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2 The Traditions of Their Fathers EastmanandDakotaSacredHistory “And who is the grandfather of these silent people? Is it not the Great Mystery? For they know the laws of their life so well! They must have for their Maker our Maker.Then they are our brothers!” Thus spoke one of the philosophers and orators of the Red men1 Thus also spoke Charles A.Eastman in the foreword to Red Hunters and the Animal People. With this publication, Eastman contributed to what would become a major genre in American Indian literature—traditional myths and legends retold in English for a wide audience. Zitkala-Sa (aka Gertrude Bonnin) made a slightly earlier contribution when she published Old Indian Legends in 1901,in which she asserts,“The old legends of America belong quite as much to the blue-eyed little patriot as to the black-haired aborigine.” However,though Eastman and Zitkala-Sa may have written with both the Indian and non-Indian reader in mind, the authenticity of the stories is retained through the manner in which theywere acquired,which was firsthand in the native language.ZitkalaSa refers to “the Dakota story-tellers,” whom she listened to throughout North and South Dakota, where she “often listened to the same story told over again by a new story-teller.” Eastman, in turn, states, “The stories contained in this book are based upon the common experiences and observations of the Red hunter.” Moreover, “The scene of the stories is laid in the great Northwest, the ancient home of the Dakota or Sioux nation, my people.” At the same time,what Arthur C. Parker said later in the introduction to his 1923 book, Seneca Myths and Folk Tales, may also be said about any collection of stories culled from the oral tradition.Specifically,Parker admonished his reader not to presume that myths and legends were suIcient forcomprehending a given people’s culture. For example, in the case of the Seneca: “To complete our knowledge we must have before us works on Seneca history, eth25 nology, archæology, religion, government and language. Finally, we must personally know the descendants of the mighty Seneca nation of old.We must enter into the life of the people in a sympathetic way, for only then can we get at the soul of the race.” What Parker, Eastman, Zitkala-Sa, and others not mentioned—such as Francis La Flesche, James Murie,and J.N.B.Hewitt—make clear is that the relationship between American Indians and their myths and legends is not based on texts written in an ancient and rarely used language,such as Latin or Sanskrit.Rather,the Dakota and Seneca dialects in which the above-mentioned myths and legends were originally told are still being used to tell these stories today (certainly this was true when these narratives were collected).The implication is that insofar as this kind of work can be done, it indicates that “the soul of the race” still exists in the people.2 On the other hand, because nations like the Dakota endured an immense amount of hardship through their relationship with AngloAmericans ,it is easy to become fatalistic about both their traditions and their physical endurance. In The Dakota or Sioux in Minnesota as They Were in 1834, which the Minnesota Historical Society first published in 1908,the author,Samuel W.Pond,who,with his brother Gideon,served as a missionary to the Santee Dakota, bemoaned the losses to posterity that the Dakota incurred as a result of the 1862 U.S.–Dakota War,calling it by what the Dakota have always regarded as a misnomer, “the Sioux Outbreak”: Considerable traditionary information might have been obtained from the Indians in 1834,but probably no one has taken the pains to collect or preserve it, and now it is too late. During the ensuing thirty years, the Dakotas of Minnesota have experienced strange vicissitudes of fortune,such as were calculated to turn their thoughts from the things that formerly engaged their attention. In the midst of the exciting scenes attending and following the Sioux Outbreak, and harassed with anxiety about the future,they have had no time to think of the past or give much heed to the traditions of their fathers. The young men have had their minds occupied with things new and strange, and the old men who had treasured up in their memories things of the past are all gone. Although Pond goes on to document a still-living oral tradition...

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