With news of the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan, B.C.'s First Nations people are recounting 300-year-old stories about the last giant wave to hit this side of the Pacific.
For generations, elders have told the legend of the tsunami of 1700, a wave so powerful it wiped out entire villages, and archaeologists have found canoes lodged in the tops on mountains.
Artist Bill Helin, a member of the Tsimshian Nation, told CTV News he heard the story of the wave from his grandmother.
According to legend, a chief was spoken to in a dream. The creator, a raven, warned him that there would be a cleansing of all who disrespected the earth.
"He was warned to move his people up the mountains, because this great wave was going to come and cleanse the coastline," Helin said.
They were told to build canoes and leave with whatever they could take.
Then, on the night of Jan. 26, "They watched and listened in the evening as this great creature from the sea churned up the ocean and pushed a wave all up and down the coast," Helin said.
They returned to find that their village had been spared.
"I think that really tied into what my ancestors felt was a message from the creator," he said.
After the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami in Southeast Asia, people reported that animals fled to higher ground before the wave hit.
According to B.C. legend, the First Nations people followed wildlife up the mountains, too.
"They were quite in tune with nature, quite in tune with what the animals were all about," Helin said.
When the Japanese earthquake hit last week, B.C. was spared any damage from the tsunami. But the quake of 1700 was a different story; it caused five-metre-high waves all the way on the other side of the Pacific Ocean.
"We know this because the Japanese have meticulous records of damage from that earthquake," said John Clague, geologist at Simon Fraser University.
With a report from CTV British Columbia's St. John Alexander
