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Native North
American mythologies stress the importance of achieving a harmonious relationship
with the spirit world and with the ultimate source of life. This “great spirit”
is not perceived as an anthropomorphic deity but as a non-personal life-force;
its names include the Ojibwa manitos, the Iroquois orenda, and
the Lakota (or Sioux) wakan tanka. Myths of the origin of the world
describe how raw matter was shaped by supernatural beings, and how human beings
arrived in this world from other regions, sometimes via caves.
The entire
physical universe, from stones and trees to the wind and Sun, is imbued with
spiritual beings, and the divide between human and animal is often blurred.
Folk tales evoke a pre-human age when animals talked and behaved like people;
bears in particular are believed to be separated from humans only by their disguise
of fur. Guardian or ancestor spirits (a clan's or individual's totem) appear in
animal form. In the forest regions of the Eastern Woodlands and the Northwest
Coast especially, direct personal contact with these spirits is considered
important. This is achieved through the “vision quest”, involving seclusion
from the group, fasting, and other trials. Once confronted through the vision
quest, the powers of the guardian spirit could be invoked by displaying its
form on shields and other personal possessions.
Widespread
communal rituals include the smoking of a sacred pipe and the sweat lodge
ceremony. The sweat lodge is a compact structure in which heated stones are
placed and steam created by sprinkling them with water from a small sacred
spoon. Gathered in the sweat lodge, men endure its extremes of heat and
confinement in pursuit of the vision quest. More theatrical public rituals
include the Sun Dance (see below) and the masked dances and potlatch ceremonies
of the Northwest Coast (the potlatch involves extravagant gift-giving,
sometimes with the deliberate destruction of possessions, as a way of
validating status). Modern Native American spirituality continues to develop,
both within and outside the orbit of Christianity.
Mediating between
the human and spirit realms is the shaman, a man or woman who has undergone
visionary out-of-body experiences and has retained the ability to converse with
spirits and travel to their world through “soul fight”. Important shamanic
powers include healing, the interpretation of dreams and knowledge of the
future, and the ability to ensure successful hunting and warfare.
Many stories
feature trickster figures, who may take human or animal form—for example, that
of a rabbit, spider, or coyote. Tricksters are irrepressible practical-jokers
who flout convention and cause mischief but who are simultaneously associated
with creative and magical powers. The best known of these figures is Coyote,
who features in many stories alongside his companion, Wolf. Like the Norse
deity Loki, Coyote brings benefits to human beings in his role as culture hero,
but he also appears as a licentious, greedy clown, the focus for obscene or
erotic tales.
The peoples of the
Arctic coasts of Alaska and Canada—now more generally referred to as the Inuit
(the plural of inua, “soul”, meaning “people”) rather than the
Eskimo—live at the limits of the habitable world, and their arts of survival
are adapted to this environment in a highly specialized way. Traditional beliefs
focus on the proximity of the populous spirit world and emphasize the need for
close attention to the inua, or soul, which exists in every object and
creature, from ice and stones to seals, whales, and polar bears. Major
superhuman powers include the Great Sea Spirit, who rules the animal realm and
provides hunters with their quarry; the Moon Spirit; and the Air Spirit, who
controls the weather and climate.
The Inuit believe
that souls are continually recycled, and that, if properly honoured, the inua
of a dead animal will be reincarnated as future prey. Thus in the winter
Bladder Festival, the inflated bladders of seals and other mammals are pushed
back into the sea through holes made in the ice.
According to the
Inuit origin myth, seals, walruses, and whales originally sprang from the
severed fingers of a girl. She had married a bird (in some versions a dog), but
her father killed her husband and forced the girl to return with him in his
boat. During a storm she was thrown overboard but managed to hold on by her
fingers. When her father chopped them off, they were transformed into sea
creatures and devoured the father, while the girl became the Great Sea Spirit,
also known as Sedna or Arnaknagsak.
Sedna's house
beneath the sea is known as Adlivun, a place from which a dead soul sometimes
returns to its earthly village as a malignant tupilaq. Blessed spirits,
on the other hand, inhabit a region of perpetual happiness in the sky known as
Qudlivun.
The vast region of
the Great Plains stretches east from the Rocky Mountains to the Mississippi
valley and central Texas. Through their conflict in the later 19th century with
westward-migrating white settlers, the indigenous peoples of this area,
including the Sioux, Crow, Cheyenne, and Comanche, have come to be seen as the
archetypal Native Americans. Their warlike, nomadic way of life was based on
mobile encampments of tepees and on the hunting of bison on horseback. This
typical Plains culture in fact flourished for little over a century from about
1770, following the introduction of horses and guns through trade with
Europeans.
The primal creator
spirit is known as wakan tanka or tirawa, from whom the major
deities—Sun, Sky, Earth, and Rock—had their being. These in turn gave rise to
other divine manifestations, including Moon, Wind, Thunderbird, and, at a lower
level, humanity itself.
Thunderbird is a
spirit of thunder and warfare but also a bringer of good fortune. Thunder is
caused by the flapping of its wings, lightning by the opening and shutting of
its eyes, or by its tearing up trees in search of insects to eat. Some myths
attribute thunder to the antics of Thunder Boys, as in the Cherokee myth in
which Wild Boy and Tame Boy play ball in the sky.
The best-known
ritual associated with Plains culture is the spectacular Sun Dance. This is
performed in a circle around a central pole symbolizing the connection between
the upper and lower worlds. In its earlier form (a toned-down version is still
danced today) participants in the Sun Dance practised self-mutilation and might
continue dancing for days until they collapsed from exhaustion.
The Woodlands
region extends across Canada and down the eastern United States from the St
Lawrence River and Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. Its landscape is very
varied, ranging from mountains and forests in the north to the swamplands of
the south, and wildlife of all kinds is particularly richly represented in the
native mythologies of the region. In addition to hunting and fishing, limited agriculture
was practised in many Woodlands areas, with thanksgiving rituals marking the
times of planting and harvest.
The sky and
celestial bodies were believed to be inhabited by powerful spirits, as were
animals, birds, and plants, and totemistic beliefs were widespread. The
totem—usually an animal—is very closely identified with an individual or group:
it may represent an earlier or alternative incarnation, or an ancestral figure.
Other supernatural beings included the trickster Wenebojo and the giant windigo
who roamed the forest in search of human prey. It was believed that a hunter
who lost his way in the forest might be forced to turn cannibal; once he had
tasted human flesh, he became a windigo. The Great Lynx or underwater
panther was a malevolent spirit inhabiting lakes and rivers; its battles with
Thunderbird caused storms and floods.
Woodlands
cosmogonies include the Iroquois myth in which a pregnant woman fell from the
sky to land on the back of a turtle. Animals brought mud from the depths to make
the world, which was then fashioned into the forms of present reality by the
woman's grandsons, Good Mind and Evil Mind. From the dead woman's body sprang
food plants such as corn and beans.
In the coastal
areas of western Canada and the north-western United States, rich fishing
grounds and other natural resources allowed the indigenous peoples to develop a
way of life that included time for elaborate rituals and performances. Rather
than being sought out by individuals, guardian animal spirits—for example the
Raven, Wolf, and Eagle—are inherited by clan members, and their images are used
in a heraldic manner on elaborate carved and painted artefacts such as masks
and the so-called totem poles (these in fact serve either as grave markers and
memorials or as house portals).
Highly theatrical
ceremonies include the Kwakiutl initiation ritual in which a young man,
believed to be kidnapped by a spirit, leaves the group to return in a wild and unmanageable
state. His reintegration is marked by elaborate masquerade and dancing.
In the arid lands
of the American south-west settled communities have a history going back well
before European contact. In the pueblos (villages) of this region, many
traditional religious beliefs and practices have continued to the present day.
The Hopi creation
myth describes how three caves originally existed below this world. The earth
gave birth to the first living things, which inhabited the lowest cave until it
became overcrowded. Two heavenly twin brothers then arrived, bringing a cane
plant, up which the creatures could climb to the second cave, then the third.
The twins then brought fire, allowing a form of civilized life to develop
before finally leading humanity into the present, fourth world.
The theme of the
culture hero—a figure who, like the Hopi twins, brings knowledge and thus the
possibility of development to humanity—is common to many mythologies of the
south-west. Navajo stories recount how two semi-divine boys, also twins, are
badly injured and set out in search of the gods. Their quest leads to a
miraculous cure, the secret of which is passed on to humankind before the twins
return to the realm of the gods.
The Navajo healing
ritual, forms of which are still practised, culminates in the creation of a
symbolic sand painting. When the patient sits on the sand painting, the images
are transferred to his or her body, with curative effect. The exact meaning of
these ephemeral paintings, made by carefully running lines of coloured sand
through the fingers, is known only to initiates but they clearly contain
stylized mythological figures.
Religious practice centres on the kiva, or underground ceremonial room, or on open plazas in the pueblos, where dancers impersonate ancestral katchina spirits in rituals intended to ensure fertility.