The Father-of-the-Secret-Society (Maidu Peheipe) is, with Turtle, one of the two beings already in existence when the world is made. The two float together on a raft that drifts out of the north over the dark primal waters, and it is to them that Earth-Initiate descends on the rope of feathers. Dixon notes that at the time he recorded the myth the name Peheipe also belonged to the figure who played the clown in the dances of the Maidu secret society, linking the primordial raft-companion of the creation to the living ceremonial life of the people. He is among the oldest beings of the cosmos, present before the land itself.