See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249551808 Folklore and earthquakes: Native American oral traditions from Cascadia compared with written traditions from Japan Article in Geological Society London Special Publications · January 2007 DOI: 10.1144/GSL.SP.2007.273.01.07 CITATIONS READS 20 5,081 12 authors, including: R. S. Ludwin Deborah Carver University of Washington Seattle University of Alaska Anchorage 18 PUBLICATIONS 261 CITATIONS 2 PUBLICATIONS 95 CITATIONS SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE Robert J. Losey Coll Thrush University of Alberta University of British Columbia - Vancouver 103 PUBLICATIONS 1,174 CITATIONS 20 PUBLICATIONS 137 CITATIONS SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects: Cheekye Fan - Squamish Floodplain Interactions View project Peace River area radiocarbon database View project All content following this page was uploaded by John J. Clague on 07 June 2016. The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file. Downloaded from http://sp.lyellcollection.org/ at Simon Fraser University on June 6, 2016 Folklore and earthquakes: Native American oral traditions from Cascadia compared with written traditions from Japan RUTH S. LUDWIN 1 & GREGORY J. SMITS 2 IDepartment of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Washington, Box 351310, Seattle, WA 98195-1310, USA (e-mail: [email protected]) 2Department of Histoo' and Program in Religious Studies, 108 Weaver Building, The Pennsylvania State UniversiO', Universio' Park, PA 16802, USA With Contributions from D. CARVER 3, K. JAMES 4, C. JONIENTZ-TRISLER 5, A. D. MCMILLAN 6, R. LOSEY 7, R. DENNIS 8, J. RASMUSSEN 9, A. DE LOS ANGELES 1~ D. BUERGE 1l, C. P. THRUSH 12, J. CLAGUE 13, J. BOWECHOP 14, J. WRAY 15 3Carver Geologic', P.O. Box 52, Kodiak, AK 99615, USA 413797 Silven Ave NE Bainbridge Island, WA 98110, USA 5FEMA, Federal Regional Center, 130 228th St, SW Bothell, WA 98021-9796, USA 6Dept of Anthropology, Douglas College, New Westminster, BC, V3L 5B2, Canada 7Department of Anthropology, Room 13-15, Too" Building Universi~.' of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2H4, Canada 8Chief Councilor Huu-ay-aht First Nation, P.O. Box 418, Port Alberni, B.C., V91 1M7, Canada 9Duwamish Tribe cultural resources expert, Duwanish Tribal Services, 4717 West Marginal Way SW, Seattle, WA 98106, USA l~ Tribe, cultural resources expert, and great-grandson of James Zackuse, Duwamish Indian Doctor, The Snoquahnie Tribe, P.O. Box 280, Carnation, WA 98014, USA ~J310 NE 85th St, Seattle, WA 98115, USA lZRm 1297, 1873 East Mall, UniversiO" of British Columbia, Vancouver BC V6T 1Z1, Canada 13Simon Fraser University, Burvlaby, B.C., Canada 14Makah Cultural and Research Centre, Makah Tribe, P.O. Box 160 Neah Bay, WA 98357, USA 15Olympic National Park, Port Angeles, WA, USA Abstract: This article examines local myth and folklore related to earthquakes, landslides, and tsunamis in oral traditions from Cascadia (part of the northern Pacific coast of North America) and in written traditions from Japan. particularly in the Edo (present-day Tokyo) region. Local folk- lore corresponds closely to geological evidence and geological events in at least some cases, and the symbolic language of myth and folklore can be a useful supplement to conventional geological evi- dence for constructing an accurate historical record of geological activity. At a deep. archetypical level, Japan, Cascadia. and many of the world's cultures appear to share similar themes in their con- ception of earthquakes. Although folklore from Cascadia is fragmentary, and the written record short, the evolution of Japanese earthquake folklore has been well documented over a long period of history and illustrates the interaction of folklore with dynamic social conditions. Local cultures in regions of significant seismic earthquakes and their consequences. The study of activity around the world are rich in myths, local earthquake-related lore can shed useful light legends, and other symbolic representations of on local cultural traditions and values, human From: PICCARD1, L. & MASSE, W. B. (eds) Myth and Geology. Geological Society, London, Special Publications. 273. 67-94. 0305-8719/07/$15.00 !' The Geological Society of London 2007. Downloaded from http://sp.lyellcollection.org/ at Simon Fraser University on June 6, 2016 68 R.S. LUDWIN & G. J. SMITS psychology vis-h-vis the violent forces of nature, and other aspects of society and culture. This lore can also shed useful light on the geological record, sometimes even to the extent of suggesting major geological events that remain undiscovered by conventional scientific approaches. Common themes appear in stories from different cultures, and may help identify stories with geological information. In this paper, we examine two types of earth- quake lore from Cascadia and Japan. First, we discuss figurative stories from the Pacific Northwest coast of North America that appear to refer to earth- quakes, tsunamis, permanent land level changes, or landslides. Geographically these stories describe events along two major fault zones: the Cascadia subduction zone (CSZ), which produced a magni- tude 9+ earthquake in 1700 (Satake et al. 2003), and the Seattle fault in Puget Sound which produced an earthquake of estimated magnitude 7.4 in approximately 900 AD (Bucknam et al. 1992). Sec- ondly, we discuss non-geological evidence from Cascadia and Japan that researchers have used to date the CSZ earthquake of 1700. Next, we examine figurative conceptions of earthquake caus- ality in Japanese folk culture, both circa 1700 and, in greater detail, during the period following the Edo (present-day Tokyo) earthquake of 1855. This earthquake produced an outpouring of figura- tive namazu-e (catfish picture prints), which expressed a wide range of popular views on earth- quake-related phenomena, both geological and social. Data from both Cascadia and Japan support our general argument that symbolic language can usefully describe geological events In addition to demonstrating a linkage between local earthquake lore and geological events in these two parts of the world, we propose some observations Fig. 1. Estimated 1700 rupture of the Cascadia about similarities in this lore, with reference to other Subduction zone, from Wang et al. (2003). Numbers regions of the world. At a deep level, which we call indicate locales of Native stories with descriptions of the 'archetypical level', many apparently uncon- shaking and/or flooding. Story elements are tabulated in nected societies throughout the premodern world Figure 9. Story references: 1. Boas 1935, la 33: lb 92; conceived of earthquakes in similar ways. lc 122: ld 27-31: 2. Teit 1912, 273-274: 3. Jenness 1955. 11.12,72.91,92: 4. Duff 1955, 9, 123-126: 5. Roberts & Swadesh 1955, 315: 6. Sproat 1987, 124- 125: 7. Arima et al. 1991,230-231: 8. Hill-Tout 1978, Stories of earthquakes and related events 157-158: 9. McCurdy 1961. 109-112. 10. Swan 1870, 57: 11. Gunther t925, 119: 12. Clark 1953.44-45: 13. from native societies in the Cascadia Eels 1878: 14. Reagan and Walters 1933, 14a 320-321, subduction zone 14b 322: 15. Reagan 1934, 15a 33-34, 36-37: 16. Jefferson 2001, 69-70: 17. Elmendorf 1961, 133-139; Geological knowledge of the Cascadia 18. Van Winkle Palmer 1925, 99-102: 19. Clark 1955, 321: 20. Boas 1894. 144-148: 21. Kuykendall 1889, 67; subduction zone 22. 22a Boas 1898:23-27 (similar story identified as historical in the following reference), 22b 30-34, 22c The plate-boundary fault at the Cascadia subduction 140: 23. Jacobs 1959, 176: 24. Jacobs 2003, 187; 25. zone (CSZ) separates the oceanic Juan de Fuca plate Frachtenberg 1920.67-91: 26. Frachtenberg 1913, 14- from the continental North America plate (Fig 1). It 19: 27. Jacobs 1939.58: 28. Ward 1986.27; 29. Dubois lies about 80km offshore and extends roughly 1932. 261: 30. Spott & Kroeber 1942, 224-227: 31. parallel to the coast from the middle of Vancouver Kroeber 1976. 31a 174-177: 31b 460-465: 32. Island to northern California. Although recognized Warburton and Endert 1966, 58-60. Downloaded from http://sp.lyellcollection.org/ at Simon Fraser University on June 6, 2016 NATIVE AMERICAN AND JAPANESE FOLKLORE 69 as early as the mid-1960s, seismologists initially oral traditions as high as 95% (Jacobs 1962). There- assumed that the CSZ was incapable of producing fore, available records may not be a representative great (megathrust) earthquakes. It is seismically sampling of the original material. Nevertheless, quiet, and no sizable earthquake has occurred on the hundreds of extant sources include numerous it since European settlement began. As the theory stories that describe shaking or marine flooding, of plate tectonics matured, studies of subduction Throughout the Cascadia coast, figurative stories zones worldwide identified characteristics associ- with no direct mention of earthquakes nevertheless ated with megathrust earthquakes. These earth- describe earth shaking and tsunami effects. At the quakes are most common in areas where hot, southern end of the region, many stories explicitly young, buoyant crust is rapidly subducted (Heaton mention both earthquakes and tsunamis. At the & Kanamori 1984). Although the rate of subduction northern end, there are explicit earthquake stories in Cascadia is relatively slow, the subducted crust is and explicit flood stories, but only a few stories among the youngest and hottest anywhere. including both phenomena. In the middle portion Field investigations in the 1980s of the coastal of the CSZ, along the coast of Oregon and margins along the CSZ located geological evidence Washington, direct mention of earthquakes is rare of abrupt land-level changes characteristic of mega- and stories of marine floods are common. The thrust earthquakes in 'ghost forests" of dead cedar differences in the content of these stories may in trees in coastal estuaries in Washington and part be the result of different methods or priorities Oregon (e.g.