Oral traditions and myths have long been an integral part of Native American cosmology. Not only have they been - and continue to be - an essential part of handing down Native American customs, norms, beliefs, and cultural histories, but they also form a communal mythic discourse. This discourse is not a "fixed text," but rather a dynamic process of interactive relations that are developed over generations of experience, and passed from relation to relation and generation to generation. In this sense, the traditional structures of mythic discourse serve an integrative function: to form a coherent basis for communal identity in terms of a shared set of fundamental ideas and beliefs expressed in multiple forms. The oral traditions and myths recorded in this book are part of the communal mythic discourse of the Lakota Sioux people. Originally collected and recorded at the close of the nineteenth century by two Native language speakers - Marie L. McLaughlin and Zitkala Sa - these oral traditions provide some of the least distorted or colonially disrupted examples of the Lakota Sioux communal mythic discourse. Containing over 40 oral traditions, Lakota Sioux Legends and Myths brings together into a single volume these remarkable myths and legends. Edited and with a forward by Peter N. Jones, Ph.D., Lakota Sioux Legends and Myths is a welcome and refreshing addition to the literature. Once again the beauty, depth, and knowledge contained within the Lakota Sioux oral traditions can speak for themselves.

Native American Mythology began long before the European settlers arrived on North American soil. Contrary to popular beliefs, there is more to Native American Folklore than stories of buffalo hunts, teepee living and animal stories. Hundreds of tribes throughout North American created a huge mythological system that has rivaled that of the Greeks. The Sioux Indians are no exception, they have offered many enjoyable and educational legends of their people, and beliefs. Included in this anthology are a group of collected works from the Sioux, a confederacy of several tribes that speak three different dialects, the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota. The Sioux, a proud people with a rich heritage, have recorded a huge amount of their history through storytelling. They were the masters of the North American plains and prairies. In these stories you will relive their history and the lives of one of North America’s First People. The stories in this book have been handed down from generation to generation. And in such tradition, they are now handed down to you to share with the next generation. Included in this collection are the stories: The Story of the Lost Wife, The Simpleton's Wisdom, How the Fawn Got its Spots, The Man Who Was Afraid of Nothing, Two Ghostly Lovers, How the Rabbit Lost His Tail, A Bashful Courtship, The Bound Children, The Legend of Standing Rock, The Boy and the Turtles, Unktomi and the Arrowheads, The Pet Donkey, The Faithful Lovers, The Story of the Peace Pipe, The Rabbit and the Grouse Girls, The Raccoon and the Crawfish, The Legend of the White Horse Plain, Myth of the White Buffalo Woman, The Stone Boy, The Legend of the Dream Catcher, The Resuscitation of the only Daughter, The Origin of the Prairie Rose, A Little Brave and the Medicine Woman, How the Crow came to be Black, Wakinyan Tanka, The Great Thunderbird, Uncegila's Seventh Spot, The Gift of Corn, The Warlike Seven, Iktomi and many others.

James R. Walker was a physician to the Pine Ridge Sioux from 1896 to 1914. His accounts of this time, taken from his personal papers, reveal much about Lakota life and culture. This third volume of previously unpublished material from the Walker collection presents his work on Lakota myth and legend. This edition includes classic examples of Lakota oral literature, narratives that were known only to a few Oglala holy men, and Walker's own literary cycle based on all he had learned about Lakota myth. Lakota Myth is an indispensable source for students of comparative literature, religion, and mythology, as well as those interested in Lakota culture.

Creation story of the Lakota in which Tatanka turned himself into a Buffalo and sacrificed his powers for the people.

"The real value of Lakota Belief and Ritual is that it provides raw narratives without any pretension of synthesis or analysis, as well as insightful biographical information on the man who contributed more than any other individual to our understanding of early Oglala ritual and belief." Plains Anthropologist"In the writing of Indian history, historians and other scholars seldom have the opportunity to look at the past through 'native eyes' or to immerse themselves in documents created by Indians. For the Oglala and some of the other divisions of the Lakota, the Walker materials provide this kind of experience in fascinating and rich detail during an important transition period in their history." Minnesota History"This collection of documents is especially remarkable because it preserves individual variations of traditional wisdom from a whole generation of highly developed wicasa wakan (holy men). . . . Lakota Belief and Ritual is a wasicun (container of power) that can make traditional Lakota wisdom assume new life." American Indian Quarterly"A work of prime importance. . . . its publication represents a major addition to our knowledge of the Lakotas' way of life" Journal of American FolkloreRaymond J. DeMallie, director of the American Indian Studies Research Institute and a professor of anthropology at Indiana University, is the editor of James R. Walker's Lakota Society (1982) and of The Sixth Grandfather: Black Elk's Teachings Given to John G. Neihardt (1984, a Bison Book), both published by the University of Nebraska Press. Elaine A. Jahner, a professor of English at Dartmouth College, has edited Walker's Lakota Myth (1983), also a Bison Book.