This is a personal advertising for those (of my friends) who may ask where
does > come from ? Note that, in this indian (Huron) story, that
Tijus-Keha is not responsible for wolves and snakes..
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The following story is found in the book, "In the Beginning; Creation
Stories from Around the World", told by Virginia Hamilton and illustrated
by Barry Moser, (ISBN 0-15-238740-4), Library of Congress
Cataloging-in-Publication Data, 1988..
The Woman Who Fell From the Sky: Divine Woman the Creator
In the beginning there was only one water and the water animals that
lived in it.
Then a woman fell from a torn place in the sky.. She was a divine woman,
full of power. Two loons flying over the water saw her falling. They flew
under her, close together, making a pillow for her to sit on.
The loons held her up and cried for help. They could be heard for a long
way as they called for other animals to come.
The snapping turtle called all the other animals to aid in saving the
divine woman's life.
The animals decided the woman needed earth to live on.
Turtle said, "Dive down in the water and bring up some earth."
So they did that, those animals. A beaver went down. A muskrat went down.
Others stayed down too long, and they died.
Each time, Turtle looked inside their mouths when they came up, but there
was no earth to be found.
Toad went under the water. He stayed too long, and he nearly died. But
when Turtle looked inside Toad's mouth, he found a little earth. The woman
took it and put it all around on Turtle's shell. That was the start of the
earth.
Dry land grew until it formed a country, then another country, and all
the earth.. To this day, Turtle holds up the earth.
Time passed, and the divine woman had twin boys. They were opposites, her
sons.
One was good, and one was bad. One was born as children are usually born,
in a normal way. But the other one broke out of his mother's side, and she
died.
When the divine woman was buried, all of the plants needed for life on
earth sprang fromt he ground above her. From her head came the pumpkin
vine. Maize came from her chest. Pole beans grew from her legs.
The divine woman's sons grew up. The evil one was Tawis-karong. The good
one was Tijus-keha. They were to prepare the earth so that humans could
live on it. But they found they could not live together. And so they
separated, with each one taking his own portion of the earth to prepare.
The bad brother, Tawis-karong, made monstrous animals, fierce and
terrifying. He made wolves and bears, snakes, and patnerhs of giant size.
He made mosquitoes huge, the size of wild turkeys. And he made an enormous
toad. It drank up the dresh water that was on the earth. All of it.
The good brother, Tijus-kaha, made proper animals that were of use to
human beings.
He made the dove, and the mockingbird, and the partridge. And one day, the
partridge flew toward the land of Tawis-karong.
"Why do you go there?" Tijus-kaha asked the partridge.
"I go because there is no water. And I hear there is some in your
brother's land," said the partridge.
Tijus-kaha didn't believe the bird. So he followed, and finally he came
to his evil brother's land. He saw all of the outlandish, giant animals his
brother had made.
Tijus-kaha didn't beat them down.
And then he saw the giant toad. He cut it open. Out came the earth's
freash water.
Tijus-kaha didn't kill any [more] of his brother's creations.. But he
made them smaller, of normal size so that human beings could be leaders
over them.
His mother's spirit came to Tijus-kaha in a dream. She warned him about
his evil brother. And sure enough, one day, the two brothers had to come
face to face. They decided they could not share the earth. They would have
a duel to see who would be master of the world.
Each had to overcome the other witha single weapon. Tijus-keha, the good,
could only be killing if beaten to death with a bag full of corn or beans.
The evil brother could be killed only by using the horn of a deer or other
wild animal. then the brothers fixed the fighting ground where the battle
would begin.
The first turn went to the evil brother, Tawis-karong. He pounded his
brother with a bag of beans. He beat him until Tijus-kaha was nearly dead.
But not quite. He got his strength back, and he chased Tawis-karong. Now it
was his turn.
He beat his evil brother with a deer horn. Finally, Tijus-keha took his
brother's life away. But still the evil brother wasn't completely
destroyed.
After he died, Tawis-karong came to Tijus-keha, appearing before him.
"I have gone to the far west," he said. "All the races of men will follow
me to the west when they die."
It is the belief of the Hurons to theis day. When they die, their spirits
go to the far west, where they will dwell forever.
COMMENT: The Hurons are a confederacy of American Indians originally of the
St.Lawrence Valley. This creation myth falls into the Earth-Diver
category. In this type of myth, a being-- sometimes divine, often an
animal-- dives into the water to bring up small amounts of soil. From this
soil, the earth is formed.
http://homepages.go.com/~neon101/legends/Crea_Wom1.htmlCharles Tijus
Laboratoire CNRS ESA-7021 "Cognition Activités Finalisées"
Université de Paris 8 - 2, rue de la Liberté 93526 St Denis Cédex 02
Tel: 01 49 40 64 79 - Fax: 01 49 40 67 54
mailto:tijus@univ-paris8.fr