I'itoi - Legend

Legend

The Papago people of southern Arizona related to Ruth Murray Underhill in the late 1930's this story of Iitoi (sic) which she recorded in her book "Singing For Power": "The world was made by Earth-maker out of the dirt and sweat which he scraped from his skin...the flat earth met the sky with a crash like that of falling rocks, and from the two was born Iitoi, the protector of Papagos. He had light hair and a beard...Iitoi and Earth-maker shaped and peopled the new world, and they were followed everywhere by Coyote, who came to life uncreated and began immediately to poke his nose into everything. In this new world there was a flood, and the three agreed before they took refuge that the one of them who should emerge first after the subsidence of the waters should be their leader and have the title of Elder Brother. It was Earth-maker, the creator, who came forth first, and Iitoi next, but Iitoi insisted on the title and took it....Iitoi "brought the people up like children" and taught them their arts, but in the end he became unkind and they killed him...But Iitoi, though killed, had so much power that he came to life again. Then he invented war. He decided to sweep the earth of the people he had made...He needed an army and for this purpose he went underground and brought up the Papagos...They live in a land scattered with imposing ruins which belonged...to the Hohokum, "the people who are gone"...Iitoi drove them, some to the north and some to the south..."Iitoi had a song for everything". Though his men did the fighting, Iitoi confirmed their efforts by singing the enemy into blindness and helplessness...Iitoi has retired from the world and lives, a liitle old man, in a mountain cave. Or, perhaps he has gone underground."