the Terrapin

Family: the four-footed animals (ballplay) · Role: ballplayer · First appears: Myth 20 · How the Terrapin Beat the Rabbit

In Myth 20, the Rabbit and the Terrapin, “very boastful, and the two were always disputing about their speed,” agreed to settle their rivalry with a race. The Rabbit offered him a head start of one ridge, but the Terrapin asked his friends to help stop the Rabbit’s boasting. When race day came, the Terrapin won.

In Myth 31, the Terrapin used a wolf’s ears as spoons, and the Wolves captured him as their prisoner. They threw him into the river, where he dived under and escaped. In an account the text introduces with “Some say,” he sang a medicine song that healed his broken back, though scars remained on his shell.

In Myth 36, the animals challenged the birds to a ballplay, and the birds accepted. In Myth 37, the Turkey tricked the Terrapin into giving him a scalp and ran off with it; the Terrapin shot cane splints into the Turkey’s leg to cripple him, but never caught him. In Myth 40, the Partridge borrowed the Terrapin’s whistle and flew away with it, never returning it.