the Sun

Also known as: Sun · Family: Arikara · Role: father of the Dog · First appears: Tale 7 · The Origin of the Arikara

In Tale 7, the Dog says, “My father is the Sun.” In Tale 14, at the boy’s father’s request, the Sun moved nearer to the earth and heated the boy’s skull until the Snake crawled out.

In Tale 16, the Sun took No-Tongue’s tongue, and No-Tongue died. The next morning, the Sun carried him to his home in the sky and invited him to choose among his possessions. After the Moon instructed No-Tongue to disguise a dark-brown robe with white clay, the wind blew the coating away, and the Sun saw that the robe was not truly white. The Sun also had a son, Little-Sun, who was to kill No-Tongue, and later told his other son, Big-Sun, to try.

In Part 2, the Sun tried three times to kill No-Tongue; on the third attempt, he changed into a Buffalo, but No-Tongue escaped the mud-hole and the Buffalo burned. After the Sun saw that No-Tongue had not been scalped, he said he would leave him alone until he was old. No-Tongue told him that the Moon had also helped him, and the Sun took him home; after failing to kill him, the Sun returned No-Tongue’s tongue.