Kilak

The kilak or gilak is a great monster-bird of Pomo myth, listed among the personages of Samuel Barrett's Pomo Myths (Barrett 1933). Its terror was dramatized among the Central Pomo in the kilak-ke or monster-bird dance recorded in the early ethnographies (Curtis 1924; Barrett 1917). Reviewing the Achumawi cosmogony An-nik-a-del, Jaime de Angulo compared its dragon Kwillah to 'the famous Kilak of the Pomo,' an index of how widely the being was known in north-central California (de Angulo 1930); the neighboring Wappo also borrowed the figure. Although some narratives speak of more than one such being, the dance and the principal tales treat the monster-bird as a single formidable figure.

Domains

• monster birds

Powers

• to fly as a great monster-bird that strikes terror into people

Sources

• Barrett, S. A. (1933). Pomo Myths. Bulletin of the Public Museum of the City of Milwaukee 15. Milwaukee: Public Museum of the City of Milwaukee.
• Curtis, Edward S. (1924). The North American Indian, Volume 14 (The Pomo). Norwood, Mass.: Plimpton Press.
• de Angulo, Jaime (1930). Review of An-nik-a-del: The History of the Universe as Told by the Modesse Indians of California, ed. C. Hart Merriam. American Anthropologist 32(1): 172.