Cherokee-Iroquois Little People

Abstract

Various types of dwarfs are conspicuous personalities in American Indian pantheons. Often they closely resemble European folk figures and might be considered as a borrowing from European tradition. Such Little People are so widespread in America, however, and often so isolated from a suitable European tradition, that a foreign origin seems improbable as a general explanation for their existence. Cherokee tradition is rather conservative and has borrowed relatively little of White folk-belief in many of its aspects, as judged by published collections and our own observations among the Cherokee. The Cherokee Little People give one the impression that they are an integral part of a highly elaborated tradition in which European motifs are rare, although it may well be that important modifications of this tradition have taken place. The prominence of dwarfs in Cherokee mythology first gave us stimulus for this study, and later we looked for parallels and similarities in the dwarf lore of the Six Nations.