Trying to help a friend out, fey and stuff are prominent in European literature, but is there any specific fey or spirit creatures in Native American culture and literature. All I could think of was a Wendigo, but that was far too malevolent for what my friend was talking about.
Something that'd play pranks and put 'weight' on people's chests. But not like 'harming' them like traditionally associated with things like Incubi and Succubi, etc.
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This is an interesting topic. Consider it dotted.
Dotting as well.
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Also dottong. Spanky, thanks for the link.
Need Moar!
dotted. Grandfather Coyote is a pretty rascally fellow
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Back where I grew up in New Brunswick we had the Maliseet tribe. They had a legend of the little people who lived along the river in small holes. The Maliseet would trade with the little people who were about as tall as a mans knee. The little people were apparently known for odd rituals and the gift of not being seen when they wanted to, even in broad daylight. They had a side of trickery to them as well, they would braid peoples hair into elaborate shapes when they were asleep. They loved the smell of sweet grass as well and could always be coaxed out of hiding by burning it. The maliseet said that the little people started to leave after colonists started to arrive, and went away completely after dams were built in the river and changed the river so much.
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If you can get a hold of it, there is a book called American Elves: an Encyclopedia of little people from the lore of 380 ethnic groups of the Western Hemisphere.
This page also gives a good rundown
Native American little people
So yeah, the new world has a pretty rich fey/spirit tradition. Unfortunately there are much fewer accessible works about the subject, compared to, say, Western Europe fey
My mother worked for the school library system and I spent many a summer helping her catalog books and sneaking off to read from an Encyclopedia of Folklore and Myth or some such.
Even pre-pubescent, I knew to fear the vagina dentata!
Even pre-pubescent, I knew to fear the vagina dentata!
That movie Teeth was awesome, if a bit one-dimensional in its portrayal of males.
Yeah, I took a pass on that one, but maybe, one day...
[Crosses legs]
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Thanks for the help. And yeah I saw that Teeth movie...it's not THAT bad compared to other movies I've seen.
And awesome there is a Cherokee affiliated 'little' folk. I'm part Cherokee and hadn't heard of the Nunnehi and Yunwi Tsunsdi. This is awesome.
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First, I would recommend checking out www.native-languages.org/ ... very informative site.
Some that I researched (from Cherokee):
Jistu ... the rabbit trickster spirit
EDIT: Ninja'd on the native-languages.org by MMCJawa... still a great resource.
I'm dotting this to read it after class.
Dotting for interest.
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Native American Mythology Articles at Encyclopedia Mythica
I've also got a nice little book in my library called Legends and Lore of the American Indians, edited by Terri Hardin.
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There was a GURPS adventure set in 1920's Tennessee that involved Cherokee supernatural forces. Old Stone Fort. Also a real place.
Various witches, 'water cannibals,' the Raven Mocker, etc. There's even a Wendigo.
I saw a bunch of shops in Albuquerque that were filled with kachina dolls.
One that was really popular was the clown kachina;
I think he might be Loki or Beetlejuice.
Looks like "kachinas" are pretty similar to "kami."
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Though your friend is probably asking about North American Natives, I can give some insight into creatures from the mythologies of the other end of the continent:
Sumpall
Half-human, half-fish creatures that, according to the Mapuche of southern Chile, watch over the rivers and lakes (and, since there are thousands of those in that area, there are equally thousands of sumpall). Water forms around the sumpall, so as long as they are alive, the places they protect are never dry. They were created by Trentren-Vilu, the titanic sea serpent whose trashing created the southern fjords while fighting Caican-Vilu (another titanic sea serpent), from the corpses of drowned men and women.
Similar to sirens, the sumpall have beautiful voices that lure people to the bottom of their river/lake/bay, into a mysterious realm called the Sumpalhue. If a person drowns in Sumpalhue, he turns into a sumpall. However, if the victim happened to be a woman about to be married, the sumpall would transform into a bird and carry a compensation back to the family.
Ngen
The Ngen are the "Owners of Things", spirits ruling over things like rivers, wind, and fire. According to the Mapuche, since everything can be given or taken, it means everything must have an owner. And the ngen would be the original owners of natural things (in contrast with man-made stuff, which has no owner spirit), left in this land when the world was first created (it's suggested that they come from another, older world).
There are many types: The Winkul, which owns mountains and volcanoes and appears as a snake or as a man who never ages; the Ko, which own rivers and waterfalls and appear as stones, logs, or youthful men and women (always in pairs); the Kütral, which own fire and embers, usually appearing as figures made from smoke; the Kürëf, owners of the wind, which appear as wispy figures (there are four sub-types, one for each wind, some as good, some as evil); the Rëpü, owners of naturally-formed roads and trails, usually appearing either as peaceful animals or travellers; the Kura, owners of rocks and stones, who always appears as huge monoliths, and sometimes speak when asked the proper questions (and help travellers who have become lost in the mountains); and the Mawida, owners of the forests, which appear in different forms (there are four sub-types, corresponding to the four sacred trees of the mapuche). Those are some examples, and there are many more types of ngen.
Gotta run now, but if you want, I can provide more intel on many more creatures from the mythology of pre-hispanic Chile.
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Gotta run now, but if you want, I can provide more intel on many more creatures from the mythology of pre-hispanic Chile.
YES PLEASE
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Ngen
The Ngen are the "Owners of Things", spirits ruling over things like rivers, wind, and fire. According to the Mapuche, since everything can be given or taken, it means everything must have an owner. And the ngen would be the original owners of natural things (in contrast with man-made stuff, which has no owner spirit), left in this land when the world was first created (it's suggested that they come from another, older world).
The Ngen sound very much like a different sort of Kami, or 'genius loci' or even the very specific angels mentioned in Kaballah, like the 'angel who pushed this mountain up' or the 'angel who carved this river.'
Then again, it would probably be easier to list the cultures who didn't have that sort of 'place spirit' or 'nature spirit' in some way.
Ngen
The Ngen are the "Owners of Things", spirits ruling over things like rivers, wind, and fire. According to the Mapuche, since everything can be given or taken, it means everything must have an owner. And the ngen would be the original owners of natural things (in contrast with man-made stuff, which has no owner spirit), left in this land when the world was first created (it's suggested that they come from another, older world).The Ngen sound very much like a different sort of Kami, or 'genius loci' or even the very specific angels mentioned in Kaballah, like the 'angel who pushed this mountain up' or the 'angel who carved this river.'
Then again, it would probably be easier to list the cultures who didn't have that sort of 'place spirit' or 'nature spirit' in some way.
Well, in the case of the Ngen it is slightly different: They are not precisely spirits of the mountains, rivers, farmlands, or forest, but rather creatures that own said things.
The concepts of property, ownership, and compensation were fundamental to the Mapuche world view and thus their mythology. For instance, when fishing they didn't exactly make offerings to the Ngen-Ko who owned the river, but rather made an exchange; they gave something owned by man in exchange for something owned by ngen.
While it is a subtle difference, it's an important concept to consider, and an interesting twist at the same time.
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Off the top of my head, some additional creatures from the far south:
Infünche
The guardians of the secret lairs of the Kalkus -Warlocks- of Chiloe (a big island in southern Chile), the infünche (literally "deformed person") were horrible creations of witchcraft that had their heads twisted to their backs, their arms and hands bent, their noses and mouth skewed, and one of their feet stuck to the back of the head, thus forcing them to either crawl with their remaining -and, of course, bent- leg and hands or tumble around frantically.
Infünche were created from kidnapped first-borns, though sometimes the father would give them willingly to the kalkus in order to keep them from cursing their bloodlines and their lands (or in exchange for magical favours). The warlocks would then break one of the kid's legs and tie it to it's back, covering him in a magical unguent that would cause him to grow thick, rough hair and toughen his skin. Afterwards, they would cut his tongue in half and then feed him milk from a pregnant woman. Once he grew teeth, they would feed him dead children, and finally dead adults.
Once completed, the infünche, appart from hideous, became a tremedously strong creature capable to breaking a man in half. Though they rarely left the caves in which they were created, the warlocks often used them as means to gain revenge or punish those who were fool enough not to fear them. Some infünche could live for centuries, passing from one group of warlocks to another, and although they could only speak in growls, they became very knowledgeable in magic and were thus the older ones were prized sources of arcane secrets.
Duam
Also called The Flying Ones, the duam were hideously ugly and withered old women with the capacity of turning into birds or sea foam in order to fly. The duam were in charge of relaying messages between the different warlock covenants of Chiloe and beyond, as well as carrying the Message of Life or Death (also called duam), which warlocks could send to someone in order to force them to perform a deed or die in the hands of the Flying Ones.
Tué-Tué
Yet another creation of the feared warlocks, the tué-tué looks like a large, disembodied human head with feathers for hair and the wings of a bird sprouting from its sides. The mere sight of a tué-tué meant death and disease were looming, and their arrival (heralded by their gutural "tue-tue" echoing for miles, which gives way to the name) was enough to send entire villages running for a new home. The tué-tué would sometimes enter the rooms of the sick in order to beat their spirits and thus be able to freely suck the blood of the victim, killing it if left to its devices.
The creation of a tué-tué involved the use of a secretive cream concocted by the warlocks that, if spread over the neck during the darkest hours of the night, would cause the head to sprout wings and depart from the body. Supposedly, the warlocks themselves would also turn into tué-tué in order to travel great distances (or just be jerks in general, which is what these guys loved to do), but only they knew how to re-attach their heads once they came back.
I'll post more later on.
The Ngen sound like the Masters of Animals from the Tolupan of the Honduras. They were spirits that "owned" specific types of animal.
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Tue-Tue sounds like a Vargoulle variant.
Yeah, pretty much. Sometimes they are depicted with claws, though, like some sort of head/owl thing.
This book and this movie are great resources.
Yeah, pretty much. Sometimes they are depicted with claws, though, like some sort of head/owl thing.
So noted! I might try statting one up.
As a Niitsitapi, should I be annoyed at people dotting instead of feathering? I thought people could tell the difference...
Dot. Second attempt.
Skinwalkers, effectively shapeshifting fey that can take a variety of humanoid and animal forms. wannabe druids.
Hopi Kachinas
Yes, Kachinas are a pretty good southwestern NA analogue for fey-like creatures, although they're more like (as you note) kami. There is quite a wide array of them as well. There was a great exhibit at the Autry last year (might still be there).
It's too bad you can't really get any authentic kachinas any longer; they're pretty much just cheap touristy knockoffs for purchase. My dad used to buy them back when I was a kid, and we had dozens of them around the house.
I really need to get those someday. I think my mom's got them all packed up somewhere. :(
Skinwalkers, effectively shapeshifting fey that can take a variety of humanoid and animal forms. wannabe druids.Skinwalkers aren't really fey, though. Depending on the lore they're either really evil and twisted human shamans or corrupted semi-divine beings who've abandoned their appointed duties.
they can also be considered fey depending on whom you consult as well. though not in the traditional medieval fantasy sense, but in the creepy predator whom disturbs people kinda way.
a lot of the more interesting fey, are the creepy and disturbing yet predatory and sadistic kind.
if skinwalkers were statted out in D&D as a monster, they would most likely be outsiders or fey depending on whether they want to build a combat monster, caster, or hybrid. though based on previous designers and similar creatures, they would probably make them fey, somehow connecting the shapeshifting to that of a druid and connecting their other supernatural talents to fey. they will probably get DR/cold iron instead of DR/Gold.
a skinwalker could just as easily be a druid variant focused more heavily on shapeshifting. though i imagine the outsider or fey monster, probably warrants a CR of 8-12.
Epic Meepo did a pretty awesome Elder Skinwalker as Outsider (Native) with some Witchy abilities.
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The pukwudgie from Wampanoag folklore, statted as monstrous humanoids in the Bestiary 3, would have been better represented as fey, I suspect.