Northward migration

[Justin McBride]

> There is SLOWLY growing evidence of migrations of peoples in
> pre-historic times out of the Amazon, across the Caribbean islands and
onto
> the mainland of North America. (The evidence is archaeological,
> ethnographic
> and linguistic, but VERY speculative.)

    I was away from my computer all weekend, and look what I missed!
Anyway, I did want to chime in a little on the particularly non-Siouan
Cherokee issues touched on this weekend.  I once heard an elder tell an
interesting origin story--one of about thirty or more attibuted to the
Cherokees--that lends some apocryphal credence to the "northward migration
via the Caribbean" hypothesis.  Way back, it seems we lived on an island
that was sinking.  We fled northward until it turned cold and "rained
white."   We stayed there only three days and then we moved slightly
westward until we came to a place where people ate one another.  And that's
where we made our home.  Definitely strange, but interesting from a
speculative What-If point of view!

    As for the Ukten, this serpentine "water monster," it is mentioned by
Mooney several times in his big three piece ethnographic work History,
Myths, and Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees.  If memory serves, it can fly
and has a charm on its head.  It seems to be suspiciously close to the
Siouan Unktehi, perhaps coincidentally or perhaps through borrowing.  A
quick glossing of the name for the Cherokee beast indicates at the very
least that "s/he looks/sees."  I was wondering what the etymology of the
Siouan might be.  Does anyone know?  Can it be traced, or does evidence
support a borrowing (for all I know, it may have been borrowed into Cherokee
and "matched" to the grammar)?


-Jm