The Star Brothers

The Star Brothers by Jeremiah Curtin

"The Star Brothers" is a myth collected by Jeremiah Curtin from the Klamath people of the Pacific Northwest, centered on two boys who overcome supernatural threats and ultimately transform into stars. The story begins with five brothers living on the south shore of Lake Klamath. Their hidden youngest brother, Tûtats, is kept buried underground by their mother. Their sister Tekewas, married to Kûlta, becomes obsessed with finding Tûtats. After persistent visits, she is allowed to take him home, but during their overnight journey she attempts incest with him. He escapes by tricking her into sleep and fleeing home. The brothers then attempt to escape to the sky with the help of a spider named Kaltsik, but one brother looks back at their burning house during the ascent, causing the web to break and all five to fall into a fire. Their hearts fly north and become mountains, with Tûtats' heart becoming Mount Shasta, the largest and most enduring. Tekewas, believing she has destroyed her brothers, returns to her husband Kûlta. The mother discovers that her eldest son's wife Skóla died giving birth to twin babies. She presses the twins together into one child, names him Wéahjukéwas, and hides him underground. The boy grows rapidly, nurtured each night with ashes and deer fat and strengthened through the grandmother's prayers to the earth and mountains. When he grows large enough, he shoots an arrow skyward that splits him in two, creating a younger brother. He hides and raises the infant in secret, bringing him food daily. Eventually the grandmother discovers the second child, and both boys are brought into the household. A duck the elder brother wounds reveals the truth about their origins: their aunt Tekewas killed their parents and now seeks to kill them. She swims in the lake in duck form, with long red hair, and has been circling their canoe trying to capsize it. Armed with this knowledge and a sharp knife given by the grandmother, the elder boy eventually decapitates Tekewas when she tips the canoe. He pushes her body into a crevice beneath the water, where her blood blackens the water to this day. Her spirit becomes an ugly bird. To escape the grandmother's wrath upon discovering the head, the brothers descend underground near the fire and travel east, aiming to serve the Sun. Along the way they perform a series of world-shaping acts. They visit an aunt named Tohós and relieve a growth from her forehead, ending the practice by which animals carry young there. They kill her husband Wámanik, a monstrous bull snake whose dismembered body becomes a mountain range and whose spirit is diminished to a common snake. They name springs, multiply fish in rivers, and establish landmarks through their actions. They come to the house of Yaukùl, a man who kills travelers by breaking their wrists. The elder brother prepares by inserting strong inner bones protected by brittle outer ones. When Yaukùl grasps their wrists and hears the outer bones crack he believes them easy prey, but when the boy reverses the grip he shatters Yaukùl's wrists and kills him. The brothers transform Yaukùl and his two servants: Yaukùl becomes a shore bird; Gäk the crow is condemned to scavenge; Gapni the louse is sentenced to live in people's hair. The brothers then repeatedly encounter Yahyáhaäs, a one-legged spirit painted in alternating colors who haunts the mountain roads to the east. Despite numerous confrontations involving pipe-smoking challenges and wrestling matches, the elder brother defeats each incarnation of the spirit, burning his body and deflecting his taunts. The brothers transform into black coals and ride whirlwinds to evade him across mountains. Finally, reaching the eastern ocean where water meets sky, the elder boy lures the spirit into a last wrestling match, defeats and throws him into the ocean, and pronounces his permanent diminishment: he will wander mountains as an apparition visited in dreams by shamans but will hold no true power. As the brothers run across the water toward the edge of the sky, Yahyáhaäs calls out that they will become stars with no further power among people. His prophecy proves true but not degrading: both boys rise into the sky and become stars, appearing each year at the end of winter as heralds of spring, watching over the country where their parents were killed.

By Jeremiah Curtin · First published 1912 · Genre: Mythology, Native American Folklore, Fantasy · 10,306 words

First lines

CHARACTERS / Gäk Crow / Gapni Louse / Kaltsik Spider / Kûlta Otter / Skóla Meadow Lark / Tekewas / Tohós A Duck / Tûtats / Wámanik Bull Snake / Yaukùl "One of the Stone People" / Yahyáhaäs or Yá-hi-yas or Yáhyahiyáas, always represented / as a one-legged man

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The Star Brothers is listed on Textopian as a short story by Jeremiah Curtin, dated 1912 CE.

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Native American folklore · Wintun mythology · California Indigenous culture · traditional tales · oral storytelling · myths · legends · cosmology · creation stories · supernatural beings · animal spirits · cultural heritage

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