Reading : Origin Stories - 2

This creation story comes from the Yoruba people of Nigeria, Togo and Benin. In the religion of the Yoruba, the supreme being is Olorun, and assisting Olorun are a number of heavenly entities called orishas. This story was written down by David A. Anderson/ Sankofa, who learned it from his father, who learned it from his mother, and so on back through the Yoruba people and through time. ƬӇЄ ƓƠԼƊЄƝ ƇӇƛƖƝ Long ago, well before there were any people, all life existed in the sky. Olorun lived in the sky, and with Olorun were many orishas. There were both male and female orishas, but Olorun transcended male and female and was the all-powerful supreme being. Olorun and the orishas lived around a young baobab tree. Around the baobab tree the orishas found everything they needed for their lives, and in fact they wore beautiful clothes and gold jewelry. Olorun told them that all the vast sky was theirs to explore. All the orishashave savede, however, were content to stay near the baobab tree,

Obatala was the curious orisha who wasn't content to live blissfully by the baobab. Tree. Like all orishas, he had certain powers, and he wanted to put them to use. As he pondered what to do, he looked far down through the mists below the sky. As he looked and looked, he began to realize that there was a vast empty ocean below the mist. Obatala went to Olorun and asked Olorun to let him make something solid in the waters below. That way there could be beings that Obatala and the orishas could help with their powers. Touched by Obatala's desire to do something constructive, Olorun agreed to send Obatala to the watery world below. Obatala then asked Orunmila, the orisha who knows the future, what he should do to prepare for his mission. Orunmila brought out a sacred tray and sprinkled the powder of baobab roots on it. He tossed sixteen palm kernels onto the tray and studied the marks and tracks they made on the powder. He did this eight times, each time carefully observing the patterns. Finally, he told Obatala to prepare a chain of gold and to gather sand, palm nuts, and maize. He also told Obatala to get the sacred egg carrying the personalities of all the orishas.

Obatala went to his fellow orishas to ask for their gold, and they all gave him all the gold they had. He took this to the goldsmith, who melted all the jewelry to make the links of the golden chain. When Obatala realized that the goldsmith had made all the gold into links, he had the goldsmith melt a few of them back down to make a hook for the end of the chain. Meanwhile, as Orunmila had told him. Obatala gathered all the sand in the sky and put it in an empty snail shell, and with it, he added a little baobab powder. He put that in his pack, along with palm nuts, maize, and other seeds that he found around the baobab tree. He wrapped the egg in his shirt, close to his chest so that it would be warm during his journey.

Obatala hooked the chain into the sky, and he began to climb down the chain. For seven days he went down and down until finally he reached the end of the chain. He hung at its end, not sure what to do, and he looked and listened for any clue. Finally, he heard Orunmila, the seer, calling him to use the sand. He took the shell from his pack. And poured out the sand into the water below. The sand hit the water, and to his surprise, it spread and solidified to make a vast land. Still unsure what to do, Obatala hung from the end of the chain until his heart pounded so much that the egg cracked. From it flew Sankofa, the bird bearing the spirits of all the orishas. Like a storm, they blew the sand to make dunes and hills and lowlands, giving it character just as the orishas themselves have character. Finally, Obatala let go of the chain and dropped to this new land, which he called "Ife", the place that divides the waters. Soon he began to explore this land, and as he did so he scattered the seeds from his pack, and as he walked the seeds began to grow behind him so that the land turned green in his wake.

After walking for a long time, Obatala grew thirsty and stopped at a small pond. As he bent over the water, he saw his reflection and was pleased. He took some clay from the edge of the pond and began to mold it into the shape he had seen in the reflection. He finished that one and began another, and before long he had made many of these bodies from the dark earth at the pond's side. By then he was even thirstier than before, and he took juice from the newly-grown palm trees and it fermented into palm wine. He drank this, and drank some more, and soon he was intoxicated. He returned to his work of making more forms from the edge of the pond, but now he wasn't careful and made some without eyes or some with misshapen limbs. He thought they all were beautiful, although. later he realized that he had erred in drinking the wine and vowed to not do so again. Before long, Olorun dispatched Chameleon down the golden chain to check on Obatala's progress. Chameleon reported Obatala's disappointment at making figures that had form but no life. Gathering gasses from the space beyond the sky, Olorun sparked the gasses into an explosion that he shaped into a fireball. He sent that fireball to Ife, where it dried the lands that were still wet and began to bake the clay figures that Obatala had made. The fireball even set the earth to spinning, as it still does today. Olorun then blew his breath across Ife, and Obatala's figures slowly came to life as the first people of Ife.

This story comes from the Menominee or Menomoni people of northern Wisconsin. The Menominee derived much of their food from the sturgeon that came into the Menominee River and Wolf River each year to spawn. When forced to accept life on a reservation by the U.S. government, the tribe chose a reservation on the Wolf River so that they could continue their way of life. However, in 1892 a dam was built downstream, and the sturgeon has since been barred from coming upstream. A Sturgeon Ceremony is still held each year, but only with sturgeon hauled from downriver. 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙈𝙚𝙣𝙤𝙢𝙞𝙣𝙚𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙈𝙖𝙣𝙖𝙗𝙪𝙨𝙝 When Mashé Manido, the Great Spirit, first made the earth, he also created a large number of spirits. Some of these spirits were benevolent, but many were malevolent, and they went to live beneath the earth. Kishä Manido, the Good Spirit, was one of these spirits. He took a bear who lived near where the Menominee River flows into Green Bay and Lake Michigan and allowed the bear to change his form. The Bear, pleased at this gift from the Good Spirit, came out of the ground and changed into the first human.

Bear found himself alone and called to Eagle to join him. The eagle descended from the sky and took the form of a human too. Bear and Eagle were deciding who else to ask to join them when a beaver came by and asked to join their tribe. Beaver too became a human and, as a female, became the first woman. When Bear and Eagle came to a stream, they found a sturgeon, and Sturgeon became part of their tribe as well. It is from these early people that the Bear, Eagle, and Sturgeon clans of the Menominee originated. One day when Bear was going up a river, he got tired and stopped to rest. As he was talking to a wolf, a crane flew up to them. Bear asked the crane to fly him up the river, promising to take Crane into his tribe in return. As Crane and Bear were leaving, Wolf asked if he could join them, both for the trip and in their tribe. Crane took both of them on his back and flew them up the river, and this is how the Crane and Wolf clans came into the tribe of Menominee people.

Bear took the name Sekatcokemau. He built the first wigwam for his people, and built a canoe so that he and his people could catch fish like sturgeon. The Good Spirit provided the people with corn, and with medicinal plants. However, the Good Spirit realized that the Menominee were afflicted by hardship and disease from the malevolent spirits. To help his people, the Good Spirit sent his kindred spirit Manabush down to earth. Once there was an old woman named Nokomis who had an unmarried daughter, and the daughter gave birth to twin boys. One of the boys and his mother died. Nokomis wrapped the surviving boy in dry grass and put him under a wooden bowl to protect him while she buried the other boy and his mother. When she returned, she picked up the bowl and found a little white rabbit. She raised the rabbit, and he became the Great Rabbit, which is "Mashé Wabösh" in Menominee, or "Manabush".

When Manabush came of age, he had his grandmother make two drum sticks with which he drummed to call the people together to a long wigwam he had built. He taught them many useful things and gave them powerful medicines to cure diseases. He gave them medicine bags that were made of the hides of mink and weasel and rattlesnake and panther. From that first meeting comes the Grand Medicine Society of the Menominee today. Manabush went on to accomplish many great feats for his people. Once there was a great water monster who killed many people, especially fishermen. Manabush let the monster eat him and then stabbed it from inside and killed it. To get his people fire, Manabush went far to the east across the water to the wigwam of an old man and his daughters. The daughters found a little rabbit shivering outside their wigwam and took it in to warm it by their fire. Manabush grabbed an ember from the fire and fled back with it across the water, bringing fire to his people. Once he climbed a mountain and stole tobacco from a giant who kept it there, and he had to flee from the giant to bring tobacco back to his people. As he fled, he hid himself just before a cliff, and the giant ran past him and over the cliff. When the giant climbed back up the cliff, bleeding and bruised, Manabush grabbed him and threw him to the ground, making him the grasshopper that today can only chew at the tobacco plants in the fields. Once Manabush was out hunting and deceived some birds into singing with him. When they were close, he caught a swan and a goose on a sand bar and killed them for his dinner. However, by then he was tired, so he buried the birds up to their necks in sand, built a fire around them to cook them, and lay down to take a nap. When he awoke, he was hungry, and so he went to get his cooked birds. When he pulled at the necks, he came up with the heads and necks, but the bodies of the birds were missing. He ran out on the sand bar just in time to see people in canoes disappearing around a point of land. Realizing they had stolen his meal, he ran after them yelling "Winnebago! Winnebago!", which is the name the Menominee have used ever since for their thievish neighbors to the south.

This story comes from the Mossi people. Before the colonization of Africa, the Mossi lived in the Mogho kingdom, which today would be in Upper Volta. The story was first written down by Frederic Guirma, who learned it from his Mossi ancestors. тнє ηαвα ѕσυтнωєѕт In the beginning there was no earth, no day or night, and not even time itself. All that existed was the Kingdom of Everlasting Truth, which was ruled by the Naba Zid-Wende. The Naba Zid-Wende made the earth, and then they made the day and the night. To make the day a time to be busy, they made the sun, and to make the night a time of rest, they made the moon. In doing so, they made time itself.

At first the earth was covered with fire, but the Naba Zid-Wendé blew on the earth to cool the fire. They ordered the fire to live inside the earth, so that the surface would be safe for the humans they were going to make. Only very resentfully did the fire go into the carth. First the Naba Zid-Wendé made a chameleon, to see if the earth's outer crust would hold it up. When the crust held it up, the Naba Zid-Wendé made snakes to crawl on the earth, to see if it was cool enough to live on. When the snakes did not complain about their hellies, the Naba Zid-Wendé made the large animals, the elephant, the rhinoceros, and the buffalo. The crust was strong enough to hold up even them, and so the crust was solid and cool.

Finally, the Naba Zid-Wende were ready to create humans. They made them very black because black is a strong color, and to make them different from the sun, which is red, and from the moon, which is white. The Naba Zid-Wendé used their breath to blow a soul into the humans that they had made. The smile of the Naba Zid-Wendé at their human creations became the sky, and they hung the sky so low that humans could reach it and eat it for their food. They made stars out beyond the sky, and they made many other wonderful things for their humans. The humans nonetheless became arrogant and suspicious, and the humans began to claim that the Naba Zid-Wendé had hidden something valuable from them under the mountains. The humans dug under the mountains, but they only found a leper living there, and they let the leper go free from his subterranean prison.

This leper, however, was really the fire, and he soon burst into flames. Still angry at the Naba Zid-Wende and jealous of the humans, the fire was evil, and it burned the sky. The sky withdrew in pain, and withdrew all the way beyond the stars, back to the Kingdom of Everlasting Truth. No longer could the humans get their food from the sky. Their arrogance had ended that. The Naba Zid-Wendé nonetheless made clouds and rivers and streams to keep the earth wet, and they made plants for humans to have food and trees that produce fruit for them. They made flowers to make the earth beautiful and made the scents of the flowers to provide the smell of life.

The humans, however, multiplied and became more and more arrogant. To wash away the arrogance, the Naba Zid-Wendé made a big blue lake in which the humans should bathe. The humans were too busy to come to the lake, however, and that gave the evil fire time to throw hatred and envy into the lake. Only when the Naba Zid-Wende sent the sun to dry up the lake did the humans finally go there to bathe? The first group that went in bathed in the waters of hatred and division, and they came out white from head to toe. The second group that went in came out yellow from head to toe. The same happened to the third group that went in, except that they came out copper-red. By the time the last group went in, only a little water was left from the sun's efforts to dry up the lake, and the last group could only wash their hands and feet. They came out with soles and palms of white, yellow, or red, but the rest of their bodies were still black. The Naba Zid-Wendé came to earth later to see what they had created, and they were shaping one last animal out of a lump of clay as they came. The plants and animals celebrated the coming of the Naba Zid-Wende, but the human races were too busy dividing up the land and enslaving each other to notice. The Naba Zid-Wendé was so sad to see what the humans were doing that they forgot their last creation until it cried out to be given a head, legs, and a tail. The Naba Zid-Wendé sadly finished their lump of clay. Which is why the turtle has the shape it has.

This story is a synthesis of three stories from classical Chinese mythology. The stories come from The Classic of Mountains and Seas, an anthology of stories collected in the first century B.C. that were nearly as ancient then as the anthology seems to us today. Ꝓ𐤠Ɲ Ɠꓴ 𐤠ƝƊ Ɲꓴ Ⱳ𐤠 Long, long ago, when heaven and earth were still one, the entire universe was contained in an egg-shaped cloud. All the matter of the universe swirled chaotically in that egg. Deep within the swirling matter was Pan Gu, a huge giant who grew in the chaos. For 18,000 years he developed and slept in the egg. Finally one day he awoke and stretched, and the egg broke to release the matter of the universe. The lighter purer elements drifted upwards to make the sky and heavens, and the heavier impure elements settled downwards to make the earth.

In the midst of this new world, Pan Gu worried that heaven and earth might mix again; so he resolved to hold them apart, with the heavens on his head and the earth under his feet. As the two continued to separate, Pan Gu grew to hold them apart. For 18,000 years he continued to grow until the heavens were 30,000 miles above the earth. For much longer he continued to hold the two apart, fearing the return of the chaos of his youth. Finally, he realized they were stable, and soon after that, he died. With the immense giant's death, the earth took on a new character. His arms and legs became the four directions and the mountains. His blood became the rivers, and his sweat became the rain and dew. His voice became the thunder, and his breath became the winds. His hair became the grass, and his veins became the roads and paths. His teeth and bones became the minerals and rocks, and his flesh became the soil of the fields. Up above, his left eye became the sun, and his right eye became the moon. Thus in death, as in life, Pan Gu made the world as it is today.

Many centuries later, there was a goddess named Nü Wa who roamed this wild world that Pan Gu had left behind, and she became lonely in her solitude. Stopping by a pond to rest, she saw her reflection and realized that there was nothing like herself in the world. She resolved to make something like herself for the company. From the edge of the pond, she took some mud and shaped it in the form of a human. Being. At first, her creation was lifeless, and she set it down. It took life as soon as it touched the soil, however, and soon the human was dancing and celebrating its new life. Pleased with her creation, Nü Wa made more of them, and soon her loneliness disappeared in the crowd of little humans around her. For two days she made them, and still, she wanted to make more. Finally, she pulled down a long vine and dragged it through the mud, and then she swung the vine through the air. Droplets of mud flew everywhere and, when they fell, they became more humans that were nearly as perfect as the ones she had made by hand. Soon she had spread humans over the whole world. The ones she made by hand became the aristocrats, and the ones she made with the vine became the poor common people.

Even then, Nü Wa realized that her work was incomplete, because as her creations died she would have to make more. She solved this problem by dividing the humans into male and female, so that they could reproduce and save her from having to make new humans to break her solitude. Many years later, Pan Gu's greatest fear came true. The heavens collapsed so that there were holes in the sky, and the earth cracked, letting water rush from below to flood the earth. At other places, fire sprang forth from the earth, and everywhere wild beasts emerged from the forests to prey on the people. Nü Wa drove the beasts back and healed the earth. To fix the sky, she took stones of many colors from the river and built a fire in which she melted them. She used the molten rock to patch the holes in the sky, and she used the four legs of a giant turtle to support the sky again. Exhausted by her labors, she soon lay down to die and, like Pan Gu, from her body came many more features to adorn the world that she had restored.

This story is really two stories that come from the Native American people of Wisconsin. The first story is a Potawatomi story of the origin of humans, and the second concerns the Potawatorai, Ojibwe, and Ottawa peoples. 𝘼 𝙋𝙤𝙩𝙖𝙬𝙖𝙩𝙤𝙢𝙞 𝙎𝙩𝙤𝙧𝙮 Earthmaker made the world with trees and fields, with rivers, lakes, and springs, and with hills and valleys. It was beautiful. However, there weren't any humans, and so one day he decided to make some. He scooped out a hole in a stream bank and lined the hole with stones to make a hearth, and he built a fire there. Then he took some clay and made a small figure that he put in the hearth. While it baked, he took some twigs and made tongs. When he pulled the figure out of the fire and let it cool, he moved its limbs and breathed life into it, and it walked away. Earthmaker nonetheless realized that it was only half-baked. That figure became the white people.

Earthmaker decided to try again, and so he made another figure and put it on the hearth. This time he took a nap under a tree while the figure baked, and he slept longer than he intended. When he pulled the second figure out of the fire and had let it cool, he moved its limbs and breathed life into it, and it walked away. Earthmaker realized that this figure was overbaked, and it became the black people. Earthmaker decided to try one more time. He cleaned the ashes out of the hearth and built a new fire. Then he scooped up some clay and cleaned it of any twigs or leaves so that it was pure. He made a little figure and put it on the hearth, and this time he sat by the hearth and watched carefully as the figure baked. When this figure was done, he pulled it out of the fire and let it cool. Then he moved its limbs and breathed life into it, and it walked away. This figure was baked just right, and it became the red people.

The Red people became many tribes, and they spread across the land. Among these tribes were the Ojibwe, the Ottawa, and the Potawatomi. These three tribes were enemies and fought many battles. One Potawatomi man had ten sons, all of whom were killed in battle. Unbeknownst to him, there was an Ojibwe man who had lost ten sons in these battles, and there was an Ottawa man who had likewise lost ten sons. Each man mourned so much that they wandered away from their tribes, each looking for a place to die in the woods. The Ojibwe man walked and walked, and eventually, he came to a huge tree. The tree had four long roots stretching to the north, east, south, and west, and four huge branches that extended in the same directions. The tree also had one huge root that ran straight toward the center of the earth, and its center limb ran straight up into the sky. The tree was so beautiful, and the view from under it was so tranquil, that the man forgot his sorrow, and eventually he was happy.

As the Ojibwe man sat under the tree, he saw another man approaching in the distance. This newcomer was crying as he walked toward the tree, but eventually he saw the tree's beauty and stopped under it. The Ojibwe man said, "I lost ten sons in war and was so heartbroken that I wandered away to die, until I came to this tree. Why have you come here?" The newcomer, an Ottawa, said, "I too lost ten sons in war, and I lost myself in grief until I came to this place". The two men sat and talked of their troubles. As the two men talked, a third approached weeping. The first two watched as this third came to the tree. When they asked, the third man, a Potawatomi, told how he had lost ten sons in war and had walked in grief until he came to this beautiful place.

The three men talked and realized that their sons had died fighting in the same wars. They concluded that the Great Spirit had brought them together to this tranquil place, where they could hear the spirits speak. They agreed that there had been too much fighting between their tribes, and too much grief. They resolved to go back to their tribes and get them to live in peace. They made three pipes, and each took a pipe of tobacco home to his people as a symbol of peace. Ten days later, the three old men led their people to the great tree. Each man brought wood from which they built a fire together, and they cooked food from each tribe. They filled a pipe and offered its smoke to the Great Spirit above, to the spirits of the four directions, and then downward to the spirit that keeps the earth from sinking into the water. The tribes each smoked from the pipe of peace and ate of the common meal, and their chiefs agreed that they should live in peace. The three old men agreed to a set of rules to preserve the peace and to guide their people. This is how the Potawatomi, the Ojibwe, and Ottawa came to live in peace and to intermarry, as one people.

This story comes from Hawaii, where it was part of the Kumulipo, a chant recounting both the origin of the world and the genealogy of Hawaii's reigning family. The Kumulipo is a work of poetry with many shades of meaning and plays on words, and it also contains many subtle parables and parodies of rivals of the royal family. It is difficult to render the native Hawaiian word-play and rhyme into English prose, and while this version tries to maintain some of the juxtaposition of organisms with similar names, it can do so only in a limited way. In each section of the story, shades of darkness, each of which have their own names in Hawaiian, progress toward daylight and give birth to the life of the world. ƁƖⱤƬǶ ƖƝ ƬǶƸ Ɗ𐤠ⱲƝ When the earth first became hot and the heavens churned and the sun was dark, land emerged from the slime of the sea. The deepest darkness of caverns, a male, and the moonless darkness of night, a female, gave birth to the simple lifeforms of the sea. The coral that builds islands was born, and the grub, the sea cucumber, the sea urchin, the barnacle, the mussel, the limpet, and cowry, and the conch and other shellfish. Born was the seagrass, guarded by the tough landgrass on land; born was the Manauca moss of the sea, matched by the Manauea taro plant on land; born was the Kele seaweed, and the Ekele plant of the land.

Next the deep darkness of the deep sea and darkness broken by slivers of light in the moonlit forest gave birth to the fish of the sea. The porpoise was born, and the shark, and the goatfish, and the eel, and the octopus, and the stingray, and the bonito, and the albacore, and the mackerel and mullet, and the sturgeon. Born was the Kauila eel of the sea, matched by the Kauila tree on land; born was the Kupoupou fish of the sea, and the Kou tree on land; born was the A'awa fish of the sea, guarded by the 'Awa plant of the land. Trains of walruses and schools of fish swam past the coral ridges, still in the darkness of night. Next darkness of night and night that just barely breaks into dawn gave birth to the flying creatures. The caterpillar was born, and the moth to which it leads; the ant was born, and the dragonfly that it becomes; the grub was born, and the grasshopper that it becomes. The snipe was born, and the turnstone and the mudhen, and the crow and the rail, and the albatross and the curlew, and the stilt and the heron. Born was the sea-duck of the islands, and the wild duck that lives on land; born was Hehe bird of the sea, matched by the Nene goose on land.

Next, as the sea advanced onto the land and passed back and forth across it, the light of earliest dawn and half-darkness produced the crawling creatures that come from the sea. The rough-backed turtle was born, and the horn-billed turtle and the dark-red turtle. The lobster and gecko were born and the mud-dwelling creatures that leave their tracks in the sand. Born was the Wili sea-borer of the sea, and the Wilwili tree on land; born was the Opeope jellyfish of the sea, and the Oheohe bamboo of the land. Thus the crawling animals were born in the night, creeping and crawling onto the land. Next were born the animals of the land, including the dog and rat. Then, in the stillness as the light of dawn came across the land, were born La'ila'i, a woman, and Ki'i, a man, and Kane, a god, and Kanaloa, the octopus. From the union of La'ila'i with Ki'i and Kane came humanity, waves of people who came from afar. Born was Hahapo'el, a girl, and Ha-popo, another girl, in the upland valleys whence chiefs arose. Born were humans, spreading across the earth, and now it was day.

1. This story comes from the Wakaranga people of what is today Zimbabwe. ȴƖƑƸ ƑⱤⰙ𐒄 𐒄ⰙⰙƝ 𐤠ƝƊ ƬǶƸ ⳜƬ𐤠ⱤⳜ Before there was any life on earth, God made a man and named him Moon. He sent Moon to live on the bottom of the sea, but Moon wanted to live on the land. Despite God's warnings of how hard life would be, Moon went to live on land. 2. Eventually, the lifelessness of the land made Moon so unhappy that he wept. God took pity on Moon and sent him a wife named Morningstar to keep him company for two years. When Morningstar came from heaven to live with Moon, she brought fire with her, for it had not existed on earth before. She built a fire in the middle of Moon's hut and slept on the side opposite him. In the night, however, he crossed over and made love to her. By the next morning, she was swollen, and she gave birth to the grasses and trees and other plants, and soon the world was green with life. The trees grew until they touched the sky, and then the first rain fell from the clouds that they touched. Thus life on the land flourished, and Moon and Morningstar led a bountiful life in their new paradise. 3. At the end of her two years, Morningstar returned to the heavens to live there forever. Again Moon wept in his loneliness. God offered him another wife, but he warned Moon that this time the husband would die after two years. Thus Eveningstar came to live with the moon. When they first made love, she gave birth to goats and sheep and cows the next day. On the day after that, she gave birth to the antelopes and birds. On the third day, boys and girls were born. Moon wanted to sleep again with an Eveningstar, but God warned him that he should not. He did so, however, and on the next day, Eveningstar gave birth to the lions, the leopards, the snakes, and the scorpions that plague humankind because Moon ignored the warning. 4. As Moon's daughters grew up, they became beautiful, and he wanted to sleep with them too. He did so, and they had many children. Thus Moon came to rule over a far-flung kingdom of his descendents. Eveningstar was jealous, however, and she sent a snake to bite her unfaithful husband. He soon fell ill, and the rainfall that his people had enjoyed stopped. As the rivers dried up and famine began, his people concluded that it was his fault. Eventually, they rose up and strangled him, and they set another man in his place as king. The people threw Moon's body into the ocean, but he rose from the sea to the skies to seek his first wife Morningstar, in the hope of reliving their life in the paradise they had made.

This story comes from the Seneca people, who lived in the Iroquois Nation in what is now central and western New York and Pennsylvania. This story is a synthesis of two stories recorded on the Cattaraugus Reservation in New York by Jeremiah Curtin in the 1880's and J.N.B. Hewitt in the 1890's. Curtin and Hewitt collected their stories from several elderly Seneca, including Abraham Johnny-John, Solomon O'Bail, George Titus, George Armstrong, Zachariah Jimeson, Andrew Fox, Henry Jacob, Henry Silverheels, Peter White, and Black Chief. Phoebe Logan, Truman Halftown, and Chief Priest Henry Stevens. ƬⱲⰙ ƁⱤⰙƬǶƸⱤⳜ 𐤠ƝƊ ƬǶƸƖⱤ ƓⱤ𐤠ƝƊ𐒄ⰙƬǶƸⱤ Long ago, before this earth existed, humans lived in the sky, and they were ruled by a great chief. This chief's lodge was near a tall tree that had white blossoms and that every year produced corn for the people to eat. When this tree bloomed, there was light, but once its blossoms fell, darkness descended until its next flowering.

Once this chief's daughter became ill with a disease no one had seen before. Despite her people's best efforts to cure her, she did not get well, and all the people were worried, Someone in the tribe dreamed that she would be cured if the tree was pulled up by its roots. No one in the tribe wanted to do that, so they ignored the dream as an aberration. This person had another dream that the people must dig a trench around the tree and uproot it to save the chief's daughter, but again the dream went ignored. Only after a third such dream did the people begin digging. They dug a trench around the tree, severing the roots as they went. When the last root was cut, the tree disappeared into the ground, into what seemed to be a bottomless hole. Many of the people were distraught, and one young man in particular complained about the destruction of the tree. The chief's daughter had been brought to the tree in hopes that she would be cured, and the young man was so angry that he kicked her into the hole. Soon she disappeared from the view of her people as she fell into the apparent abyss.

The young woman fell through the darkness, but eventually, it became light and she saw that she was falling into the water, and in fact, there was no land at all in sight. The animals saw her, however, and they resolved to save her. In the loon's direction, the fishhawk flew up to catch her, and the fishhawk deposited her on the turtle's back. Even Turtle grew tired of holding her, however, and the animals decided they needed land on which to place her. Several dove down to find mud in the water, but they failed until Toad tried and came back with some wet dirt. Soon the other diving animals did likewise, and Beaver patted the mud down on Turtle's back to make an island. Before long the island was quite large, and bushes began to grow at its banks. The young woman recovered from her disease, and in fact she soon gave birth to a daughter. She raised her daughter on the island, and they ate potatoes that they grew there. When they went out to dig potatoes, she warned her daughter that she must always face the West. This was so that the west wind could not enter her and make her pregnant. The daughter nonetheless disobeyed, and soon she was heavy with a child. She could hear twins inside her debating how to exit her body. One was born naturally, but the other was born through his mother's armpit, and she died from the wound.

1. The two brothers grew up together, but the younger was disagreeable and angry. They decided that the island needed more life, so they the made the forests and lakes. One day they divided the island in half, with each to make his own animals. The older brother made human beings, and he breathed life into them. He also made many animals that were fat and slow moving, he made the sycamore tree bear fruit, and he made the rivers flow both ways, with one half going upstream and one half going downstream. The younger brother also made many animals, including a huge mosquito that knocked down trees when it flew, and he made his half of the island rocky and full of ledges and precipices. The younger brother tried to make humans, but he could only make ugly animals, and in his anger he vowed that he would make animals that would eat humans. The two brothers returned home to their grandmother's lodge, and decided that the next day they would go out to see what each other had done. First they went to the younger brother's half, where the older brother was distressed at the huge mosquito that could kill his people. 2. He grabbed the mosquito and rubbed it between his hands until it was tiny, and it flew away when he blew on it. Then they went to see the older brother's half of the island, where the younger brother was disgusted because life would be too casy for the humans. He took many of his brother's animals and made them smaller and faster so they couldn't be caught, and he made the fruit of the sycamore tiny and unpalatable, and he made all the rivers flow downstream so that humans would have to work to travel. Soon the two brothers got into a terrible fight about how each had changed the other's half of the island, and in their battle the older brother was killed. The older brother went to his home in the sky, where those who live good lives go to join him, and the younger brother went on to spread evil, and when evil people die they are tormented by him because he could not make a human.

1. This story comes from the Wichita people of southern Oklahoma and eastern Texas, The story was told by the Wichita chief, Towakoni Jim, to George Dorsey, who compiled Wichita stories. The Wichita religion centered on the worship of the heavenly bodies, as the conclusion of this story suggests. ƬӇЄ MƠƠƝ ƛƝƊ ƬӇЄ MƠƦƝƖƝƓ ƧƬƛƦ In the beginning, there was neither sun, nor stars, nor anything else that we know today. For a long time, the only man was Man-never-known-on-Earth. He created everything. When he created the world, he created land and water, but they were not separate, and still, everything was dark. Then Man-never-known-on-Earth created a man who was known as Man-with-the-Power-to-Carry-Light and a woman named Bright-Shining-Woman. Everything that they needed, they dreamed of, and it was there when they awoke. Bright-Shining-Woman received an ear of corn and knew that it would be the food of generations to come. 2. Still, there was nothing but darkness. Without knowing why, Man-with-the-Power-to-Carry-Light began a journey to the east, moving slowly through the darkness. He came to a stranger who told him that there would be many villages and many people in the future and that it would be up to Man-with-the-Power-to-Carry-Light to teach them. As they talked, a voice from the east called to this stranger to shoot a black-and-white deer that would follow a white deer and a black deer out of a stream nearby. Four times the stranger had to tell the impatient voice that he was preparing a bow and arrow to shoot the deer. Finally, he emerged from his lodge as the deer jumped out of the water, and he shot the black-and-white deer. 3. This meant that the earth would turn, that the stars would move and that there would be day and night. The stranger, whose name was Star-that-is-always-moving, went to follow the deer that he had wounded, but Man-with-the-Power- to-Carry-Light stayed by the shore. From where the voice had spoken, he now saw the sunrise for the first time. He returned to his home, but he traveled much faster now that it was light. That night he saw three stars in the sky, with another star nearby, and he concluded that they were the three deer and the man who followed them. After there was light, villages and people multiplied, as the stranger had predicted. Man-with-the-Power-to-Carry-Light and Bright-Shining-Woman went from village to village, teaching the people. Man-with-the-Power-to-Carry-Light taught the men about bows and arrows, and he taught them to play the ball game and the shiny game. 4. Bright-Shining-Woman taught the women about corn, how to grow corn, how to feed the people with corn, how to offer some corn at each meal to Man-never-known-on- Earth, how to take four kernels and rub them on their child as a prayer. She also taught them the double-ball game. She told them that, after she was gone, they could look at her face to tell when their monthly bleeding should occur, and by counting her appearances they could keep track of when their children would be born. Then she left them, and that night the first moon came up because she was the Moon. Man-with-the-Power-to-Carry-Light taught the men that they must offer some of the game that they caught to the moon and to the stars and to the other supernatural beings. He told them that he would leave them, but that they would see him sometime in the early morning. When they saw him, they were to take their children to drink and bathe in the river, which would give them a long life. Then he left them and became the Morning Star.