Variations: Akhlut (erroneously)
Around the coastlines of the Bering Strait, pack ice constantly breaks off and floats away. If there are wolf tracks on the ice, and a chunk of that breaks loose, then it looks as if the prints lead into the water’s edge, or as if a wolf came out of the sea. Yupik folklore holds that this is evidence of the Kăk-whăn’-û-ghăt Kǐg-û-lu’-nǐk.
A kăk-whăn’-û-ghăt kǐg-û-lu’-nǐk is a killer whale (akh’-lut) that can shapeshift at will into a wolf (kǐg-û-lu’-nǐk) to hunt on land. The name of kăk-whăn’-û-ghăt kǐg-û-lu’-nǐk is applied to those creatures when in wolf form. They are aggressive and will kill humans if given the chance.
The kăk-whăn’-û-ghăt kǐg-û-lu’-nǐk is typically depicted as halfway through its transformation – whale at one end and wolf at the other. The beluga whale and caribou are a similarly symbiotic pair, becoming a whale in the sea and a reindeer on land.
References
Nelson, E. W. (1900) The Eskimo about Bering Strait. Extract from the Eighteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, Government Printing Office, Washington.
