Darrell J. Pursiful

Tsul ‘kalu is a Cherokee word that roughly translates as “slant-eyed.” In the singular, the word refers an individual, a “lord of the hunt” in the spirit of “master (or mistress) of animals” figures in many world mythologies. He is said to live in Tsunegunyi, on the Tanasee Bald in Jackson County, North Carolina. European settlers sometimes garbled Tsul ‘kalu to Judaculla, from which the mysterious Judaculla Rock in western North Carolina gets its name.

The Cherokee of northern Georgia no doubt would have also been familiar with Tsul ‘kalu. But this “lord of the hunt” was not merely an individual. The plural form, tsunil ‘kalu refers to a race of mythological giants that live in the far west. According to James Mooney’s Myths of the Cherokee (1900),

James Wafford, of the western Cherokee, who was born in Georgia in 1806, says that his grandmother, who must have been born about the middle of the last century, told him that she had beard from the old people that long before her time a party of giants had come once to visit the Cherokee. They were nearly twice as tall as common men, and had their eyes set slanting in their heads, so that the Cherokee called them Tsunil’kälû’, “The Slant-eyed people,” because they looked like the giant hunter Tsul’kälû’.… They said that these giants lived very far away in the direction in which the sun goes down. The Cherokee received them as friends, and they stayed some time, and then returned to their home in the west.

In Children of Pride, my protagonists pass by Judaculla Rock on a couple of occasions, although I don’t bring up its associations with Tsul ‘kalu. In Oak, Ash, and Thorn, however, I did manage to find room for a slant-eyed giant as a secondary character.

The honka is sometimes referred to as “Hairy Man.” More specifically, it is a hairy, man-eating ogre in Creek mythology. Another Creek term for this creature is kolowa, a term originally used by the Crow people but adopted by the Creeks after their forced removal to Oklahoma. Some recent Creek storytellers have translated kolowa as “gorilla.”

In many ways, the honka or kolowa is the Creeks’ answer to “Bigfoot”—although it is questionable whether Native Americans ever had a “Bigfoot legend” such as white Americans would conceive it.

Honkas are malicious creatures. One story reported by Michelle Smith in Legends, Lore and True Tales of the Chattahoochee (The History Press, 2013) describes how a female kolowa killed and ate the wife of a hunter—and other members of his village—while the hunter was away from home.

Here’s another creature described in Bill Grantham’s Creation Myths and Legends of the Creek Indians (University Press of Florida, 2002):

The nokos oma (“like-a-bear”) is an obscure creature from Muskogee folklore. It is described in Bill Grantham’s Creation Myths and Legends of the Creek Indians (University Press of Florida, 2002):

The origins of the legend of the ishkitini are hard to pin down. Apparently, it was first described in Choctaw legend, but it was also known among the Creeks and Seminoles. It is a given that the Creeks and related peoples of Georgia would have believed in such creatures. Ishtikini, stikini, stigini, etc. are all variations of the same word.

Ishkitinis are malevolent shape-shifters. Although they might take on the shape of any sort of wild predator—wolves, coyotes, bears, etc.—they strongly favor owls. In fact, their name means “horned owl.”

These creatures are classified as “witches.” In much Native American lore, a “witch” is not a human practitioner of magic but rather an inhuman monster that is able to pass as human. By day, ishkitinis look like ordinary humans. By night, however, they prey upon their neighbors. The Seminole version of the legend is the most disgusting. According to this version, ishkitinis change their shape by vomitting up their souls—along with their internal organs.

 

In some stories, mentioning these creatures by name puts one at risk of becoming one. Therefore, stories about ishkitinis are only told by certain medicine men and women. In other communities, however, they are more of a bogeyman figure casually discussed to frighten children.

An ishkitini appears in The Devil’s Due, though he is never identified as such. One character describes him as “a pooka with a bad attitude.”