The Squamish, indigenous people from this area, consider the Chief to be a place of spiritual significance. The Squamish language name for the mountain is ( is usually translated as "chief" though it is really a social ranking), and their traditions say it is a longhouse transformed to stone by Xáays, as the Transformer Brothers are known in this language. The great cleft in the mountain's cliff-face in Squamish legend is a mark of corrosion left by the skin of Sínulhka, a giant two-headed sea serpent.