're gcod to eat. ) 
He dug that whJle lake up, then go oorre eat a bit of soup 
with his kids. He tells his wife, "I'm going to rp look 
out, just see if any ITIX)Se roming around." :t-b gun. 'Ihey 
just got tow and arrow. 
He sit down under tree. He got his p:i.cksack he sit on and 
rest. I 91-ESS he's tired and -weak witrout eating. Star-
vation. A lot of people starve in Yukon that tirre. He 
sit there and he hear oorrething running; you cnuld hear it 
run on the ice, ice break under. So he open his eye and 
look. He keep still. He got his tow and arrow all ready. 
He just h:>ld it. Here that cnw noose cnrre down to have 
5a 
her baby. He soot it. Just one soot he got it. He open 
it. He took the guts out and he go hone to tell his wife. 
''We ha.ve to nove," he said. "I can I t pack all that rreat. 
I got rroose cbwn there." So they all nove down and they 
nake canp right there. She cut rreat, she dry them~ She 
o:x>k for the kids. Everything like that. 
Just then my older grandfather--my rrother's father--canE 
rack from toward Mayo. That's the one they say he cpt ten 
wives, ten'·rren to \>.Ork for him. They cnrre back each of 
them pull toroggan. They got dry ~t and dry fish and 
everything what you cnuld think of--berries, blll:!berries. 
When they cx,rre rack that way they saved a lot of people. 
'Ihen spring cnrre and it get warm and everybody get better 
again. 
The Year Sumrer Never c.arre 
told by Mrs. Angela Sidney, Tagish 
What part I know on this side, they said tw::> winters 
joined together. Maybe not all surmer, I don't think, 
rraybe late spring, I guess that's what they JTEan. And 
everylx>dy just alxmt starved out. Had hard winter, what 
they call hard winter. 
'lhere's one nan, I don't know what his naJTE is. Anyway he 
killed s::me rroose. CDw noose and the young ones and that 
bull, I guess, late fall, in the winter tine. And here at 
the end I guess he started to ID::ike canp first instead of 
going to the rroose and trying to dress them or sorrething. 
And here he passed out after he make the canp. He pass 
out. And when he cnrre to he \owe1t to see his noose and 
here they ~e gone. They took off. 'Ihey just dropped. 
M3.ybe they didn't get hurt. And here they were cpne. 
'Ihere sure was awful luck that tine they said. SUre must 
rave been awful. '.Ihat' s why they tell al:x:mt it • . 'lhat was 
before my tine. 
A long tirre arj) that happened. ·Why my nother was just a 
child that tirre I guess. That's her rrother, they stayed 
in Carcross I <JlESS. Carcross, they call that place 
(Natassaheen). Tlingit narre I guess. Means ''Water going 
through the Narrows . " She I s narrow there you know. 
Carilxm there. They live there I guess. 
My great grandrrother, I guess it was, used to go to 
Carcross there to that rrountain there , I don't know what 
they call it. I see they call it Caribou fuuntain. They 
say where the snow all JTEl t she pick SOJTE stoneberries. 
From there when she gets mrre she rrake soup out of it for 
the children. 
5b 
I 
Peq,le went there to where the fish--when it thaw out 
quick you kno.v when the river open place like that they 
start fishing. 'Jhat's why they all went to that place. 
Sare went through to Atlin, I suppose. I just kno.v about 
what IT¥ nother tells rre, you kru:M. I don't kru:M about 
other people. But that's when Jdmny Ned said people eat 
each other. I never heard of that story though. So I 
don't believe it. It's not true I don't think. 
'Ihat was before the gold.rush. My nother was just a child 
I guess that tine. She's the one who tell rre about her 
nother used to rp to that nrnmtain, pick berries to nake 
soup for the kids. 
All over the Yukon every place they say. In Teslin it 
ha:i;:pen too. Mr. Fox, Jim Fox, was just a ymmg mm they -
say. He went out htmting too. People start to travel to 
go travel sorreplace and he went ahead to go htmting 
srneplace. And he know where his people are going to 
stop. I forget about this story. My husband used to tell 
it. 'Jhat's his grandlll1Cle, I guess, his nother's uncle. 
Mr. Fbx, Jim Fox. 
Anyway, he kill five caribou. And after he dress them all 
and everything here he canp. He had to canp because got to 
lake I gt.Ess. Anyway he brought one of the liver back and 
he cooked it and he eat it. And here that night he got 
sick. You k:now when not eat a long tine and then eat 
sorrething? He got sick. 'lhat liver ffi3.de him sick. 
Arrjway, the next day, well he cnuldn't go next day, had to 
stay there. Arrl towards evening I guess he started 
feeling better. So he got wex:>d, pack lots of wocii and 
then he start cnoking. So he cnuld take cooked things 
back you kno.v. He can't rp anyway, it's too late to go. 
So he started to cook scree caribou, the shoulder, the 
whole ann I gt.ess, tw::> or three of them. 'lhat' s all he 
pack. Enough for what he cnuld pack, you kno.v. Anywey 
next norning, early norning, he start rping. He catch up 
to the people where they were going to rp. 
Here when he CXKTE out to that lake, I don't know what they 
call it in English, just Indian way they call it T'ati'a. 
'llie m::x)Se, caJ;"ibou and everything in winter they poop all 
over the place ~ .M:::>ose dropping. 'lhat' s why they call it 
like that. .t-Eans ".M:::>ose Dropping lake." I don't kno.v 
\oklat they call it in English. 
Here he see sorrething black out in the middle of the lake. 
Well he kno.v very well who that be so he walked right out 
there and here it was his uncle, Tan Kok' la. Here he 
was fishing, fishing through the ice. When his uncle look 
up at him he sure look awful he said, no rreat on his skin 
just awful looking he said. He put his pack do.vn there 
and he just gave srne cooked rreat to his uncle right there. 
5c . 
I 
I 
111 
I 
Here he was sitting. And then he went not very far, I 
gu2ss. Well he went across the lake I gu2ss. 'Ihat I s 
where people carrping. My old man's nother was just a 
child, just a girl I guess, that's the tine it happen. 
Don 't krx:M hCM old she would be, just four or five years 
old, I gu2ss. 'lhat's the tine it happened. 'lhat old Mr. 
Fox used to say to II!f old m:m, "A-se" well that I s his 
sister's niece I guess, "A-se, look hCM much I save you. 
You wouldn I t have been here if she died," he say. 'lhat I s 
what he always say. He always ask him to think about 
that. HCM m:my people he save. 
One m:m starve. '.Ihey don I t think he starve they say, 
think he had heart trouble. It was so cold, I gtEss, and 
here r:eople make fire on the way, that's the way they 
travel, you krx:M. When it's cold weather they make fire 
here and there all over and when the kids, everylxxly, get 
wann enough again they go again to next place. Next fire 
there they wann up they say it was cold too. Very cold. 
'lhat' s what brought on that starvation I gu2ss, you kncM. 
Wild noose you can't COITE closer. Too cold and sncM make 
lots of noise. '!hey take off. lDng ways. Caribou too. 
'lhat's h<M people starve out. 
(Q. Did lTfil1Y kids starve?) 
No, not Jlllld1, only one m:m, he's gr<Mn man. '!hat's the 
one _Mr. Fox say he don't think he starve. Where they make 
fire you krx:M across the fire it nelt, you kncM, and here 
he t(X)k out his sp::on, he start eating that wet snc:M. And 
he think that's what make him die. His heart got cold, I 
gu2ss, and he got a shock. People never do that eating 
sOCM. When it's cold your heart get cold and sarething' s 
bound to happen. Ndx>dy died at Carcross, either, I never 
heard that. Maybe not so much fish at Selkirlc. But where 
stream was, Carcross never froze before they put the dam, 
but a£ter they put the dam it froze up. So's Tagish too. 
'lhat .Marsh Lake Dam. I guess water start n.mning so fast 
once, you krx:M. 
'lhat' s all I kno.v of. '.Ihey say all over it happen. 
5d 
/ / 
Si man• 
(Mrs Kitty Smith) 
My grandpa, my Monuny's Daddy tell me this story. 
Mush Creek goes into deep lake, cold lake. 
they call it. (Keet pp. .,d lt>.k~) 
/ / 
Si man' 
He sat on top of a mountain hunting when he was 
young. He's got wife already. My mother is a baby 
that time. 
Six caribou went across that lake. 
Right there, he sat down. Some people with him. 
Two men. Three of them together. Six caribou go across 
that lake. 
"Look at that caribou go across to the other side." 
Right in the middle of that lake, just like a sack, 
they got to go that way (a whirlpool}. Those six caribou 
went down in the water, never come up. That water just 
turn round and round. He's not dreaming. My grandpa 
is an honest man. 
6a 
/' / / , 
Tashal ~~n' (Bates Lake) 
(Mrs Kitty Smith) 
My grandpa, my Daddy's Daddy, Doc Scottie used to 
be a policeman. He told me this, but he didn't see it 
himself. He saw the place where it happened. It was 
at Deep Lake, they call it, 
/ / /, 
Tashal rn~n' . (Bates Lake). 
Somebody camped at that Lake, just hunting. They 
cooked some kind of meat, grease, I guess. They got 
pet dog. 
Don't know how many people were there. My (other) 
Grandpa was there too, my Mamma's own. Somebody had a 
little dog. At night time, that little dog is barking. 
When they }:leard him, ,trees broke. Crash. 
"Ah, something is wrong". They ran away. They 
\ ' 
had no blankets (when they ran away). They went on 
top of a mountain. They lay down, I guess. 
Daylight now. They watched down there, their camp. 
No, nothing. Daylight now. 
One man said, "Well , we've got to see what made that." 
6b 
Lots of people. About five or ten, I guess. They 
.went down to their camp again. My goodness, trees were 
knocked down about this far (a few feet) from the ground, 
for about this far (indicating the edge of the lake). 
Something came out of that lake. Snake, it looks like, 
they say. About that much (depression) in the ground. 
Then he turned (around) this way, that time, after those 
It's just like they clean all the trees off 
and leave the grass. 
I don't know what it was. They saw one man say some 
kind of rock - a big island (before this). On top, a 
big head came out, then another. Two. I don't know 
(where) that one though. Nobody believe him. 
That time (I'm telling you about) one man said, 
"You see that one man said he saw that kind of 
think lay down .on 
\ 
top of that island? This one, down 
the water must be like that. II That's what he said. . 
People didn't believe it before. 
"You see this place now? It smells funny too." 
Funny, eh? That thing came from the water. That 
little dog barked (so that snake tried to get him). 
in 
6c 
That snake knocked the tree down with his head and went 
in the water again. I guess he scared that dog. 
Lots of bones on the shore, they say, from animals 
he ate. 
/ . •/ 
This was at Ta"shal man' 
/ 
near Na~udi' Deep 
Lake, white man calls it. (Bates Lake ) It doesn't 
freeze much in wintertime, just a little bit. 
One time Jack Pringle used to be policeman (North-
west Mounted Police). He married Susie, my grandpa's 
sister. He went marten hunting with my grandpa, (Doc 
Scottie). He (Jack Pringle) said, 
"We're going to go on that ice. We'll camp on the 
other side." 
My grandp\ knows that lake, you know. 
"That lake doesn't freeze all winter, just snow on 
top, that's all. Maybe a little ice." He told him. 
That white man didn't believe it, you know. He does 
that (tested the ice). It's true; it's just a little 
thin. It's after Christmas. 
6d 
That time he asked my grandpa, Doc Scottie, 
"What makes that lake like. that, Scottie?" 
He told him. "Something is in the water. Something 
like a snake", he told him. 
little dog was barking." 
"It came to shore: that 
He scared that dog, I guess. They find lots of 
bones in that lake, I guess. Game bones, I guess he 
swallowed them. 
Whitemen used to know about that lake too. One man 
made a boat there. He told my grandpa, 
"I don't go to that deep lake there. I don't want 
it. It looks funny to me ~ - I don-1t -go on that one, just 
on Mush Cre~k Lake (Mush Lake) I trap around on top." 
Well, it's true. 
/ . / ,,(_ 
Tashal man' they call that Deep Lake (Bates Lake) 
/ 
Mush Lake, though is Si man~ 
Little Creek runs between those lakes. From 
Dezadeash, a road goes to Mush Creek Lake (Mush Lake), 
from there, little creek; from there, Deep Lake. 
\ 
6f