Date: Tue, 17 Dec 2002 11:42:32 -0500
From: Kit Mason <kit at hers.com>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Myths Far and Wide
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>

Barry L. Newton wrote:
> Interestingly, Strong, Lee said:
>
>>.  While trolls are fairly distinctively Scandanavian in origin,
>>practically all human cultures have some version of dwarves, elves, little
>>people, goblins, ogres, giants and undead, often with interesting
>>variations.
>
> Ok, I'm always willing to be educated.  Examples, anyone?

Can't say about this immediate region, but the Iroquois have tales of
little people -- say, one to two feet high -- along Conewango Creek in
western NY.  Most stories are Seneca, but some may have come from the
Neutral Nation that was absorbed (kindly word) by the Seneca several
hundred years ago.  There are also stories of giants, 8-10 feet tall, in
western NY -- early settlers plowing and digging near Lake Ontario
disturbed burial mounds that had bones whose measurements showed their
owners were that size.  And there's the story of the hunters who were
out along what's now considered the border between NY and PA who
surprised a mammoth one day...

Kit