SACRED FORMULAS OF THE CHEROKEES
I
CONCERNING LIVING HUMANITY
LOVE CHARM
Hû! Listen! In Alahí yi you repose, O Terrible Woman,
O you have drawn near to hearken.
There in Elahiyi you are at rest, a White Woman. *
No one, is ever lonely when with you.
You are most beautiful.
Instantly and at once you have rendered me a white man.
No one is ever lonely when with me.
Now you have made the path white for me.
It shall never be dreary.
Now you have put me into it.
It shall never become blue.
You have brought down to me from above the white road.
There in mid-earth you have placed me.
I shall stand erect upon the earth.
No one is ever lonely when with me.
I am very handsome.
You have put me into the white house.
I shall be in it as it moves about and no one with me shall ever be lonely.
Verily, I shall never become blue.
Instantly you have caused it to be so with me.
And now there in Elahiyi you have rendered the woman blue.
Now you have made the path blue for her.
Let her be completely veiled in loneliness.
Put her into the blue road.
And now bring her down.
Place her standing upon the earth.
Where her feet are now and wherever she may go, let loneliness leave its mark upon her.
Let her be marked out for loneliness where she stands.
Ha! I belong to the Wolf clan, that one alone which was allotted into for you.
No one is ever lonely with me.
I am handsome.
Let her put her soul in the very center of my soul, never to turn away.
Grant that, in the midst of men she shall never think of them.
I belong to the one clan alone which was allotted for you when the seven clans were established.
Where other men live it is lonely.
They are very loathsome.
The common polecat has made them so like himself that they are fit only for his company.
They have become mere refuse.
They are very loathsome.
The common opossum has made them so like himself that they are fit only to be with him.
They are very loathsome.
Even the crow has made them so like himself that they are fit only for his company.
They are very loathsome.
The miserable rain-crow has made them so like himself that they are fit only for his company.
The seven clans all alike make one feel very lonely in their company.
They are not even good looking.
They go about clothed with mere refuse.
They even go about covered with dung.
But I—I was ordained to be a white man.
I stand with my face toward the Sun Land.
No one is ever lonely with me.
I am very handsome.
I shall certainly never become blue.
I am covered by the everlasting white house wherever I go.
No one is ever lonely with me.
Your soul has come into the center of my soul, never to turn away.
I, Gatigwan asti—I take your soul.
Sge!
II
TO INSURE CONSTANCY
Listen! O, now you have drawn near to harken, O, Ancient One.
This woman's soul has come to rest at the edge of your body.
You are never to let go your hold upon it.
It is ordained that you shall do just as you are requested to do.
Let her never think upon any other place.
Her soul has faded within her.
She is bound by the black threads.
III
Listen! "Ha! Now the souls have met, never to part," you have said, O Ancient One above.
O Black Spider, you have brought down from on high.
You have let down your web.
She is of the Deer clan; her name is Ayâsta.
Her soul you have wrapped up in your web.
Listen! Ha! But now you have covered her with loneliness.
Her eyes have faded.
Whither can her soul escape?
Let her be sorrowing as she goes along, and not for one night alone.
Let her become an aimless wanderer, whose trail may never be followed.
O Black Spider, may you hold her soul in your web so that it shall never get through the meshes.
What is the name of the soul?
They two have come together.
It is mine!
Listen! Ha! And now you have harkened,
O Ancient Red.
Your grandchildren have come to the edge of your body.
You hold them yet more firmly in your grasp, never to let go your hold.
O Ancient One, we have become as one.
The woman has put her soul into our hands.
We shall never let it go!
Yu!
IV
TO DESTROY LIFE
Listen! Now I have come to step over your soul
You are of the Wolf clan.
Your name is A’yû’nini.
Your spittle I have put at rest under the earth.
I have come to cover you over with the black rock.
I have come to cover you over with the black cloth.
I have come to cover you over with the black slabs, never to reappear.
Toward the black coffin of the upland in the Darkening Land your paths shall stretch out.
So shall it be for you.
The clay of the upland has come to cover you.
Instantly the black clay has lodged there where it is at rest at the black houses in the Darkening Land.
With the black coffin and with the black slabs I have come to cover you.
Now your soul has faded away.
It has become blue.
When darkness comes your spirit shall grow less and dwindle away, never to reappear.
Listen!
V
THOSE ABOUT TO BE SLAIN
Ha yi! Yû! Listen!
Now instantly we have lifted up the red war club.
Quickly his soul shall be without motion.
There under the earth, where the black war clubs shall be moving about like ball sticks in the game, there his soul shall be, never to reappear.
We cause it to be so.
He shall never go and lift up the war club.
We cause it to be so.
There under the earth the black war club and the black fog have come together as one for their covering.
The black fog shall never be lifted from them.
We cause it to be so.
33:* White—happy; blue—despondent. "To make lonely" or to be "lonely" was, to the Cherokees, the depth of degradation.