Storytelling Week 10: Kut-O-Yis

There was once this village that was run by a man. He took over the village when he married his father-in-law’s daughters. The father-in-law knew that it was his time to give up his position. So he happily gave the position to his new son. The son took care of his new parents for a while. He eventually got tired of taking care of them and started mistreating them. He made his father-in-law help him hunt but would not give him any meat to eat. The father-in-law was able to sneak a blood clot of a buffalo one day and rushed home. By the time he got home a baby boy had formed from the clot. They named the boy Kut-O-Yis. Kut-O-Yis grew very quickly and was a man within a few days. He noticed that his parents did not have much food to eat. This upset him because he saw that the son-in-law had plenty of food. The next day Kut-O-Yis took his father to hunt. The son-in-law showed up and was angry with his father-in-law. They had a battle but neither could win so the father-in-law called to Kut-O-Yis for help. Kut-O-Yis did come to help and killed the son-in-law for the mistreatment of his parents. Kut-O-Yis also punished his sisters for not helping their parents. He did take it easy on the youngest though because she did give a little meat here and there. 

Kut-O-Yis knew that he had a great gift. He was strong and smart. He decided he wanted to go and help other people that were being mistreated. He was told of a village not far from his own. He traveled there and saw a beautiful lodge in the middle of the village. Instead of going to that lodge, he went to a smaller not so nice lodge. Some old women welcomed him and brought him food and water. The food they gave him was some of the worst meat you could have off of the buffalo. He asked the elderly ladies why they did not provide him with better food. They told him because the bear chief that lived in the beautiful lodge took the best meat from the entire village and left everyone with the worst. This infuriated Kut-O-Yis. He decided the next day to kill a big buffalo and hang it up outside the old ladies lodge. Later that day, the bear chief sent his daughter to collect the best meat. When she saw Kut-O-Yis buffalo she knew she had to take it. She walked over and started to take the buffalo down. Kut-O-Yis walked out and smacked her on the head. He told her she could not have the buffalo. She ran home crying to her father. The whole bear family came to destroy Kut-O-Yis for disrespecting the little girl bear. Kut-O-Yis was stronger than the bears and killed the entire family except the little girl bear. Instead, he let her go so she could populate the world with more bears. His smack on her head knocked the knowledge of knowing bears could be chief out of her head so that they could never be leaders of a village again. Kut-O-Yis continued his journey to defeat all things evil. By the end of his journey he defeated 7 evil beings. 

 

Blackfoot Tipis (Lodges) 

Web Source: UN-Textbook

Author’s Note: This story is from the Blackfoot Stories unit in the Native American section of the UN-Textbook. This particular story is based on Kut-O-Yis, The Blood Boy. I told this story to follow almost exactly how the story is told. I thought the story was so great that I didn’t need to change much. I did however add the part about how Kut-O-Yis’ smack knocked the knowledge out of the bear. In the original story he does hit her on the head and she does get away. He says in the story that he let her go to populate the world with bears. I thought that since bears are not village leaders that it would be a nice touch to say Kut-O-Yis made that happen. 

Bibliography: Blackfoot Stories by Grinnell. Web Source: UN-Textbook