{"collection":"Sacred Texts: Native American","full_text_available":false,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/sacred_texts_v1_nam_inu_eft_eft53_htm/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/sacred_texts_v1_nam_inu_eft_eft53_htm","id":"sacred_texts_v1_nam_inu_eft_eft53_htm","license":"unknown_pending_legal_review","rights_basis":"sacred_texts_v1_preview_gate_primary_text_only; acquisition-method/ToS and compilation-copyright questions still open, not resolved by this gate","source":"sacred_texts_v1","source_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/nam/inu/eft/eft53.htm","summary":"This is a short folk tale from Knud Rasmussen's 1921 collection of Eskimo oral literature, belonging to a tradition of Arctic shamanic storytelling in which wizards (angakoks) can transform into animals. The story follows two rival shamans from the same village: Saunikoq, consumed by jealousy over his neighbor Tungujuluk's son, transforms into a bear and approaches the child with murderous intent, only to be caught and shamed into laughter. Tungujuluk waits patiently before taking revenge \u2014 he transforms into a walrus, allows Saunikoq to harpoon him, steals the float, then publicly exposes the deception at a communal feast by producing the lost equipment. The tale's moral architecture is one of measured, public humiliation rather than violence: the ultimate weapon is social shame, which drives Saunikoq into permanent exile. Distinctive to this tradition is the matter-of-fact treatment of shapeshifting as a practical skill used in everyday rivalries, blending the supernatural seamlessly into domestic and hunting life. It would interest readers drawn to indigenous oral traditions, Arctic ethnography, or the anthropology of shame and social control in small communities.","tags":[],"text":null,"title":"Eskimo Folk-Tales: TUNGUJULUK AND SAUNIKOQ","tradition":"Sacred Texts: Native American","translated_text":null,"word_count":797}