This is an IHeart podcast.

Guaranteed Human.

Welcome to Aaron Menke's Cabinet of Curiosity's, A Production of IHeart Radio and Grim and Mild.

Our world is full of the unexplainable.

And if history is an open book, all of these amazing tales are right there on display, just waiting for us to explore.

Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosity's.

It's impossible to understate how important ancestors are to human society.

It's easy to evoke the concept as some ancient belief, but it never really has gone away.

We honor those who came before us, regardless of our religion, political belief,

or culture. The ancestors brought us to where we are. Their knowledge is how we built our cities,

because at the end of the day, no society can exist entirely in the present and the future.

But what do we do when our ancestors have a more sinister reputation, when their knowledge and wisdom was important, but their actions were despicable?

It turns out this conundrum is as old as time itself.

It exists in legends that predate written history.

The Kauia people of the Western United States have a legend that tells this story, and it's

one that still resonates today.

Centuries before Spanish colonization, they lived in the canyons and deserts that would become

Southern California.

One of their first leaders was a shaman named Takwitz.

His knowledge and skill with medicine came from Mukat, creator of all things,

and he led the Kauiya people wisely, teaching them how to become shamans of their own.

He was something greater than a human, a spirit who guided his people and showed them right

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