Blackfeet Indian Tipi Legend - How Big Snake Received The Yellow Otter Tipi
Yellow Otter TipiOnce the Blackfeet were moving south to the Yellowstone. When they reached the flooded Missouri River the young men invited old Big Snake to cross in their boat. He refused. Big Snake had always feared nothing, but faced each danger by singing his war song. Then he said, "This river has no guns or knives. This river won't kill me. I am going to walk across by myself. If it does not kill me, then you can follow me across."
The people stood back and watched Big Snake enter the swollen river. He waded a little ways. Then he started swimming, and in mid-river he disappeared. From the shore the people saw him go down and surface again and again. The third time he rose he grasped something black in one hand, which he held up as he reached the far shore, and motioned to the people to come across.
The people loaded all their belongings onto hide boats, pulled by rawhide lines held in the teeth of men while they swam the river. Some women and children rode on those boats. When all crossed safely Big Snake showed them that the thing he was holding was a big otter. Then he explained, "While I was walking in the water I felt something trying to trip me. When I started to swim something caught my legs and pulled me under the water. I kicked him until I got away, and came up again. Then I drew my knife, and when this animal pulled me down again, I grabbed one of his legs and stabbed him. He was so heavy I had to swim a long ways under water."
The people rested for a while, then continued on their way. A few nights later Big Snake had a dream in which a man spoke to him. "I am the man you stabbed in the Missouri River. I wanted to take you to my tipi, but you killed me. Since you have my pelt, I have come to give you my tipi. Take a good look and see how this Yellow Otter Tipi is painted. See how my pelt is decorated. Hang it on the altar of your tipi until you are ready to tie it on a pole as a flag in the summer time. Use a long pole and fasten it so it won't blow down."
That is how Big Snake obtained the Yellow Otter Tipi.*
*This may have been the Big Snake who was the father-in-law of White Calf, the last head chief of the Piegan Division of the Blackfeet in Montana. White Calf died during a visit to Washington, D.C. in 1903.