Belief and Ritual of Crater Lake

Native peoples of the region travelled to the Crater Lake area for many purposes. The Park environs were used for both hunting and gathering. Huckleberry Mountain, an important gathering site for the Klamath, lies about ten miles southwest of the lake. Nonetheless, the primary significance of Crater Lake appears to have been as a place of power and danger, renowned as a spirit quest site, yet also feared for the dangerous beings residing in the lake.

For the Klamath, spirit power could be found in many sources, among these "such natural features as mountains, streams, rocks, or even landmarks like Crater Lake" (Spencer 1952b:218). The ritual significance of giwas, or Crater Lake (Barker 1963b: 145), reflects a more general Klamath understanding of the natural world, involving not only reverence but the capacity for significant interaction with certain mountains, lakes, and streams, as the individual sought comfort, assistance, or power. One Klamath woman, speaking in the late 1940s, noted that,

those old Indians had a lot of sense. They kind of felt at home around here and they would get a lift from just talking to the mountains and lakes. It was like praying andit made them feel at peace. (Spencer 1952b:223)

As one Klamath individual noted, Crater Lake was a particularly dangerous site for the spirit quest. (1) Gaining a vision of the supernatural beings residing in the lake was a major goal of that quest (Spencer 1952b:222). The seeker would often swim at night, underwater, to encounter the spirits lurking in the depths (Spier 1930:98). Leslie Spier commented regarding the father of one of his consultants, "having lost a child, he went swimming in Crater lake; before evening he had become a shaman" (Spier 1930:96). The quest for such spirits required courage and resolution:

He must not be frightened even if he sees something moving under the water. prays before diving, "I want to be a shaman. Give me power. Catch me. I need the power." (Spier 1930:96)

A fuller account of the quest for spirit power is recorded in a manuscript by Jeremiah Curtin:

Indians used to believe. Doctors said "we begin to be doctors by swimming and camping on top the mountains where there is a pond of lake and breaking willows and piling rocks on top the mountains and swimming in the lake." On ***** Mountain they used to camp. And at Crater Lake they used to say they got to the water and swam. And after swimming and camping and keeping awake all night piling rocks and breaking up twigs and tying them together till daylight [then] they would sleep. They sit down and slept, then they would dream. And whatever they dreamed of, Grizzly Bear, Black Bear or Wolf, Coyote, Skunk or all kinds of birds. Whatever they dreamed of became their medicine and they doctored with it and snakes, fishes[,] everything became their medicine. (Curtin, n.d.) (2)

An elderly Klamath woman recounted in the late 1940s her experience of seeing aspirit being on the lake:

When I was young, I went up to Crater Lake with a woman I knew. She tied my eyes and led my horse. ... Then she said, "Untie your eyes," and I nearly fell off the horse. I saw a man standing on the water far away, just like in the Bible. He scared me so, I don't know who that was, but I like to think of that man now. (Spencer 1952b:222)

In other Klamath accounts the floor of the lake contains a mythical world:

People were stolen and taken down into Crater lake by beings there. Some say they have found no water in the lake. Instead there were rocks as big as trees and deep tunnels in the bottom. There are animals, snakes, and a sort of people who live at (or in) the ocean. (Spier 1930:98)

Individuals also undertook strenuous and dangerous climbing along the caldera wall.Spier's informants noted a site termed makwalks:a point of rock projecting over Crater lake from the western cliff. The seeker clambers down and piles rocks on the point. (Spier 1930:98)

Individuals would often start at the western rim of Crater Lake and run down the wall of the crater to the lake. One who could reach the lake without falling was thought to have superior spirit powers. Sometimes such quests were undertaken by groups. (3)

The Modoc also made spirit quest trips to Crater Lake. Verne Ray noted that "most quest sites were within Modoc territory but sometimes distant trips were made. Crater Lake, in Klamath territory, was not infrequently visited" (Ray 1963:81).

The Crater Lake area was also significant for the Cow Creeks. Although used for hunting and gathering, the Crater Lake area had spiritual importance as well. The lake was regarded with both reverence and fear, because the souls of evil persons were believed to inhabit it. One informant commented that her grandmother would travel there for "quiet communion." (4)

The historian A. G. Walling, apparently referring to the Upper Umpquas, noted in 1884 that,

In the past, none but medicine men visited [Crater Lake]. When one of the tribe felt called upon to become a teacher and healer, he spent several weeks on the shore of the lake in fasting, in communion with the dead, and in prayer. (in Bakken 1973:17)

There are several Klamath and Upper Umpqua myths extant regarding Crater Lake. Only one, however, the Klamath myth of Le*w and Sqel, can be traced to versions in the original language, rather than to westernized and possibly corrupt retellings by settlers or amateur folklorists.

The appears in five published versions, and in an unpublished translation. (5) Le*w is "the monster who dwells in Crater Lake .... rather octopoidal and of a dirty white color" (Barker 1963b:215). The myth relates his battle with Sqel (who also appears as Old Marten or Old Mink), a great figure of Klamath myth:

a culture transformer, giving laws, destroying evil beings, teaching subsistence techniques, and generally preparing the world for the myth age humans. (Barker 1963b:389)

The myth opens with Sqel/Mink/Old Marten and his friend Weasel. They are tricked by the beautiful but wicked daughter of Le*w, who ingratiates herself with Mink (or in an alternate version, Weasel), and tears out his heart. She then takes the heart to Le*w's people at Crater Lake, who play ball with it.Weasel runs for help to Gmokamc, the Klamath creator figure, who advises Weasel, and then proceeds with the help of various allies to recover Mink's heart. Mink revives, but Le*w now carries him off to Crater Lake, and is about to cut him to pieces and feed him to his children, the crawfish. Howevei, Mink outwits Le*w and slays him, cutting up his body and (pretending the pieces belong to Mink's own corpse) feeding them to the crawfish. Finally Mink throws Le*w's head into Crater Lake, naming it correctly. Stern's account concludes:

Then he [Mink] threw into the water all this,heart, windpipe-and-lungs, and liver. "Here's Mink's heart, windpipe-and-lungs, and liver!" Now the Crawfish came and ate all that. "Then here's Lao's [Le*w's] head!" Bawak sound of head splashing into the water. The Crawfish recognizing their father scattered in all directions. Then that head of Lao's lodged there. This is Wizard Island. (Stern, trans. 1951:5)

Ella Clark includes in her collection three other Crater Lake myths, attributed to Klamath sources. In "The Origin of Crater Lake" (Clark 1953:53-55) describes a battle between the Chief of the Below World and the Chief of the Above World. The opening to the underworld was found in a vast mountain ("the high mountain that used to be"). In a development recalling the myth of Hades and Persephone, the Chief of the Below World falls in love with the beautiful daughter of a Klamath chief. She spurns him, and in revenge the Chief of the Below World tries to destroy the Klamath with fire. However, the Chief of the Above World pities the humans, and does battle with his underworld counterpart. Amid vast explosions and fire the Chief of the Below World is driven underground, and the mountain collapses upon him, creating Crater Lake.

"Crater Lake and the Two Hunters" emphasizes the lake as a realm inhabited by spirits of the dead, dangerous to the living, and safely accessible only to powerful shamans. Two hunters, defying this taboo, travel to Crater Lake, and are destroyed (Clark 1953:58-60). "Another Crater Lake Legend" has much the same theme. A group of hunters discovers the lake. One man is greatly drawn to it, returning again and again to swim in its waters and to camp on the overlooking cliffs. In this way he acquires great spirit power. Ultimately, however, he is killed by one of the spirit creatures which dwells in the lake (Clark 1953:60-61).

At least one myth of Crater Lake from the Upper Umpqua area is extant. "The Mountain with a Hole in the Top" was related by a Cow Creek informant, Ellen Crispen, to W. K. Peery (in Bakken 1973:13-17). Long ago the animal-people and the man-people spoke the same language, and were friends. They lived in the shadow of a great mountain, perpetually covered with snow. An evil chief arose among the man-people, and taught others to kill the animals. Bear, chief of the animal-people, protested to Tamanous, Old Man God. Angered, Tamanous created a great wind, which uprooted trees, and made the mountain explode. All that remained was a crater, which filled with water. The evil man-people were killed, and their souls were sent to dwell in lodges at the bottom of the lake. (6)

Crater Lake exemplifies the concept of a sacred place or sacred landscape, embodying in a specific location the qualities of mystery, power, and danger. (7) Traditionally Crater Lake served as an important site for Indian spirit quest activities, and continues to be used for spiritual purposes today. (8)

A sacred landscape entails a correlation of physical place and cultural meaning, existing within a larger body of tradition. Its physical elements (a piled rock site, Wizard Island, the lake bottom) have associations with various culturally postulated events, some in a mythic time (for example the myth of Le*w and Sqel), others (such as spirit quest rituals) still occurring today. Traditional knowledge of such a landscape--of the myths which recount its origins, and the rituals by which its powers are encountered--shapes one's experience. Some appreciation of the myths and rituals associated with Crater Lake allows the Euro-American visitor to have some understanding of the traditional Indian experience of Crater LakeNational Park, of its spiritual powers and the possibilities for personal transformation which it affords.

Introduction | Adaptations | Social Organization | Ritual
Myth | Post-Settlement Life | Crater Lake