Blood Clot Comes into Being

The Crow culture hero Blood Clot, “one of the powerful beings,” emerges from a clot of blood in a soup made from buffalo blood. The people have been starving due to a greedy man, the husband of seven sisters, who hoards all the meat. Blood Clot sees how this man is starving his father-in-law and vanquishes the evil son-in-law. This supernatural being then releases all the buffalo from a hole in the earth where they have been hiding, thus providing food for the hungry Crow.

Once Blood Clot has saved these people, he goes on a quest to free others tormented by monstrous beings. He first encounters two young bears that steal into a tipi to eat all the best parts of the buffalo – leaving very little for the poor woman who is cooking. Blood Clot defends this old woman by banishing the bear cubs from the camp and sending all bears off to live in the woods.

Next, he finds two giant snakes that also threaten to eat all the people’s food. The greedy male snake and his children are decapitated by the valiant Blood Clot, saying, “You’ve been torturing my people, and now I will torture you!” The female snake agrees to leave Blood Clot’s people alone, but as she disappears into a hole in the ground, says that snakes will “bite them once in a while.”

Then Blood Clot comes to a dangerous river crossing where four women are married to a water monster. They sacrifice those crossing a rope bridge to the water monster that lurks below. Again, this powerful being rids the earth of an evil force. Finally, Blood Clot must out think a dangerous gambler by tricking him into an advantageous challenge. After winning their race, Blood Clot finishes him off by cracking his head open and throwing him into a lake.

It emerges from these stories that Blood Clout is a powerful buffalo himself, a guardian being. His mission is to take care of his people. Blood Clot leads them into what is now Yellowstone National Park, into the verdant Lamar Valley. In Crow, this hunter’s paradise is known as Alakúpitche which translates as the Good Valley. It is here that Blood Clot cares for his people by providing a haven where they have plenty of meat to hunt and can live a “good life.”