Saturday, October 09, 2004

Who is RAVEN?











...that trickster guy

The traditional Northwest Coast creation story involves the sun, moon, people and raven. In the beginning, people didn't have a sun, and had to do all of their work by starlight. This made things very difficult for everyone, including raven, who was tired of the fly by night business. .




A powerful and wealthy aristocrat, who was also a chief, owned the sun and the moon. He kept them in boxes in his house. After a nasty crash into another tree in the dark, raven was very angry. "Who does this chief think he is that he can own the sun and the moon, and keep the rest of us in the dark," he cawed with righteous indignation. Raven paid a visit to the chief with the sun and the moon. After observing the scene from a perch high in a tree, he noticed that the chief had a daughter and that the boxes with the moon and sun were kept in the house. He thought up a strategy and set about his work.

When the chief's daughter went to get water from the stream, raven turned himself into a spruce needle and floated into her basket of water. When she drank from it, he impregnated her with himself. The new baby raven was immaculate in every way. He was born a healthy baby boy, who looked like a miniature of his new grandfather, who couldn't have been more pleased. Grandfather was curious as to who the father was, but waited for his daughter to tell him on her own terms.

The chief was obliging and kind to his new grandson, and spoiled him. Nothing was denied his grandson, and raven delighted in spilling food on his grandfather, pulling his mustache hair out and screaming at him when he wasn't fast enough serving him. Baby raven also got a special pleasure from rubbing mud on his grandfathers' finest robes while sitting on his lap. Raven laughed openly at his grandfather, who was grumbling to himself while cleaning up the mess.

The only thing the chief denied his grandson was to play with the box of daylight. By this time, raven was very, very good at throwing fierce tantrums that made his grandfather shake. The chief was weary of the scenes and finally one day acquiesced to baby raven. Raven snatched the sun from the box and darted out of the smoke hole in the ceiling with it. Until this time, raven was white, and the trip through the smoke hole made him black, as he is today. As he was ferociously pumping his now black wings to the sky, the small feathers on his head were starting to smoke and his beak was hot. Raven looked down to see the chief storming out the door, his regal robes flying behind him as he shook his fist at him, mouthing some choice words. With a flick of his head, raven shot the sun high into the first morning light of the land. As he soared home the only thing he could think of was, "I'm going to miss teasing the old fart... was that a moon I saw in the other box?"
Larry McNeil - Fly By Night Mythology

If you would like to read more about Raven,
Here are a few links.
Raven and Crow's Potlatch


Raven and The Tides

Raven and The First Men

RAVEN Stories: Background