Spiritual Aspects of Anishinaabemowin
Thunderbirds, really! Wake up!
dewe’igan - dewe’iganag - drum(s)
miigwan - miigwanag - feather(s)
asemaa - asemaa - tobacco
opwaagan - opwaaganag - pipe(s)
Seeing a Thunder Bird
When I visited the Ojibwa [in the 1930s] and Indian [Peter Berens] was living who, when a boy of twelve or so, saw pinèsi with his own eyes. During a severe thunderstorm he ran out of his tent and there on the rocks lay a strange bird. He ran back to call his parents, but when they arrived the bird had disappeared. He was sure it was a Thunder Bird, but his elders were skeptical because it is almost unheard of to see pinèsi in such a fashion. But the matter was clinched and the boy’s account accepted when a man who had dreamed of pinèsi verified the boy’s description
-- A. Irving Hallowell, “Ojibwa Ontology, Behavior, and World View,” Contributions to Ojibwe Studies: Essays, 1934-1972, eds. Jennifer S.H. Brown and Susan Elaine Gray (Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 2010), p. 547.
