FIRE AS AN AGENT IN HUMAN CULTUEE 161 



6. BENEFACTION MYTHS 



This type of myth attributes fire as the voluntary gift of beings or 

 culture heroes. It is frequently accompanied with causational, pres- 

 ervational, and artifactural episodes. 



The Uintah Utes say: "Coyote caught fire and gave it to the 

 Indians. The Indians kept the fire and never lost it again. It made 

 light and heat. It was cold; and if there had been no fire the Indians 

 would all have died. The fire kept them alive. Coyote said, 'It is 

 very good to do that.' He gave life to the Indians. Perhaps Coyote 

 got the fire from the white men in the east."** 



The Lillooet Indians have a myth embracing light origin and fire 

 origin. It states that Sea Gull owned daylight and kept it in a box. 

 Raven got him to open box and broke box, letting daylight escape. 

 Raven saw smoke in south, embarked in a canoe and came to house 

 of fire people. Stole baby and escaped. Traded baby back for fire. 



The fish people showed Raven how to make fire with dry cotton- 

 wood roots. Thereafter Raven sold fire to every family who wished 

 it, and became possessed of many wives in payment.** 



6. RENEWAL HTTBS 



James Mooney states that in the Ghost Dance religion a message 

 was received from the gods to renew and preserve fire. The renewal 

 idea was general in Mexico and extended to other cult practices. It 

 follows, of course, the invention of fire making, as experience always 

 precedes myth formation.*^ 



From our present knowledge of fire-origin myths among the tribes 

 south of Mexico it appears that as we move southward the basic 

 myth, so clear in North America, has faded out gradually among 

 the tribes of South America. There is a lack of observations on the 

 natives, but what is found seems to bear out the assertion. 



The Bribri and Brunka Indians of Costa Rica have genesis myths 

 in which gods utilize fire to roast and boil chocolate. No gift of fire 

 to man is incorporated." 



Ehrenreich says that it is strange that but three fire myths are 

 known from South America, and they exhibit quite different traits, 

 but all have parallels in North America. 



Fire myths, he says, have had but slight consideration in South 

 America. In three places only have they been collected, and but 

 superficially explained. The shining eye of the camp fox, according 



»*J. Alden Mason. Myths of the Uintah Utes, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, vol. 23, July-September, 

 1910, pp. 362-363. 



'*J. Teit. Traditions of the Lillooet Indians of British Columbia, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, vol. 52, 

 October-December, 1912, pp. 300-303. 



*« The above extract from American fire-origin myths is from a paper by the author on American 

 Indian fire-origin myths read before the twentieth International Congress of Americanists at Rio do 

 Janeiro, Brazil, August, 1923. 



» H. Pittier di Fabrega. Folk Lore of the Bribri and Brunka Indians, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, vol. 

 16, January-March, 1903, pp. 1-9. 



