A Brief Guide to Native American Myths and Legends Read Online Free PDF Page B

invocation, and the ‘sacrifices’ no more than would be accorded to any other assisting agent. Thus sharply must we differentiate between a fetish or captive spirit and a god. But it must be further borne in mind that a fetish is not necessarily a piece of personal property. It may belong collectively to an entire community. It is not necessarily a small article, but may possess all the appearances of a full-blown idol. An idol, however, is the abode of a god – the image into which a deity may materialize. A fetish, on the other hand, is
the place of imprisonment of a subservient spirit
, which cannot escape, and, if it would gain the rank of godhead, must do so by a long series of luck-bringing, or at least by the performance of a number of marvels of a protective or fortune-making nature. It is not unlikely that a belief exists in the Indian mind that there are many wandering spirits who, in return for food and other comforts, are willing to materialize in the shape the savage provides for them, and to assist him in the chase and other pursuits of life.
Apache fetishes
    Among the Athapascan Indians the Apaches, both male and female, wear fetishes which they call
tzi-daltai
, manufactured from lightning-riven wood, generally pine or cedar, or fir from the mountains. These are highly valued, and are neversold. They are shaved very thin, rudely carved in the semblance of the human form, and decorated with incised lines representing the lightning. They are small in size, and few of them are painted. Bourke describes one that an Apache chief carried about with him, which was made of a piece of lath, unpainted, having a figure in yellow drawn upon it, with a narrow black band and three snake’s heads with white eyes. It was further decorated with pearl buttons and small eagle-down feathers. The reverse and obverse were identical.
    Many of the Apaches attached a piece of malachite to their guns and bows to make them shoot accurately. Bourke mentions a class of fetishes which he terms ‘phylacteries’. These are pieces of buckskin or other material upon which are inscribed certain characters or symbols of a religious or ‘medicine’ nature, and they are worn attached to the person who seeks benefit from them. They differ from the ordinary fetish in that they are concealed from the public gaze. These ‘phylacteries’, Bourke says, ‘themselves medicine’, may be employed to enwrap other ‘medicine’, and ‘thus augment their own potentialities’. He describes several of these objects. One worn by an Indian named Ta-ul-tzu-je ‘was tightly rolled in at least half a mile of saddler’s silk, and when brought to light was found to consist of a small piece of buckskin two inches square, upon which were drawn red and yellow crooked lines, which represented the red and yellow snake. Inside were a piece of malachite and a small cross of lightning-riven pine, and two very small perforated shells. The cross they designated “the black mind”.’ Another ‘phylactery’ consisted of a tiny bag of hoddentin, holding a small quartz crystal and four feathers of eagle-down. This charm, it was explained by an Indian, contained not merely the ‘medicine’ of the crystal and the eagle, but also that of the black bear, the white lion, and the yellow snake.
Iroquoian fetishes
    Things that seem at all unusual are accepted by the Hurons, a tribe of the Iroquois, as
oky
, or supernatural, and therefore itis accounted lucky to find them. In hunting, if they find a stone or other object in the entrails of an animal they at once make a fetish of it. Any object of a peculiar shape they treasure for the same reason. They greatly fear that demons or evil spirits will purloin their fetishes, which they esteem so highly as to propitiate them in feasts and invoke them in song. The highest type of fetish obtainable by a Huron was a piece of the onniont, or great armoured serpent, a mythological animal revered by many North American