Sometime about 150 million years ago the North American plate crashed into a series of rock islands borne along by the Farallon plate. The North American plate absorbed these rocks creating a large inland sea, the floor of which gradually rose to form the Pacific Northwest. During the Miocene, a time when human precursors were taking their first bipedal steps across the African landscape, the Columbia River was cutting a path through basalt flows. It lost its battle against the swiftly rising Mt. Hood; relocating a bit north.
The melting of the great ice sheets provided ample water for the Columbia to keep clear a path through the tough basalt. At the end of the latest ice age, perhaps 12,000 years ago, at least 40 great floods scoured the Columbia Plateau leaving a landscape of short, steep-sided, basalt based buttes on the east side of the Cascades and a huge silt fan west of them.
There is a place along the River where the land resisted its cutting force. Here the ancient basalt flows force the river up over their base and compress it between the faces of adjoining buttes. The result is a series of tumbling rapids and cascades which the early French speaking voyageurs called ‘The Dalles’. For thousands of years before the voyageurs, these rapids slowed the great salmon runs on their upriver spawning journey; crowding the fish until they filled the water by the millions.
The rapids also provided the white sturgeon, largest of North America’s freshwater fish, clean fast moving water below which they spawned. Other, less robust fish species, such as Pacific lamprey and Eulachon, spawned in tributaries joining the river below the rapids.
The vast numbers of fish attracted people, and for more than 10,000 years they have come to collect from schools of fish that have been returning to the Columbia River since at least the late Miocene. The Wasco and Wishram peoples called the river Nihhluidih.
The language of the Wasco and Wishram peoples is of Chinook origin. The Wasco lived on the River’s south bank and the Wishram the north bank. Like other Chinook speaking people they were great traders, exchanging the wealth of the river for far away goods.
Over time these people intentionally marked the landscape, and despite modern vandalism, road building, and dam construction some of the earliest marks in the form of petroglyphs and pictographs remain visible. We’ve come to see a few of them; notably Speedis Owl:
and, probably most famously, Tsagiglalal: She Who Watches; the Guardian of Nihhluidih.
Her story is intertwined with that of two invaders which forever changed the lives of the Columbia River peoples; the horse and the foreign microbe. The Wishram people, who are thought to have rendered Tsagiglalal, never embraced the horse like their neighbors to the North. Why would they? The river gave them everything. However, they could not escape the microbes. Small Pox, measles, influenza, and malaria all took their toll; until most of the people were gone. By 1962 there were but ten Wishram left on the Washington state census.
Near the beginning of these epidemics, the people were prosperous and happy. They never had to worry about food as Nihhluidih provided well for them. They never had to worry about war as their neighbors respected them as great traders.
One day Coyote came trotting along, as coyotes are wont to do. He saw that the people were rich and happy. People shouldn’t be so complacent; they should be thin and anxious for their next meal. People should quarrel and live in fear of their neighbors. He wondered who was chief. Coyote pulled off his coyote fur robe to become a person. He sauntered up to a fisherman mending nets alongside the great river.
“So fisherman, I see that you are well fed and pleased with your life,” said Coyote.
“Well yes, why shouldn’t I be? The river gives us everything we can eat and much more to trade,” the fisherman replied.
“I can see. Who is your chief; I would like to pay my respects,” asked Coyote.
“Tsagiglalal is our chief. She watches over us. I will take you to meet her,” offered the fisherman.
“I would like that,” said Coyote.
The pair walked through the village just beyond the reach of the highest flood waters. Everywhere they walked they found happy, contented people. The fisherman led Coyote into the rocks above the village to the home of Tsagiglalal. She had seen them coming and was filled with a dark premonition.
“Tsagiglalal, this man would render his respects to you,” The fisherman said turning and walking down the hill back to the village and his nets.
Tsagiglalal looked at the man standing before her and said “You are not what you seem, young man.”
Coyote looked around at the wonderful view of the village and the powerful river. “You live up here watching over your people. What kind of living do you give them?”
Tsagiglalal looked at the man’s yellow eyes and noted his slightly pointed ears and said “You are Coyote, are you not?”
“I may be, and you; what do you do for your people?” asked Coyote.
“I am teaching them to live well and to build fine houses,” replied Tsagiglalal.
Coyote nodded and said “The world is going to change again soon. The people will have need of a watchful spirit. Will you be here?”
Tsagiglalal thought a moment and replied “I would watch over my people from these rocks as long as they stand.”
Coyote said “It will be a very hard time. Women will no longer be chiefs. New people will come. Many of your people will die. The river will not give up its fish. Even the grass will be different. From now on, change will be constant.”
“How may I best help my people?” asked Tsagiglalal.
“You shall stay here and watch over the people and the river, forever.” And with that Coyote changed Tsagiglalal into a rock. Then he donned his robe and trotted off disappearing into the shrubs, just like coyotes do to this very day.
In 1910 Edward Curtis photographed Tsagiglalal. I borrowed the title of his photograph for the title of this post.
I think she has passed the ensuing century well; even though more changes have come than Coyote predicted. The river is swollen with water impounded by a dam. The whistle and rumble of trains have replaced the roar of the rapids. The spray thrown from the crashing water has dried from the rocks. The great Condor no longer circles the skies. The smell of drying fish is gone and the smoke from cooking fires no longer rises from the village. The people are gone, moved away, their village site submerged under the new-made lake.
However the wind still blows along the river. Ravens still call from the bluffs. Osprey still circle over the lake. And Eagle still cries from above. Gazing at the paintings on the rocks, smelling the fresh-basket fragrance of the Dogbane, and holding very still, one can almost hear the voices and songs of the ancient peoples moving in time with the softly rustling grasses.
It is clear that Coyote was correct “change will be ever present”. Given time, I imagine, our marks on the landscape will be no more noticeable than theirs are today.