Virtues-wolves-coyotes

[Koontz John E]

On Tue, 16 Jul 2002 bi1 at soas.ac.uk wrote:
> While we are on animals I noticed in the Bushotter texts a word
> mnaja (ie mnaz^a) as 'wolverine'.  Being English I don't know what
> a wolverine is except remembering it as an epithet for a Michigan
> Regiment in the Civil war led by General Custer played by Errol
> Flynn.

I thought Custer was in the regular army in the cavalry?  Michigan is
called the Wolverine State, I think.

> I have also seen it in Riggs Dakota Dictionary as 'lion, wild cat'.

A wolverine is to a marten as a tank is to a sportscar, though I'm not
sure whether this conception would meet with the approval of the
taxonomists. In northern North America there's an intermediate of sorts, a
large, darkish martern called variously a fisher or a pekan, or sometimes,
a cat.  I think that the French in particular called things like raccoons,
fishers, and skunks chats.  Maybe wolverines, too.  This would seem to
underlie the 'wild cat' conception in Riggs.  There's a Siouan name in
Lewis & Clark that they render 'Black Cat' that I think might refer to a
skunk or a fisher or maybe a wolverine - perhaps one of the Missouria
names?  I've forgotten the actual name, too, awkwardly enough.