ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses upon Beaver Indian myths and legends. Pliny E. Goddard collected a series of stories from the Fort Vermilion Beaver at the beginning of this century. These provide a native perspective on historic events. The chapter discusses fur trade post journals, district reports and account bodes contain additional vital information, particularly with respect to local group sizes. If groups like the Beaver and Slavey avoided extensive dependency and carried out economic activities similar to those of the prehistoric past, may legitimately inquire if fundamental principles of group formation held during the early fur trade. Myths have provided fertile ground for anthropological thought; approaches have included treatment of myth as history, as social charter, as dream or as codified social ontology. The key tenet in the local group developmental processes given for the Beaver involved the tendency toward local group endogamy.
