Natsilane

Natsilane (Naatsilanéi) is the culture hero credited with the origin of the killer whale. In the version Swanton recorded, a skilled carver and sea-lion hunter, a man of the Tsaagweidí, was abandoned on a rock by his jealous brothers-in-law; aided by the sea beings, he reached shore and carved blackfish first of spruce, red cedar, and other woods, which floated lifeless, and at last of yellow cedar, which swam. The living whales destroyed his treacherous brothers-in-law, sparing only the youngest who had shown him kindness, whereupon Natsilane commanded the whales never again to harm a human being — an injunction Tlingit tradition holds killer whales keep to this day. The Dauenhauers published Tlingit-language tellings by Willie Marks and J. B. Fawcett, and the narrative underlies Killer Whale crest claims among several clans.

Domains

• killer whales
• carving

Powers

• to carve killer whales from yellow cedar and bring them to life in the sea
• to command the killer whales he made and forbid them ever to harm human beings

Sources

• Swanton, John R., Tlingit Myths and Texts, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 39 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1909)
• Dauenhauer, Nora Marks, and Richard Dauenhauer (eds.), Haa Shuká, Our Ancestors: Tlingit Oral Narratives, Classics of Tlingit Oral Literature 1 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1987)
• Beck, Mary Giraudo, Heroes and Heroines: Tlingit-Haida Legend (Anchorage: Alaska Northwest Books, 1989)