English Translation


39. Old Apache Customs
Lawrence Mithlo

(39.1)
Long ago, at a time long before there were many white men,
All of the different ones who are called Indians lived poorly, they say.

But anyhow, I am one of those called Chiricahua.
My people, those people with whom I live, I shall tell you exactly how they are said to have lived long ago.

(39.2)
Our grandfathers lived in the dirt, they say.
Their houses were made only of grass.1
They lay on grass that had been spread out.

There were no blankets.2
There were no tents.
None could be secured anywhere.
Things like deerskin were wrapped about them, they say.

When it rained, the water flowed down upon them.
When it snowed, the snow fell on them.
In the winter, only the fire was their blanket.

(39.3)
At that time, there were only arrows.
The Indians' arrows were feathered.
Those arrows had sharpened stones set into their tips.

With just those arrows of theirs, they went to war.
With those only, deer, cattle, [and] anything that they ate, they killed.3

(39.4)
The slingshot was also a help, they say4
The stone axe was also a help, they say.
They fought the white man with spears which were [made of] very hard wood, they say5

(39.5)
Now these were the only weapons of the Indians, they say.
You who are white men could at that time make slaves of a whole camp of Indians anywhere by means of the six-shooters you carried.
I say thus to them:
"We who are called Chiricahua are not ashamed of the fact that you made us slaves.
Perhaps whoever is said to have made arrows for us is ashamed.6

Then, today, they have made for you who are white men different kinds of guns that shoot and pierce everything, even big logs and hard metals.

And, [for] we who are called Chiricahua, nothing else has been made besides the arrows that were made for us in the past."


(39.6)
The Indians lived a hard life, they say.
Everything was lacking, they say.
There was no metal, they say.
There were no big axes, they say.
There were no small axes, they say.

Only sharp stones were their axes, they say.
Only sharp stones were their knives, they say.
When they killed a deer, they butchered it with stones, they say.7
Besides the stones, there was an even sharper knife, they say.
That was their teeth, they say.
They ate meat with them, they say.

(39.7)
These were the only knives the Indians had, they say.
We are not ashamed of that.
Only he who is supposed to have made it so for us probably laughs at us.

(39.8)
Long ago, even fire was lacking, they say.

They customarily made fire with two sticks one of which lay on the ground while the other stood erect and it and was twirled in it, they say.

They took out boiled meat [from the pot] by means of a slender stick that had been pointed, they say.
With that also they turned over the meat they were broiling in the coals, they say.

Their spoons were somewhat slender sticks in which they had made a hollow, they say.

Their cups were ball shaped protuberances which lie on the side of large growing trees which they had hollowed out inside, they say.8

Their dishes were also [of] dried hide, they say.
They cooked in clay pots which they had made themselves, they say.

(39.9)
Coffee was lacking, they say.
At that time, even flour, sugar, and beans, all of these, were lacking, they say.

Now, I'll also tell what food there was upon which we lived at that time.
These: All of these [were] our food9.

We are not ashamed of that.
In that way, they made our food for us, they say.
Many poor people lived by means of it.

(39.10)
At that time long ago, they lived poorly.
But Apache women taught their children well, they say.

Even when their children became men,
even when the young girls became women,
all of them were obedient, they say.

(39.11)
"My child, one does not curse.
One hates no one.
One behaves foolishly to no one.
One laughs at no one.

One treats with respect those to whom one can do nothing.10
Pray to God [and] Child of the Water.
We live because of those two.
They made the earth [and] the sky."
they said to them, they say.

(39.12)
Even when the boys [and] girls were twenty five and over,
they listened well to their fathers [and] mothers.

You who are white people, then,
do not realize that
even though these ancient people knew nothing,
they taught their children in a good way
inside their poor camps.

Though hardship, hunger, cold, heat, poverty all overmastered them,
they talked to their children about God [and] Child of the Water.

Though their camps were everywhere poor,
they inside of them spoke by means of good words [and] good thoughts.

They thought by means of them.
They taught by means of them.

All of this is true.
It is true just as that which I told you [about] our eating wood rats [and] burros is true.




Ethnological Notes
Morris Opler



39.1
The Chiricahua home was of the wickiup type, often thatched with grass.

39.2
The informant is alluding to the cotton and woolen blankets sold by the white men today. Of course, the Chiricahua used robes of animal skin before white contact. [See the third sentence following.]

39.3
The reference is to wild cattle which seem to have been present in the territory before the white men had arrived in any appreciable numbers.

39.4
The Apache sling is a diamond-shaped piece of rawhide, made pliant or partially perforated down the center. A thong is tied to each side. One of these thongs only is looped at the end. The stone is placed on the diamond-shaped piece of-rawhide and the rawhide is folded over it. The thongs are held in the hand, a finger being passed through the loop to hold the one cord. The sling is whirled around the head once and then thrown forward. The unlooped cord is released at the same time, so that the rawhide may unfold and allow the missile to fly.

39.5
Mountain mahogany was one of the woods used.

39.6
The reference is probably to the culture hero, Child of the Water.

39.7
Flint knives were used for the purpose.

39.8
Protuberances on the trunks of oak trees especially, were utilized in this manner.

39.9
A better account of Chiricahua Apache food plants may be found in E. F. Castetter and M. E. Opler, The Ethnobiologyof the Chiricahua and Mescalero Apache [University of New Mexico Bulletin, Biological Series, Vol. 4, No. 5, 1936.]

39.10
[For the same reason cited in Ethnological Note to Chiricahua text 19, note 5, this sentence has been modified from the original version. In the original, this sentence is translated: "One worships those to whom one can do nothing." -- MEC]