Several native (American and other) tribes have deep-rooted traditions of ancient migrations through an underworld, and that in forgotten history their tribes discovered huge caverns underground with a diffused phosphorescent lighting -- somewhat similar to the polar 'aurora' lights -- and lived down there for a long time until at least some of their kind, in most cases, decided to emerge once again into the outer world. Following are several cases and legends concerning these "subterranean migration":

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ACOMA --- On page 60 of Sheila Moon's book "A MAGIC DWELLS", we find the following Acoma tradition:

"...In one version of the ACOMA Indian myth, it is written: They came out of the earth, from Iatik, the mother. They came out through a hole in the north called Shipap. They crawled out like grasshoppers; their bodies were naked and soft. It was all dark; the sun had not yet risen. All of the little people had their eyes closed: they hadn't opened them yet..."

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APACHE (JICARILLA) --- The Jicarilla APACHE Indians are somewhat divided as to the exact place from which their ancestors are alleged to have emerged from the subterranean world. Pages 26, 57, and 163-164 of Morris E. Opler's book "MYTHS AND TALES OF THE JICARILLA APACHE INDIANS" gives the information that some of the Apache's believe their place of emergence to be somewhere west of Flint Mountain, which is west of Abiquiu, New Mexico. Others place it north of Durango Colorado; near Alamosa; or in the San Juan Mts. of Colorado.

The following tradition is recorded on pages 10, 26, 57, 58, & 109 of Opler's' book:

"...Down in the underworld there were many brooks and streams. The people had all kinds of water.

"...The earth is our mother. We came from her. When we came up on this earth, it was just like a child being born from its mother. The place of emergence is the womb of the earth.

"...Now the people were dissatisfied with life on this earth. They wanted to go BACK to the place below.

"...The people now wanted to go back into the place from which they had emerged because the monsters (saurians!? - Branton) were beginning to come around. They said, ‘This is a dangerous place. We had better go back. "...If the people had been as they are now they would have been frightened and would have run back into the hole of emergence. But when all of the monsters were killed ...all was at peace."

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APACHE (WHITE MOUNTAIN) --- The following bit of information comes from page 49 of Grenville Goodwin's book "MYTHS AND TALES OF THE WHITE MOUNTAIN APACHE":

"...This myth is the basis of the Ant songs and ceremony. The name of the place of emergence, ha'tc'ono'ndai (coming up out of), is identical with that used for this tale. The place of emergence is vaguely somewhere north of the historic Western Apache territory..."

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CARIBS, ETC. --- Some interesting legends can be found on pages 265-266 of Daniel G. Brinton's book, "MYTHS OF THE NEW WORLD":

"...This cavern, which thus lingered in the memories of nations, frequently expanded to a nether world, imagined to underlie this of ours, and still inhabited by beings of our kind, who have never been lucky enough to discover its exit.

"According to a myth extensively disseminated among the CARIBS, Arawacks, Warraus, Carayas and other South American tribes, in the beginning of things sky and earth were as one, and man abode within the earth in a joyous realm, where death and disease were unknown, and even the trees never rotted but lived on forever.

"One day the ruler of that happy realm walking forth discovered the surface of the world as we know it, but returning warned his people that though sunlight was there, so also were decay and death. Some, however, went thither, and the present unhappy race of men are their descendants, while others dwell in gladness far below..."

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CREEK, ETC. --- Pages 105-107 of Albert S. Gatschet's book "A MIGRATION LEGEND OF THE CREEK INDIANS", contains the following account concerning the emergence of the Cha'hta 'Indians':

"The Cha'hta trace their mythic origin from the 'Stooping, Leaning or Winding Hill,' Nani Waya, a mound of fifty feet altitude, situated in Winston county, Mississippi, on the headwaters of Pearl river. The top of this "birth-place" of the nation is level, and has a surface of about one-forth of an acre.

"...The curious tale of the origin of the Cha'hta from Nani Waya has been often referred to by authors. B. Romans states that they showed the 'hole in the ground,' from which they came, between their nation and the Chicasa, and told the colonists that their neighbors were surprised at seeing a people 'rise at once out of the earth.' (p.71)

"...Other legends conveyed the belief that the emerging from the sacred hill took place only four or five generations before (Missionary Herald, 1828, p.215.). The emerging of the human beings from the top of a hill is an event not unheard of in American mythology, and should not be associated with a simultaneous creation of man. It refers to the coming up of primeval man from a lower world into a preexistent upper world, through some orifice. A graphic representation of this idea will be found in the Navajo creation myth, published in Amer. Antiquarian V, 207-224, from which extracts are given in this volume below. Five different worlds are there supposed to have existed, superposed to each other, and some of the orifices through which the 'old people' crawled up are visible at the present time."

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CUBANS --- Thy following information can be found on page 123 of Ellen Russell Emerson's book. "INDIAN MYTHS":

"...It is to the CUBANS we are indebted for the following version of man's origin:

"It was from the depths of a deep cavern in the earth that mankind issued. There were two apertures to this cavern, one large and the other small: out of the large aperture passed the men who are of tall, majestic proportions; and from the small issued the men of diminutive size..."

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CUBEO, ETC. --- The following accounts come from page 242 of "THE JOURNAL OF AMERICAN FOLK-LORE" - Vol-52:

"...The CUBEO Indians, a Tukano-speaking people, live at present along the Cuduiari, Querari, Pirabaton, and Vaupes rivers in southeastern Columbia. The region of these rivers is hilly, heavily forested country, at an average elevation of some 750 feet. Some thirty gentes grouped into three exogamous unnamed phratries comprise the tribe. The Cubeo Indians refer to themselves as pamiwa - 'first people.'

"...The Cubeo are a river people, and according to their traditions their ancestors first EMERGED from the rocks at river rapids; thereafter all the Cubeo lived along the rivers."

Pages 248-249 of the same work contains the following information:

"The CARAJA are an isolated people inhabiting a large territory slightly north of the geographical center of Brazil.

"...In the underworld, the original home of the Caraja, there was neither sickness nor death. As the emergence myth states, 'More people kept being born. Nobody died. There wasn't enough room. When a man got old, he sat there in one place without moving. Kaboi couldn't add any more houses to the village. It was full. A new father was lying on the mat. It was time to eat honey. He went off hunting honey. While he was hunting he heard a 'seriema' (Portuguese name of a bird) sing. He scooped a hole toward it and came out. He found fruit at once and decided to return. When he got back he gave his folk the fruit to taste. They found it very good and wanted to come out. They invited the others to come with them. Wobedu sent his folk out first and he went first among them. Kaboi came among the last. He got stuck in the hole. His belly was too big. He decided to go back. It was a dead leaf that he spied. He spoke to his wife, 'Let's go back. There is death there.' They went back again..."

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HOPI --- The HOPI Indians are a group of native Americans living on a reservation in northern Arizona. The word "Hopi" means "Peaceful". This extraordinary group of 'Indians' (native Americans) have resisted all pressures to conform to the White mans way. Their traditions and legends are very colorful and detailed, especially the story of their emergence upon the surface of the earth... Long ago, they say, their ancestors lived in an underground world. After millennia's of such living conditions and after migrating through four different underground countries, they decided to come to the surface of the earth to live. The following is an account from pages 205 and 214 of Harold Courlander's book "THE FOURTH WORLD OF THE HOPI'S":

"More Hopi's then not accept the version in this collection, and most agree that the location of the Sipapuni (place of emergence) has long been forgotten.

However, some of the Third Mesa clans place the Sipapuni in the Grand Canyon near the confluence of the Colorado and little Colorado rivers, and they stop at this sight ceremonially in the course of salt-collecting expeditions..."

The legend primarily belongs to the Third Mesa villages - Oraibi, Hotevilla and Bakavi (Bacobt) - and to Moencopi, an offspring of Oraibi..."

As Titiev paraphrases the description given by Don Talayesva: "It was not long now before the expedition found itself approaching the Kiva, the original Sipapu through which mankind emerged from the underworld. Its outlines are indicated by soft, damp earth and an outer circle of bushes called pilakko.... Pushing their way through the fringe of vegetation, the party stepped into the inner ring within which the kiva is located. The Sipapu is full to the brim with yellowish water, of about the same coloring of the surrounding earth, which serves as a 'lid' so that ordinary humans may not see the wonderful things going on beneath the surface.'"

Harold Courlander, in his book 'THE FOURTH WORLD OF THE HOPIS' described an ancient Hopi legend about an underworld. Whether or not the account is accurate, it nevertheless shows that the POSSIBILITY for the existence of such a 'world' was and is foremost in the minds and legends of many native American tribes.

Courlander describes the Hopi legend which states that the Hopi ancestors, before their 'emergence' to the surface world, migrated through different cavern regions until they came to the 'third' cavern world -- or the realm below the general 'Four Corners' area of the Southwest, a series of caverns that were very extensive and in which crops were able to grow to some extent. Life there eventually became very oppressive for the majority of the Hopis when a few of their numbers turned to practicing sorcery, making it very difficult for the rest. The 'peaceful' Hopi's later left this cavern world (in an attempt to escape the influence of the sorcerers who were collaborating with the advancing reptilian forces?) on a journey which took several days, leaving the sorcerers below. If true, this does not necessarily mean that all Hopi ancestors who remained below are presently collaborating with the reptilians. Dr. Hank Krastman, who claims to have been allowed into an underground "Hopi" city below the Grand Canyon beginning in 1960 and beyond, states that those humans he encountered there were presently at war with the Grays. The surface Hopis themselves have legends of those who have re-visited the ancient traditional site of 'emergence'. Some suggest that the 'Sipapu' is covered by a mound, while others hold that a small pond seals the entryway to the cavern world. Whatever the case, most Hopis agree that the ancient site is somewhere near the convergence of the Colorado and Little Colorado rivers. As Courlander reveals on pp. 213-214 of his book:

"...The story of the journey to Grand (Salt) Canyon to transfer the salt deposits to that place conforms to an account given in the 1930s by Don Talayesva or Oraibi, as recorded in Mischa Titiev's article, 'A Hopi Salt Expedition' (AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, vol. 39, 1937). That account contains detailed reference to all the shrines and sacred spots along the salt trail, and the ritual observations at those places. The legend primarily belongs to the Third Mesa villages -- Oraibi, Hotevilla and Bakavi (Bocobi) -- and to Moencopi, an offspring of Oraibi. In former times these villages sent expeditions to Grand Canyon to gather their salt. According to the belief of some Third Mesa clans, Grand Canyon contains not only the sacred salt beds and shrines, but the Sipapuni through which mankind emerged from the Third (Lower) World. As Titiev paraphrases the description given by Don Talayesva:

"'It was not long before the expedition found itself approaching THE Kiva, the original Sipapu through which mankind emerged from the underworld. Its outlines are indicated by soft, damp earth and an outer circle of bushes called pilakho... Pushing their way through the fringe of vegetation, the party stepped into the inner ring within which the Kiva is located. The Sipapu is full to the brim with yellowish water, of about the same coloring as the surrounding earth, which serves as a 'lid' so that ordinary humans may not see the wonderful things going on beneath the surface.'

"The Walpis and other First Mesa people do not agree that the Sipapuni is at that place, asserting that its location is no longer known. The salt myth given here is not part of First Mesa belief. Walpi customarily sent its salt expeditions to Zuni in the south- west. In recent years, of course, virtually all Hopi salt expeditions have been to the nearest trading posts..."

It may be a coincidence, then again maybe not -- but an early issue of the 'HOLLOW HASSLE' newsletter reported one woman's belief (she did not state where she got her information) that within caverns a mile-and-a-half beneath the surface of northern Arizona and New Mexico lies the remains of one of the most ancient human civilizations on (or rather, within) the earth.

More on the Hopi underworld and 'Palatkwapi':

THE FOUR CORNERS: Another popular place for talk of underground activity is the area known as the Four Corners. This is the place where Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico meet to share a common border. According to intelligence reports from several of my sources there are "at least six underground facilities in this area," This is also the area where a large number of people died a "mysterious" death a few years back. Are there connections?

This harsh but beautiful arid land is also where the government decided to place several Indian Reservations. However, the Hopi Indians have been in this area as long as they can remember and luckily for us, their history of origin contains important details not found in the memory of other tribes.

The Hopi believe that this world we live in is the Fourth World and the other three are inside the earth. In stages, and through many hardships, they emerged from a hole called Sipapu, entrance to the Hopi underground. In my Inner-Earth Bibliography, 'A Guide to the Inner Earth' (1983), I (Bruce Walton) state:

"It is a sacred place of pilgrimage for the Hopi, at the bottom of the Canyon of the Little Colorado above it's junction with the Colorado River." (Page 66).

But, unlike most of the emergence stories of the other clans, the Hopi describe the city near from which they came. This city is called Palatkwapi, meaning "legendary Red City of the South." It is interesting to note that Frank Waters tells us in The Book of the Hopi (1965) "No one knows where Palatkwapi might have been. Some of our Hopi spokesmen, who are able to read Hopi meanings from symbols and pictographs carved on Mayan stelae and temple walls, believe that the center of the Mayan Old Empire, Palenque, in Chiapas, Mexico was the Hopi legendary city of Palatkwapi." (Notes: Page 68).

In support of this theory of Palatkwapi being the same city as Palenque browse through any of the many National geographic magazines containing photos and paintings of the mysterious Mayan ruins and it won't take you long to realize that the Ancient Mayan cities were predominantly bright red. And if you'll read Plasma Guns & Sub-riders in THEI (The Hollow Earth Insider) Volume 1 #3, you'll find my research concerning Lord Pacal. Lord Pacal was sent from Valum Chivin (the underworld) to Valum Votan (the upper world) and there he founded the city of Palenque. This we see gives us a direct link of unbroken evidence of a migration of people northward from the Inner Lands.

Summary.... By the use of thugs and murders, after Queen Isabelle and Columbus double-crossed the elitist the "Keepers of the Secret" tried to destroy the true history of the origin of many Native Americans. However, by studying the oral history of these wise people we find that they came from the Inner Lands. Before the controllers got their hands on the truth and completely covered it over it a few American Archaeology books were written which tell the true story of people migrating south to north.

We have traced the Hopi tribe from their emergence near the ancient Mexican town of Palatkwapi/Palenque their present home in the Four Corners. We have looked at many accounts of underground passages in the Four Corners and the White Sands area of New Mexico. Accounts recorded long before today's researchers started sending out reams of reports proving the government has control of underground facilities in these and other areas of the world, yet not a word on the possible origin of the ancient underground excavations. But, using what we know of these underground passageways, we can safely state that they were probably the trade routes connecting the Inner World with the Outer world.

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HURON --- "...The war had desolated the great Island. This destruction was caused by the use of fire by Tseh-stah and of the use of the North Wind by Tah-weh-skah-reh. No means of substance were left. To preserve his people until he could re-create the destroyed works of the Great Island, Tseh-stah built the Yooh-wah-tah-yoh, or great underground City or subterranean Dwelling, far to the north of Montreal's present site. Into this he led his people, and then went forth to his work of reconstruction... Here the people were in a torpid state, like turtles and toads and snakes in winter. They were lying about the City in all positions, and they retained only a partial consciousness. The Woman who fell down from heaven ruled over them with her fiery torch given her by Heh-noh, the Thunder God.

"In making these things anew, Tseh-stah could only reproduce them as they were before their destruction in the war, and as they had been left by the modifications of himself and Tah-weh-skah-reh. This work required an immense length of time.

"After ages had elapsed, Tseh-stah came back to Yooh-wah-tah-yoh. He said the work was done, and that it was yet too new for use. They could not go out until the Earth was ripened by the Sun.

"From the point of the Yooh-wah-tah-yoh where the Wyandots were, a glimmering of light could be seen, and Tseh-stah went forth from the Yooh-wah-tah-yoh by the small opening. He looked about the whole of the Great Island. He saw it was indeed ready to receive the people for whom it had been created, and for whom all the work of Nature cried out both day and night. He returned to the Yooh-wah-tah-yoh where sat the Woman who fell down from heaven with her torch of fire given by Heh-noh, the Thunder God. He announced to his Mother that the world cried aloud for her children. She said to him: 'My son, lead them forth in the Order of Precedence and Encampment. They shall come to me on their journey to the land of the Little People.'

"Then Tseh-stah caused the Earth to quake and to rock to its foundation. Heh-noh shook the heavens and rolled over the Great Waters with his Thunder. All the sky flamed with his fiery darts. The great Yooh-wah-tah-yoh was rent asunder. A nation stood marshaled to go forth. They marched to the waiting world. The hills, the waters, the beasts, the trees, the birds, and the fishes cried out with welcome to the nation born of the earth in a day. They found the earth decked with flowers, and songs of joy poured out from the forests filled with happy birds.

"They found some of the people of Tah-weh-skah-reh still living on the Great Island. Their preservation is not accounted for.

"Here ends the Song of the Creation, as sung by Captain Bull-Head and William Big-Town."

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INCA --- One interesting legend which 'may' give a clue as to how the INCA race 'originated' into Peru, is recorded on page 42 of Harold Osborne's book "SOUTH AMERICAN MYTHOLOGY". The legend/tradition is as follows:

"...The first version tells of a cliff with three small cave mouths, or a building with three exits, about twenty miles from the present city of Cuzco (Peru). It was called Paccari-tambo (Inn of origin) or Tambotocco (place of the hole). In prehistoric times four brothers and four sisters, who were to be the founders of the Inca dynasty, emerged from the middle orifice. Their names and numbers are differently given. According to some versions the ancestors of other non-royal Inca clans emerged from the other two orifices."

Later on in this book, there is a particular legend which states that after the ancestors of the Incas emerged from the caves, they passed through two areas known as "Apitay" and "Huana Cauri" while on their way to the present city of Cuzco, which many believe to be the 'birthplace' of the Inca civilization.

More 'related' info on the Inca origin legend/tradition can be found in Ignatius Donnally's writings...

Donnelly was a strange man who wrote strange books. In his work entitled 'RAGNARK: The AGE OF FIRE And GRAVEL', written in 1882 and devoted to the conception that the so-called glacial deposits of the earth were actually left by a comet that struck and ravaged our planet, he has collected from earlier writers numerous legends of prehistoric cave life that are as widespread as they are suggestive. It seems certain that after a period of fiery devastation man came up out of the earth to remake a world.

(Note: Literally dozens of Native American tribes in North America, and even more in other countries, reflect this theme in their origin or 'emergence' legends, of in ancient times going underground into vast cavern systems to escape some prehistoric cataclysm, only to 'emerge' when they were led to do so, into the outer world. These vast caverns were often illuminated by a diffused atmospheric phenomena in the vast cavities similar to the polar 'aurora' phenomena. By this phenomena the subterranean atmosphere is illuminated... that is, by an 'electromagnetic' phenomena which is the result of a process involving the interaction between air molecules that are stimulated by the subterranean electromagnetic waves or currents in a fashion which results in the subterranean atmosphere 'glowing'... as said before... just like the polar 'aurora' phenomena, also known as the northern or southern lights. - Branton)

"Of special interest in light of the great tunnels beneath their land, is the legend of the ancient Peruvians that their ancestors emerged from the primeval cave known as Pacarin-Tampu, or Lodgings of the Dawn, the entrance to which, in days long ago, was located five leagues distant from Cuzco, and was surrounded by a sacred grove containing temples of great antiquity. And the Toltecs and Aztecs traced their origin back to 'the seven sacred caves.'

"In reference to the Peruvian cave, Balboa, in his 'HISTOIRE DU PEROU', writes: 'From its hallowed recesses the mythical civilizers of Peru, the first of men, emerged, and in it, returning during the time of (a) flood, the remnants of the race escaped the fury of the great waves.' Thus, again, we have a striking conformation of the Apache legend uncovered by L. Taylor Hansen."

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IROQUOIS, ETC. --- Page 28 of Hartley B. Alexanders' book "NORTH AMERICAN MYTHOLOGY" (also found in THE MYTHOLOGY OF ALL RACES vol X) contains the following account of a race of legendary beings existing beneath the territory of the IROQUOIS Nations:

"...the Ohdowas, or underground people. The underworld where the Ohdowas live is a dim and sunless realm containing forests and plains, like the earth of man, peopled with many animals - all of which are ever desirous to ascend to the sunny realm above. It is the task of the Ohdowas to keep these underworld creatures in their proper place, especially since many of them are venomous and noxious beasts; and though the Ohdowas are small, they are sturdy and brave, and for the most part keep the monstrous beings imprisoned; rarely do the latter break through to devastate and defile the world above."

Pages 61 and 63 of the same volume carries the following interesting information concerning the Cherokee and Choctaw Nations:

"...Furthermore, the Cherokee myth continues with an obvious addition of southwestern ideas. 'There is another world under this, and it is like ours in everything - animals, plants, and people - save that the seasons are different. The streams that come down from the mountains are the trails by which we reach this underworld, and the springs at their heads are the doorways by which we enter it, but to do this one must fast and go to water and have one of the underground people for a guide. We know that the seasons in the underworld are different from ours, because the water in the springs is always warmer in winter and cooler in summer than the outer air.'

"...The Choctaw, like the Creek, regard themselves as earth-born. In very ancient times, before man lived, Nane Chaha ("high hill") was formed, from the top of which a passage led down into the caverns of earth from which the Choctaw emerged, scattering to th the compass."

And finally, page 289 of the same volume tells the following interesting story:

"...De Smet (p.1378) mentions a cavern in the Yellowstone region which the Indians named 'the place of coming-out and going-in of underground spirits,' and the South-Western notion of the Sipapu is an instance in point; other examples appear in the mythologies of the Creek, Kiowa, and Mandan..."

Pages 152-153 of Rev. William M. Beauchamp's book, "IROQUOIS FOLK LORE", contains the following explanation for the origin of the Five Iroquois Nations:

"...I have not as yet given Cusick's 'Origin of the Kingdom of the Five Nations, which was called a Long House.' It is odd and interesting, but facts are against it. 'By some inducement a body of people was concealed in the mountain at the falls named Kuskehsawkich, (now Oswego). When the people were released from the mountain they were visited by Tarenyawagon (i.e. the Holder of the Heavens), who had power to change himself into various shapes; he ordered the people to proceed towards the sunrise as he guided them, and came to a river named Yenonanatche (i.e. 'going round a mountain' - now 'Mohawk'), and went down the bank of the river and came to where it discharges into a great river running towards the midday sun; and Shaw-nay-taw-ty (i.e. 'beyond the Pineries' - now 'Hudson'), and went down the bank of the river and touched bank of a great water..." (The Five Iroquois Nations included the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca tribes. After the Tuscaroras tribe was admitted in 1722, it became known as the 'Six Nations').

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LAKOTA --- "People (once) lived in the underworld." They emerged from Maka Oniye (Wind Cave, in the Wind Cave National Park of Custer County, South Dakota). Wind Cave is 'sacred' also to the Cheyenne and at least 20 other native tribes, suggesting that an original tribe was associated with Wind Cave, and it divided itself into several other tribes and factions over a period of time.

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MANDAN, ETC --- Page 10 & 18 of Martha Warren Beckwith's book, 'MANDAN-HIDATSA MYTHS AND CEREMONIES', carried the following Mandan 'Indian' legend:

"The Mandan people originated at the mouth of this river (Missouri?) way down at the ocean. On the north side of the river was a high bank. At its foot on the shore of the ocean was a cavern -- that is where the Mandan people came out.

"...The people were once living inside the earth. There the game was scarce, so they wanted to come up on the earth. And they found a hole into which a root hung, so four men climbed up to the surface of the earth. They killed lots of Buffalo, made jerked meat, took the paunch and dried it and carried it all down to where they came from. The rest were glad to see the dried meat and they all decided to come up. They caught hold of the root and climbed up hand over hand. After the four men and their sister and many others had already reached the surface, a woman heavy with child tried to climb up and broke the root, so no more could get up..."

(Note: According to differing legends, there are several reasons why the 'Indians' came up from the Subterranean World. Some tribes claim they were forced to the surface when the Underworld became flooded, still others made the emergence to escape a portion of their race who had turned to evil, others came up in search of food, which became scarce in their underground country. Or, they emerged due to any other reason which would lure them to seek a new land on the surface of the earth. The means by which they made these journeys are also varied. For instance, some say their ancestors came up through a hollow reed or bamboo, a vine reaching down into the depths, ladders, winding tunnels, trails, etc. The appearances of the entrances also differ, for instance... lakes, hills or mounds, caves, tunnels, etc. - Branton)

More on the Mandan (and Apache) tradition:

In 'Native American Myths & Mysteries' (1991) by Vincent H. Gaddis in chapter IV titled 'Tunnels of the Titans', we find:

"Throughout all the Americas there are legends of archaic avenues, racial memories of subterranean passages stretching for miles. After the great cataclysm the ancestral North Indians lived in the vast cavern complex until it was safe to return to the upper world. The story is spread through many tribes, from the kivas of the Pueblos to the lodges of the Blackfeet, from the campfires of the eastern woodland tribes before their dispersion.

"The Mandans of the northwestern states, some of whom had blue eyes and silky hair. They said the first man to emerge from the tunnels were the Histoppa or the "tattooed ones" (Picts). Having left safety too soon, they perished. The rest, who remained below, waited until a bright light dispelled the darkness on the surface..."

"The Apaches' have a legend that their remote ancestors came from a large island in the eastern sea where there were great buildings and ports for ships. The Fire Dragon arose, and their ancestors had to flee to mountains far away to the south. Later they were forced to take refuge in immense and ancient tunnels through which they wandered for years..." (Page 39).

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MINNATAREES, ETC. --- The next accounts can be found on pages 201-209 of "TRADITIONS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS"(Vol. I) by James Athearn Jones:

"...The MINNATAREES, and all the other Indians who are of the stock of the grandfather of nations, were once not of this upper air, but dwelt in the bowels of the earth. The Good Spirit, when he made them, no doubt meant - at a proper time - to put them in the enjoyment of all the good things which he had prepared for them upon the earth. But he ordered that their first stage of existence should be within it, as the infant is formed, and takes its first growth in the womb of its natural mother. They all dwelt underground, like moles, in one great cavern, which covered the whole island. When they emerged, it was in different places, but generally near where they now inhabit..."

"...On first emerging from the caverns, they came, they said, into a world where all was light and beauty. It was directly over that part of the cavern where our tribe dwelt. They saw a great round ball of fire, which gave light and heat to the earth, and whose beams it was which had shot down through fissures of the rock, partially illuminating the cavern..."

"...When the Indians had determined to leave their habitation under ground, they agreed to do it at different points, that they might sooner be on the surface. The Minnatarees began - men, woman, and children - to clamber up the vine. One half of them had already reached the surface of the earth, when a dire mishap involved the remainder in a still more desolate captivity within its bowels. There was among the Minnatarees a very big and fat old woman, who was heavier than any six of her nation. Nothing would do but she must go up before certain of her neighbors. Away she clambered, but her weight was so great, that the vine broke with it; and the opening; to which it afforded the sole means of ascending, closed upon her and the rest of the nation.

"Other tribes fared better: in particular the beasts. The tortoise -- who always took the lead, because he was descended from the Great Tortoise who bears the world on his back, and can live both on land and in the-water -- very easily crept out, but the Monseys or Wolves, who dwelt under Lake Onondaga, did not emerge so easily. After trying to reach the upper air for a long time in vain, one of their number, a cunning old wolf, discovered a hole through which he crept out.

"He soon caught a deer, which he carried down to the tribe, who found it so sweet that they redoubled their exertions to reach the spot where such good things were to be had, and fortunately soon reached it in the company of the Turkeys, whom they overtook on the way. The Mengwe crept out of the same hole, but it was a long while afterwards..." "...When the Minnatarees arrived in the upper air, they established themselves on the spot where they now reside..."

(Note: The book also states that the Paukunnawkuts, the Delawares, the Tuscaroras, and the Sioux also resided within the caverns before emerging from the cavern world into the surface world.)

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NAVAJOS --- The following statement can be found on page 144 of Ellen Russell Emerson's book" INDIAN MYTHS":

"A Great many years ago the NAVAJOS, Pueblos, Coyoteras, and (some) white men all lived under the Cerra Naztarny, on the Rio San Juan. Here they subsisted on flesh alone, for they had with them all kinds of birds..."

Still more on the ancient underground migrations of the Navajo can be read elsewhere...

A Navaho Indian legend speaks of ancient migrations involving a cavernous realm below the four corners areas. The Hopi's speak of a similar legend involving an alleged opening, sometimes described as a hill and sometimes as a 'pond', covering the path to the cavern world. The Hopi 'emergence' point is called the 'Sipapu' or 'Sipapuni' and is said to be near the confluence of the Colorado and Little Colorado rivers. According to the Hopi tradition not all of the people who dwelt in the cavern world came up with them. Others chose to remain below. As for the Navajos, one of the elders speaking of their 'origin', states that:

"At one time all the nations, Navajos, Pueblos, Coyoteros, and white people, lived together, underground in the heart of a mountain near the river San Juan. Their only food was meat, which they had in abundance, for all kinds of game were closed up with them in their cave; but their light was dim and only endured for a few hours each day...

"Then the men and the animals began to come up from their cave, and their coming up required several days. First came the Navajos, and no sooner had they reached the surface they commenced gaming at patole, their favorite game. Then came the Pueblos and other Indians, who crop their hair and build houses. Lastly came the white people, who started off at once for the rising sun and were lost (from) sight...for many winters.

"While these nations lived underground they all spoke one tongue; but (with) the light of day and the level of the earth came many languages..."

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PAJARITA --- Researcher TAL LeVesque has stated: "The Pajaritan Pueblo Indians have a Legend that they emerged from the INNER EARTH, near the Great Sand Dunes (National Monument) in Colorado. They then traveled down the Rio Grande, setting up Pueblos..."

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POLYNESIAN, ETC. --- Pages 9-12, of "SUBTERRANEAN WORLDS OF PLANET EARTH", edited by Gene Duplantier, contains an interesting chapter by Paul Doerr. In it we find the following Information:

"...An article in Fate covers the search for the cavern systems mentioned in Perelandra and describes the area found and some of the caves, including one which can be followed for miles by boat along its half-flooded passages, Of course, no one has explored deep enough yet to find the city, if it exists. A POLYNESIAN legend describes the ancient race living deep beneath the ruins of the stone city on the South Pacific island and says they will someday emerge to again rule the earth. A peculiarity of the construction of these buildings is the odd stone shapes which take the structures look somewhat like...forts.

"...A cave was found in Cornwall which had artifacts useable only by very tiny people. Another cave in the American west was dry when the finders entered It, only to fill up with boiling water. Some think the lights of Brown Mountain issue from a cave as yet undiscovered on the *side of the mountain, hidden in the very dense underbrush. Marioua caves are said, by reliable witnesses, to have strange sounds and even lights deep inside then. One cave "disappears". The entrance can be found at some tile: and not at others. Some caves fill with poison gases..." (Brown Mt. in North Carolina.

"...The TSareg supposedly have great, very ancient, underground cities. Some North African, still build their homes underground to escape the great heat. labyrinths and catacombs underlie many great cities, both ancient and modern, from the Cobi to Mayaland, The UFOs have been said to have underground house in isolated places, or In the Amazon. Certainly, thousands of documented cases exist of this exciting subject."

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TEWA --- On pages 23-24 of Edgar L. Hewett's book, "HANDBOOKS OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL HISTORY", we find the following interesting story:

"TEWA legendry tells us that the human race and the animals were born in the underworld. They climbed up a great Douglas 'fir' tree, and entered this world THROUGH a lake called Sip'ophe. When people die, their spirits go to Sip'ophe, "lake of the dead", through which they pass into the underworld. There are many spirits in the waters of Sip'ophe. Sip'ophe is a brackish lake in the sand dunes northeast of Alamosa, Colorado (now within the Great Sand Dunes National Monument). The senior writer of this volume visited the site in 1892. He found among the dunes a small lake of very black, forbidding-looking water. It was approximately one hundred yards in diameter. Around the shore was a continuos line of dead cattle. An old man who had long lived on the slope of Sierra Blanca gave the information that the lake never dried up, and that many cattle died every season from drinking its water. The location of Sip'ophe is generally and definitely known by the Tewa. Here their ancestors came out upon the surface of the earth.

"...In varying forms, the name of the place of emergence appears in other Pueblo languages. The Tewa say that the Keres did not enter this world from the dune lake, but from two caves, "Keres holes," near La Cueva, in Taos County, New Mexico. The cliff in which these caves are situated is about twenty-five feet high. They (the caves) are tunnel-shaped, have a level floor, and are high enough for a man to stand erect in them; the openings are a few feet above the bottom of Oja Caliente creek. The northern cave extends "into the cliff some seventy-five to one hundred feet; its innermost recesses are dark owing to the curvature which the cave makes. Interior surfaces of the chambers are smooth and flesh-colored. From these two caves, the Keres people are said to have come forth when they first emerged into this world."

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TUPARI --- Page 119 of Harold Osborne's book "SOUTH AMERICAN MYTHOLOGY", tells of one of the legends of the TUPARI Indians, who live up the Rio Branco (or Parima) river. This river eventually merges with the Rio Negro and is to be found in the upper Mato Grosso region of Brazil. A young Swiss ethnologist, Franz Casper, learned of the following Tuparian tradition when he visited the tribe in 1948:

"...Long ago there were no Tupari or other men. Our ancestors lived under the ground where the sun never shines... Then the men began to stream out in great hordes... Many men remained inside the earth. They are called 'Kinno' and still live there.

"One day, when (most of) the people of the earth have died, the Kinno will come out of the ground here. But the men whom Aroteh had let out of the earth did not find room in the same place. We Tupari remained here, the others wondered far away in all directions. They are our neighbors: the Arikapu, Yabuti, Makurap, Arua, and all other tribes."

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ZUNI --- Pages 96-99 of the book "AMERICAN INDIAN MYTHOLOGY" by Carol K. Rachlin, contains the following tradition of the ZUNI Indians, who live within the border country of northern New Mexico and Arizona:

"...The first people who came into this world were the Ashiwi... After the Ashiwi came into this world, other people followed them. First came the Hopi's, who had been neighbors and friends of the Ashiwi in the underworld. Then came the Mexicans ('native' Mexican tribes such as the Aztecs!? - Branton), and then the Coconino and the Pima, and finally the Navajos and the other Apaches.

"Now the world was populated indeed. The Ashiwi found the middle place of the whole world, and there they established Zuni, where it is today... This went on for a long time. It would be hard to say how long it took in years, but four magic cycles were completed before the last of the people emerged from the underworld. The last to leave was a man and woman witch who held all power for good and evil..."

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Page 155 of "THE SEXUAL LIFE OF THE SAVAGES", by Bronislaw Malinowski, carries the following passage:

"According to active tradition, mankind originated from the underworld, whence a coupler, a brother and sister, emerged at different specified places. According to certain legends, only women appeared first. Some of my commentators insisted upon this version: 'You see, we are so many on this earth because many women came first. Had there been many men, we would be few.'"

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In his book "THE COMING RACE", Edward Bulwer Lytton seems to support the idea of dead cities underground which were once inhabited by people who descended into the subterranean world, possibly to escape some ancient surface cataclysm... cities which were later abandoned by the ancient inhabitants as they sought for other lands (either above or below the surface) where they could re-settle.

The following quote comes from chapter IX of his book:

"...A band of the ill-fated race, thus invaded (had) taken refuge in caverns amidst the loftier rocks, and, wandering through these hollows, they lost sight of the upper world forever.

"Indeed, the whole face of the earth had been changed by this great revolution; land had been turned into sea, sea into land. In the bowels of the inner earth even now, I was informed as a positive fact, might be discovered the remains of human habitation, -- habitation not in huts and caverns, but in vast cities whose ruins attest the civilization of races which flourished (in the ancient past), and are not to be classified with those genera to which philosophy ascribes the use of flint and ignorance of iron."

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Researcher Robert Drake wrote some years ago:

"...Some of my readers may be familiar with the fact that at least one tribe of Indians in the Southwestern United States has a legend of coming from South America.

"This legend relates a story of many years ago. The forefathers of the tribe are said to have lived in a large city far to the south. The story even ties the stars of the sky with the Southern Cross. The town may have been Huanuaca before the earth shift which raised it above sea level. At any rate the legend asserts that the people of this town in the south, the forefathers of a tribe of American Indians, were driven from their homes by a much more hostile and fierce group of warriors. The remnants of those who fled wandered for a long, long time in underground passages which led to the north. These passages eventually led them to our Southwest, where they emerged and set up tribal life once again.

"How these ancient Indians were able to see in the dark does not seem to have been taken into consideration. The question of how these ancient tunnels of the Atlan or Titan were illuminated has long been of interest to those who follow the Shaver Mystery. It has long been considered that the tunnels were lit by a type of atomic light.

"...Perhaps some time in the future we may find one of the entrances to the caves and discover just how they are lighted."