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Cherokee Creation Myth
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Cherokee Creation Myth
By Asa Parnell and AC Anderson
How Man Came to Be
There was a brother and a sister. The brother hits his sister with a fish and tells her to multiply. There was a child born every seven days until they earth could almost not hold them all. So it was made that a women can only have one child a year.
The Underworld
The underworld is identical in every way to the surface world omitting the seasons. At first, the animals were told to stay awake for seven nights to keep watch. By the end of the seven nights only the panther, the owl, and a one or two more animals had stayed awake. These animals were given the ability to see at night, thus creating nocturnal animals.
Sources
"Cherokee Indians: Story of Creation." Cherokee Indians: Story of Creation. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Apr. 2014.
The Buzzard
The Craw Fish
The animals retrieved the sun. The set the sun in a track just above them; it would travel on this track daily from East to West. Tsiskagili, the craw fish, turned red and his meat spoiled because the sun was much too close to the earth. They raised the sun seven hand breadths high; that is why the highest place is called Gulkwagine Digalunlatiyun meaning "the seventh height".
The "great buzzard" was sent down to check on the new earth created to see if it was dry. As he flew low his wings hit the ground making valleys and when they came up, they made mountains.
The Water-beetle
Before the earth was created, there was only water and the animals lived in Galunlati. It was becoming too crowded, and the animals were curious about what was under the water. "Beaver's Grandchild", the water-beetle, Dayunisi volunteered to go into the water to see what was underneath. He did not find any solid ground on the surface of the water, so he dove to the bottom where there was soft mud. He brought the mud to the surface where it began to expand in every direction until it created the island called earth.