Week 14 Readings A and B: Russian Folk Tales!

This week I chose to read Russian Folk Tales ! This, like the Kalevala, is something I’ve been interested in for a while but have never really gotten around to investigating for myself.

The Three Copecks

Already I can tell these folk tales are going to be a strange affair. This story was like watching the domino effect. To be clear, a copeck is a small unit of money (probably equivalent to one of our pennies or nickels).

The story focuses on this one orphan who goes from job to job. At his first job, he collects three copecks after three years of work (a real rip-off if you ask me) and decides to buy a cat with them. This I can be on board with. I’m all about collecting cats. Or rather, I would be if my apartment complex didn’t have a ridiculous non-refundable deposit for them.

After he buys this cat he goes to work for a merchant who eventually becomes rich. The merchant sails overseas, taking the poor boys’ cat with him. He promises that if anything should happen to the cat he will pay the boy back in full.

So he goes overseas to a land that has no cats and is infested with mice and rats and stays the night in a hotel room. In the morning, the hotel manager finds a pile of dead mice and begs the man to sell him the cat. The merchant agrees, gets a sack full of gold coins for the kitty and sails back for home.

Initially he’s like, “Sweet, I just won’t give any of this gold to that orphan,” but then a storm comes and almost drowns the boat because God is like, “The hell you won’t, give that poor kid his money.”

So he comes back, gives the orphan the sack of gold, and the orphan buys a bunch of incense with it and burns it all to praise God. Personally, I think he should just buy a house and call it good for a while, but he wants to make the land smell like Franckincense and Myrrh.

Then as luck would have it, an old man comes down the road and asks him if he would prefer gold or a good wife. After seeking counsel from some other men, the boy decides a good wife. Lo and behold, he receives a wife and lives happily ever after. But only after a series of strange coincidences.

Dnieper, Volga, and Dvina

This is an origin story of three great rivers in Russia. It starts off describing the rivers starting off as three orphaned children (a boy and two girls) who had to toil and struggle just to survive each day. After a counsel between themselves, the siblings agree they shall all travel together to find a place free of pain and struggle.

So they set out to find this mythical place for three years. Then one night the two sisters decide to leave their brother and seek their own fortune. So they leave and flow their separate ways down to the sea.

Their brother upon waking discovers that his sisters have abandoned him and goes seeking after them in a torrent and rage. But his anger eventually subsides and he calms as he enters the sea.

I’m not sure how these children magically changed into swift, coursing rivers, but I suppose folk tales don’t need much explanation on the ‘how’ and ‘why’ certain things happen. 

Volga River

Image: Traveler's Digest

The Soldier and the Vampire

This is from the second half of the reading unit and I found this story to be the most riveting out of all the ones I read! Of course, it helps that I’ve held a fascination of vampires since I was very young, but that’s besides the point.

A soldier is coming back from war on furlough and as he’s nearing his village he stops by the house of a miller he had been friends with for a long time. They talk and talk and soon the night comes.

The miller warns the soldier against leaving, claiming there is an evil upon the village in the form of a warlock. The soldier, having little fear and owing his life’s duty to protecting those ‘under the crown’ sets off to find the cause of this mischief.

Lo and behold - he meets the Warlock (in a graveyard, of course)! Playing the part of a harmless passerby, he acquaints himself with the warlock and the two go into town for a wedding.

Everything is going well until the warlock drinks too much and decides to stab the bride and groom and collect their blood. The soldier follows him back to graveyard, asking him little things like, ‘Why did you collect that blood? Is there anyway to bring those two back? Is there any way to kill you?’ Except he asks much more tactfully than that.

The warlock, thinking himself invincible, tells the soldier everything. When they reach the graveyard, the warlock sets himself on the soldier, meaning to kill him (and no doubt drink his blood). After a long battle the sun rises and the warlock collapses.

That’s when the soldier steals the blood from him, returns to town, restores the bride and groom back to life, and burns the warlock. Then the town lives happily ever after!

But really though - if I were the warlock I wouldn’t be telling people my secrets willy-nilly. Nobody is invincible.

Week 13 Readings A and B

Finally! I’ve waited all semester to get to the Europe portion so that I could read the Kalevala! I’ve heard of this Finnish epic before and have wanted to read it for a long time. However, reading for pleasure is a virtue long sought-after during the school year. But now I can read it for class credit! How wonderful!

Finnish mythology, culture, and their language in general is fascinating to me because it’s so profoundly unique. The language is especially intriguing because there’s nothing like it anywhere else on Earth. Finnish is a Uralic language and is completely different from the other more common Romance languages we typically hear about. Just to hear it spoken or sung makes my heart happy - it’s a magical language I imagine the elves from ‘Lord of the Rings’ would speak.

The Kalevala is very large - composed of 50 songs (Finnish: Runo), all sung in their own unique metre known as the Kalevala metre. Most epic poems are simply that - poems. The Kalevala, however, is one giant song. How cool is that?

The portion we’re given to read includes the song-battle of Joukahainen and Väinämöinen, Väinämöinen’s pursuit of Joukahainen’s sister Aino, Aino’s suicide, Väinämöinen’s fishing, Joukahainen’s revenge, Väinämöinen’s wooing of the maiden of Pohjola, and the creation of the legendary Sampo.

The epic starts off with haughty Joukahainen wishing to challenge the great song-sorcerer Väinämöinen to a singing contest, to pit each other’s wisdom against each other (as much wisdom was carried in the form of songs). His mother warns him to not go up against such a great sorcerer, but Joukahainen ignores her and goes to challenge the old man still.

Väinämöinen asks him many questions and Joukahainen answers, until he falsely states that he was there at the time of creation. Väinämöinen, knowing this is a lie, punishes the youth by singing all he has brought with him into useless dirt. Then, to drive his point home, he sings the lad into a mud hole. As the mud is closing over Joukahainen, nearly drowning him, he begs Väinämöinen to free him, promising his sister in return for his life.

To me, Joukahainen is a coward in this respect. He thought himself wiser than he was, and his pompous actions endangered not only him, but also his sister. He selfishly offered up his sister to repent for his own foolishness, and this will cost Aino her life (kinda).

Väinämöinen is obviously stoked by this. Aino, Joukahainen’s sister, is certainly not. Upon hearing she’ll be wedded to an old man, she sinks into a deep depression. Honestly, I would too if I got roped into an arranged marriage I wanted nothing to do with. Her mother tells her to stop crying because Väinämöinen is a great and powerful wizard and will keep her home warm and larders full, but Aino is having none of it. In her anguish, she allows herself to be taken by the lake and drowns in the abyss. 

Her mother, brother, and Väinämöinen grieve tremendously for her passing. Väinämöinen actually catches her as a fish one day while out on the lake, but she wriggles out of his grasp and mocks him. Fruitlessly, he tries to recapture the Aino-fish by dredging all the lakes, streams, and rivers of the land. After giving up, his mother comes back from the dead and tells him to seek out the maiden of Pohjola as a wife. What are these regions? Where exactly is Kaleva, Pohjola, and several other regions mentioned in this national epic?

Väinämöinen's fishing 

Image: Wikipedia

On his way to Pohja, Väinämöinen is shot out of vengeance by Joukahainen and immerses himself in the Ocean. There, he is tossed about and beaten up by waves for many days and nights. When he finally washes up on shore in Pohja, he’s so weary and heartbroken that all he wants to do is go back home. The old woman of Pohja promises to send him back and give him her daughter if he can forge her a Sampo. Väinämöinen answers honestly that he can’t, but he can send someone who can, Ilmarinen, the great smith. Also, what’s with everyone using their children as bartering goods or currency? Your child’s opinion matters too!

And from what is said about the land of Pohja between Väinämöinen and Ilmarinen, it’s not a great place. People eat each other, it’s dark, and really cold. What a place to live.

Ilmarinen arrives in Pohjola and says he can and will forge a Sampo. It’s described as an object with a ‘many colored cover’ and is made of impossible things, much like the chains which hold down the wolf Fenrir in Norse mythology.

Ilmarinen eventually forges the complex Sampo, and it churns out milled grain for the inhabitants of Pohja. But he does not take the maid of Pohja as his prize. Like a gentleman, he actually asks for her hand, but she refuses. Even though he’s deeply saddened by this, he accepts her decision and goes back home to Kaleva, to do his smithing and talk with Väinämöinen.

Want to hear some of the original songs of the Kalevala? Click on the link below!
Songs of the Kalevala

Reading Week B: Still More Celtic Fairy Tales!

In the second part of this section is where I see the stories that I usually associate with fairy tales - light-hearted, with children begin whisked off away into the land of Faery or other strange dimensions and playing with the Fair Folk. Such a tale is seen in ‘Elidore,’ where a little boy, escaping the wrath of the monks who are trying to train him, is led by a pair of pygmies through a cave into a magical land with no sun and moon, only clouds.

There, Elidore spends time playing with the King’s son and keeping him company rather than try his hand at the arduous task of reading and writing. All is well for a time, and then he longs to see humans like himself, along with his mother.

So the King, benevolent as he is, agrees to let Elidore go. His mother is very happy to see him, though distraught (understandably) and begs him to stay. He stays for a while but returns to the happy land to play. So this goes for a few months, maybe years.

Eventually, his mom coerces him into bringing her one of the yellow balls he plays with (convinced that it’s gold), and he’s caught sneaking one out by the pygmies. Since then he can never find his way back to that magical land.

Elidore becomes a monk, but mourns the days when he would play with the little fair people. St. David tries to find out where these little people come from and based on what Elidore tells them of their language, deduces that they must be Greek. How? I don’t understand. I’m not even sure there are fairies in Greek mythology, but there’s a very good chance I’m wrong. 

Looks like it could be the glittering land of Faery to me. 

Image: Flickriver

Another great story, How Cormac Mac Art Went to Faery, shows the value of truth and maybe even of love. In this story, the King Cormac trades his wife and two children for a magical fairy branch which takes away the sorrows and pain of any who are lulled to sleep by its sweet music. After a year goes by and his citizens are lulled into happiness, he decides to go out and seek his family.

Something I found very interesting about his journey - it is said he wanders down a magical path and then mists rise around him and all of a sudden he’s in Faery! Myself, I’m reading ‘The Mists of Avalon’ at the moment and keep trying to find correlations between the myths of Faery along with how those myths are upheld in the book. It excites me every time I find even the tiniest correlation, like the mists rising to reveal the land of Faery!

Anyway, he eventually is reunited with his family after seeing many strange things, such as a man who brings wood to a fire, but it’s burned as soon as he goes out for more (much like a Sisyphusian paradox if you ask me), and a hog that is quartered and cooked under a quarter of a log once a truth is told.



Cormac, for telling the truth that he is out seeking his family, is gifted a hog who regenerates overnight when his bones are in the sty, seven cows that produce an abundance of milk, and his family by Manannan Mac Lir. LIR. Any connection or relation to King Lir, whose children were turned into swans? Curioser and curioser….

Reading A Week 12: Celtic Fairy Tales (2)

This week I chose to read More Celtic Fairy Tales, by Joseph Jacobs. For some reason I keep choosing tales that have something to do with some part of my heritage. Two weeks ago it was Cherokee Folk Tales, now it’s Celtic Fairy Tales for my Irish heritage. I think this class is bringing me closer to my ancestors. :)


The stories in this section are much longer than most of the stories featured in folk or fairy tales, with some taking 3 parts to finish!

The first story featured, ‘The Fate of the Children of Lir’ was rather sad. Typically, when I think of Celtic Fairy Tales, I think of fairy tales - light hearted and fun tales of whimsy and magic. This tale was certainly filled with magic, but more woe than whimsy. Four children are born to a King and his lovely wife, but she soon dies and he takes her sister as his second wife after a time. She becomes jealous of his children, as he dotes on them and gives them more attention than he does her, so she takes them out to a lake to kill them. However, she finds she cannot drown the children, so she instead turns them into beautiful swans, cursing them in these forms for 900 years.

Her plan backfires because the swans can still talk, so they rat her out for being a traitorous sorceress and in she is in turn transformed into an air-demon.

Perhaps the saddest part of the story (I thought) was how even though the children waited 900 years to be transformed back into humans, they did not take the same age as when they were turned into swans. Instead, they all had the forms of withered old men and women and died soon after regaining their human forms due to their decrepitness.

King Lir bemoans the fate of his beloved children. 

Illustration by H. R. Millar

A second story, ‘The Vision of MacConglinney’ is a little more light-hearted, but just as bizarre. A King whose massive hunger is nearly driving his kingdom bankrupt is challenged to fast one night by a young man. Not wanting to look weak, the king obeys and the lad taunts and tempts him by telling him how he once went to a Kingdom in a far-away place made of slatters of bacon, troughs of bread, pots of custard, and rivers of cream. My mouth was watering as I read this, myself!

As he’s doing this, he’s taking savory slices of bacon and passing them just within reach of the King, but not to where he can actually get a bite. Eventually, a small demon is seen climbing out of the King’s mouth, unable to resist the temptation of bacon anymore (and who can blame him? Bacon is delicious!)

And then the demon is thrust into the fire, poof, happily ever after.

More than anything, this story made me think of a similar method I’ve read on how to get rid of tapeworm infections. Very similarly, the afflicted will fast for a night, then hold a very ripe apple in front of their mouth first thing in the morning. Supposedly, the smell will tempt the worm so much that it’s head will come out the mouth, allowing the sick person to pull the worm out. Maybe this story was based off a potential cure for tapeworm infections.

Week 11 Reading A: Britomart the Brave

So for the first reading for week 11 I chose to read the ‘Tale of Britomart,’ from the Faerie Queene reading unit. Instead of taking notes like I usually do where I summarize the plot from a couple tales from the first half of the unit, I’m going to point out parts of the first half of the reading that I really like, including aspects of Britomart’s personality and character.

Within the first half of the reading, we’re given an in depth look at Britomart’s heart, morals, drive, determination, and bravery. This is a girl who comes from royalty, a princess, and one day she accidentally peers into her father’s magical looking glass gifted to him by the Merlin (a powerful wizard famous throughout Arthurian tales) and beholds the sight of her husband-to-be, Sir Artegall. For weeks thereafter her heart is tormented at the thought of not being with him at the very soonest moment and she can’t eat or sleep because of it.

Her nurse, Glauce, sees what’s happening and takes Britomart to the great Merlin to figure out why she is becoming so sickly with no visible illness. The Merlin merely laughs and tells them it is merely heartsickness, and that Britomart must go after her true love if she wishes to find peace.

So Glauce, being a wonderful friend and person, suggests to Britomart that they take off to the land of the Faerie Queene where Sir Artegall is rumored to be. But they go in disguise - Britomart as a gallant knight and Glauce as her squire. Britomart pulls off the guise of knight easily because she’s already had training in self defense with the sword and shield.

So they ride off into the land of the Faerie Queene. I actually wonder if the ‘land of the Faerie Queene’ is another name for Avalon, because I’ve been reading ‘The Mists of Avalon’ by Marion Zimmer Bradley and it seems like a lot of important events happen in Avalon.

Along the way to find her destined lover, Britomart and Glauce have many run-ins with other knights, jealous Queens, and churls of the worst kind.

What impresses me so about Britomart is her strength of heart. Through her journeys she often feels the pang of heartsickness, fear, and longing to find Sir Artegall, but she never gives up on her quest for him. She keeps going forward and keeps up hope, even in the most dire of situations. Britomart reminds me of myself in some cases because she has such drive and determination and when she wants something she doesn’t sit idly by and wait for it to come to her. She goes out and gets it on her terms through her own means. Maybe it’s just my impatience, but I’m much the same way.

The character Brienne from ‘Game of Thrones’ also reminds me a lot of Britomart in her morals. She is always kind and looking out for those less represented and she also kicks ass with a sword.

Brienne of Tarth

Game of Thrones Wiki

I’m looking forward to reading the rest of her story and I hope it ends up having a fairy tale happy ending, with her and Sir Artegall riding off into the sunset. I guess I’ll have to read and see!

Week 10 Extra Reading: Tales from the Blackfeet

I was going to go with Apache stories this week, but the way they were written was too hard for me to follow. So instead I decided to read tales from the Blackfoot Native Americans. After some brief research on Wikipedia, I’ve found out these people are from British Columbia and Montana, so they’ve survived in harsh territory.

To read more Blackfoot stories, visit the unit here!

The Dog and the Root Digger

In this story, Napi, one of the great chiefs, goes undercover as a dog to discover where all the buffalo have gone by visiting a lone tent in the middle of the plain. A friend goes with him and turns himself into a root digger (a tool) to also disguise himself.

A man, his wife, and their child are the only ones living in the tent. The child takes the dog (the chief in disguise) and root digger as his companion and playthings. Through this way the chief and other man discover that the lone family has been hiding all the game inside a cave and they release them all back onto the plain so that other families can have their meat.

What really struck me in this story was how Napi and the root digger hid themselves as the buffalo were exiting the cave while the man who had put them there watched for the dog and root digger to come out. It was almost exactly like what I had read in the Odyssey when Odysseus and his men escape the cyclops’ cave by latching onto the underbellies of sheep! It’s amazing how similar stories can be even when they’re told in different time periods by completely different cultures.

Buffalo in Yellowstone

Image: Wikipedia

The Camp of Ghosts

I really liked this story just because I’m a sucker for cheesy romance stories where one will do anything to bring their beloved back to them. For example, if anyone has seen ‘The Crow,’ that’s a perfect example of the kind of love stories I’m into.

A man and his wife have a son but she dies soon thereafter. For days he weeps and mourns and, because he can bear it no longer, he goes out in search of his wife who passed away.

He leaves the child with his grandmother and begins his journey.

He enters into the land of ghosts through the direction and counsel of old women he meets in dreams. When he finally comes to the camp of ghosts he stays there for four days on the agreement that his wife will be returned to him on the fourth day and that he can travel home with her.

There are a lot of rules and contingencies on her going back with him. He can’t open his eyes while traveling, he cannot hit her, he must allow her to carry a pipe, etc. etc. He is also instructed to take a sweat as soon as he arrives home because there’s ‘something about the ghosts that is hard to get off.’ Maybe it’s ectoplasm? Bleh.

They return home safely, have a sweat together, and live together again for a long time, happy and healthy. But this guy screws it all up and makes as if he’s about to hit his wife with a branding iron, so she vanishes forever. Way to go.

Week 10 Reading B: More Eskimo Stories!

I’ve noticed the Eskimo folk tales focus a lot on vengeance and the consequences of doing wrong by another. These are good morals, but I kinda wish there was more variety to it.

‘Papik, who Killed his Wife’s Brother’, and ‘Pâtussorssuaq, Who Killed His Uncle’

The moral of this story and the one before it is ‘it is wrong to kill’. Of course it is, that’s why we have laws against murder and the like today. It appears the Inuit also had their own form of punishment for murder, though it came about in the way of superstition and evil spirits.

In each story, a man kills another man out of envy of his hunting skill or his wife. One of the family members of the murdered man either dies or kills themselves to exact revenge on the murderer in the form of an evil spirit. And so we see in both stories that the man who murders is torn to pieces by the angry spirit of the victim and THAT is why you shouldn’t kill. Not that it’s immoral and outright rude, but that you’ll be torn apart. Some people just need better incentive, I guess.

The Eagle and the Whale

A group of brothers with two sisters keep trying to get the sisters to marry, but they refuse. Frustrated, they tell their sisters that one will have an eagle for a husband and the other a whale for a husband. Then the sisters are whisked away by their new husbands and live with them for a while. Why is it so bad that women don’t marry?

The sisters (understandably) don’t like their husbands and so begin making rope. One uses hers to get off the eagle husband’s rock, the other uses it to trick her whale husband and escapes. The brothers help their sisters do this because they’ve missed them. The husbands are killed by the brothers and everyone lives happily ever after.

One thing I noticed in this - the eagle husband brings back narwhal and walrus for the girl to eat. How big are eagles in Greenland? They sound frightening. 

The Narwhal, the unicorn of the sea.

Image: Wikipedia

Atarrsuaq

A man named Attarsuaq had many enemies. He bore a son who he taught to swim very well and hold his breath underwater for a long time. His son grows and he continues to teach him how to swim, but one day he does not return because one of his enemies has finally killed him. They come down to the hut to finish the job, but the boy lures them out to sea with his great swimming capabilities and kills them one by one on top of an iceberg. One man is left alive to go back to his village and tell the other men to never come again. The boy grows up in peace without any trouble from his father’s enemies.
Reading this story, I thought it would first take a turn where the son swam so much he eventually turned into a seal and his father one day accidentally killed him. There’s a lot of revenge in this story, though, and it didn’t take the turn I thought it would.

Check out the Eskimo Stories here!

Week 10 Reading A: Eskimo Folk Tales

Many of the blog posts I read last week focused on the Eskimo stories. The Inuit have always fascinated me in that they are able to live in some of the harshest environments in the world and still thrive. I’m curious to see if harsh climates breed harsh folk tales.


The Coming of Men:

This origin story surprised me because it is not like many other origin stories I’ve read. Instead of the Earth coming up from a great body of water, the Earth simply was to be made one day and stones and dirt fell from the sky to create it. Children came up from the Earth and a woman sewed clothes for them and raised them to be men. Nobody knows where this woman comes from. And apparently there was only one woman because every child was male.

There was no sunlight and water was able to burn. The cost of no light meant no death, but then people just grew really old and there were too many people. So a bargain was made for there to be death AND light, but no death without light.

I guess the Inuit also prize dogs, because no other animal is mentioned in this creation story except for dogs. Man wanted dogs so he called for them and they came. I wish this was as easy for me as it was for this old Inuk because I love dogs. I want to roll around in a pile of dogs.


The Woman Who Had a Bear as a Foster Son:

A little old woman who usually receives shares of meat from young hunters is presented one day with a frozen bear cub. She leaves it to thaw, goes about cooking, and finds that it moves. Thereafter she feeds it and talks to it, helping it to grow strong and smart. The beart plays with the children, with men, and eventually helps the men to hunt seal. The bear is loved by all of the community, but tribes further to the North have other ideas. They want to kill the bear but are met with backlash when the bear kills one of their own and brings it back to his foster mother. She weeps and sends him away to live with his own kind, despite the sadness it brings her.

Cute lil' cub

Image: Huffington Post

Qalagánguasê, Who Passed to the Land of Ghosts

I’m beginning to learn that Inuit names are oftentimes pretty long and hard to pronounce. I don’t even know how to pronounce this boy’s name. Anyway, this story is about a boy whose family died and he had to be looked after by strangers because he was lame. When the villagers go out to hunt, ghosts come in and play and talk with him, including his family members. Eventually he decides to go with them into the Land of Ghosts and the story goes that he turned into a woman when he went. I find this interesting as there is so much controversy today about trans-gendered individuals. Did the Inuit believe a person could have been born into the wrong gender? I would like to learn more about their culture.

Check out the Eskimo Stories here!

Extra Reading Week 9: Pacific Northwest Stories!

One thing I've noticed and love about the myths and legends from the Native Americans - they all feature animals as either main characters or an integral part of the story. I know the Natives held animals in high regard and in the myths from the Pacific Northwest Natives, the animals are caught dancing without their 'skins'. Without them, they look just like people!

How Silver-Fox Created the WorldAs with most creation myths, this one begins with a large body of water. Coyote and Silver-Fox share the world above the sky, but Silver-Fox becomes curious and cuts a hole in it while Coyote is gone to peer down at the world. He goes down to the water and creates and island. Coyote eventually joins him and asks questions. Silver-Fox does not reply immediately to a lot of his questions. He is very mysterious that way.

Silver Fox keeps making the world bigger, pushing dirt out into all four directions. Where is he getting this dirt? I have no idea.

He makes Coyote run around the world to find how big it is growing. Then the two argue about how many moons should be in one winter. Coyote says 10, Silver-fox says two. It is then decided that there will be four moons in a whole year - 1 moon for spring, 1 moon for autumn, and two moons for winter. Notice how there’s no mention of Summer in here?


How Beaver Stole Fire

Before there were people, there were animals and trees that walked and talked like people. Only pine trees had fire and that means all the animals nearly froze to death in the winter. So one day, the animals got fed up with the greediness of the pine trees and plan to steal fire from them.

Beaver volunteers to do the job. As the pine trees are warming themselves at a large fire, a coal rolls down to the riverbank and beaver snatches it away, hiding it in his breast. Personally, I think this would burn, but maybe that’s just me.
A grand chase ensues between Beaver and the pine trees. The pine trees chase after him for a long way and eventually grow tired and stop in random places. This is why there are so many pine trees in certain parts along the river bank.
Once beaver is far ahead of everyone he gives fire to the trees and animals so that they can stay warm.

This is a myth of the Nez Perce. I wonder why it was beaver they chose to tell the story about? I would think fire and a water animal wouldn't mix, but maybe that’s just me.


The First Totem Pole

Wakiash was the chief of his tribe, but unlike the other chieftans, he never had a dance for his people. This made him ashamed, so he went to find solitude and fasted for four days.

On the fourth day he woke up and discovered he was on Raven’s back and Frog was on his chest. Frog was telling him that Raven was taking him to the house of animals to learn how to dance. I’ve heard Raven is a pretty important animal in Native American mythology, so I’m not surprised he’s featured here.

Anyway, the chieftan comes to the house of animals and hears them dancing inside. The animals have all shed their skins and are now in the form of people. Interesting! So I wonder if the Pacific Northwest natives have myths about Selkies too!

The animals can sense the stranger and send Mouse outside to investigate. She comes across the chieftan and he explains that he wants to learn the dances to bring to his people. Mouse tells him to come in just as the animals start dancing. So as they begin to dance again, Wakiash jumps into the room and the animals are shamed because they’ve been caught by a human in their people form. They ask what he wants and he answers truthfully.

So the animals teach Wakiash their dances and their songs. He packs up their house and the animals in it and takes them with him back to his tribe He returns to his people after being away for four years and throws down the bundle, revealing the house and the animals on a totem pole.  Then he throws for his people the biggest dance ever seen and makes all the chieftans in the land ashamed. Afterwards he carves another totem pole and puts it outside his house and calls it Kalakuyuwish: The pole that holds up the sky. 

Totem Poles in Vancouver

From Totem-Pole.net

Week 9 Reading B: More Cherokee Myths!

These are a continuation of the notes for the second part of Cherokee Myths

The Owl Gets Married

In this story, a girl is advised by the widow she lives with to only marry a man who is a good hunter. So when a potential suitor comes courting and claims he’s a good hunter, the girl is arranged to be married with him. He comes to live with her.

Everytime he goes out claiming to hunt, he comes back with only small things - fish, scraps of meat, a single crawdad. The old woman gets suspicious and tells the girl to follow him secretly the next time he goes out.

She does so and discovers that he transforms into an owl to collect the mere morsels for their table. The next time he comes home she tells him that he knows what he is and sends him out of her house. He spends the rest of his days pining with grief and love-longing.

See, I don’t understand why the owl didn’t just remain in the form of a man and hunt that way. Maybe he didn’t know how? But regardless, getting anything bigger than a small fish would be easier in a larger body.

The Uktena and the Ulûñsû'tï

This myth is about a great horned snake called the Uktena. The Cherokee created it to kill the Sun when she sent a sickness out upon them, but it failed. Angry and jealous of the people for choosing Rattlesnake as their champion instead, the Uktena was sent to a place where other dangerous things are kept. 

The Uktena as depicted by Kyoht on DeviantArt

The Ulûñsû'tï is a bright transparent crystal in the forehead of the Uktena. Whomsoever has it will have luck in all aspects of life, but especially in prophecy. It works very similarly to a crystal ball. But keeping the Ulûñsû'tï has a price - the owner must bathe it in fresh blood and keep an eye on it, lest it becomes wise and escapes from its hiding place.

The Uktena reminds me of what I’ve read of British Isles mythology. The horned God Cernunnos is often depicted as yielding two horned snakes. Do these and the Uktena have any correlation to one another, I wonder?

Âgän-uni'tsï's Search for the Uktena

A great medicine man, Âgän-uni'tsï, is captured by a warring tribe and is about to be executed, but he claims he can get the crystal from the Uktena. The tribe leader warns him of the danger, but the medicine man assures him he knows. With his life, he begins the search for the Uktena.

He goes to many places where the Uktena is rumored to live - lonely places in the mountains and deep pools of water. He encounters all sorts of monsters, like giant snakes, frogs, fish, and lizards. At last when he travels very far south he finds the Uktena in a mountain hollow asleep.

Âgän-uni'tsï devises a plan and digs a trench and sets a bunch of pine cones on fire at the base of the mountain. Then he shoots the Uktena in the heart with an arrow and races down the mountain, jumps over the fire and trench, and takes cover. The Uktena races after him but, being wounded, is stopped by the fire and uselessly spits poison at the medicine man, which sizzles in the flames. Once the Uktena dies, Âgän-uni'tsï waits seven days while the birds pick at the giant snake until all that is left are bones and the Ulûñsû'tï. He gathers his prize and becomes the most revered medicine man in the land.

I’m curious how big this Uktena actually was. Are we talking Anaconda big, or even bigger like as wide around as a sequoia tree trunk? Anway, the Cherokee have many myths about the Uktena and I still wonder if it and the horned snakes held by Cernunnos have any relation to each other.

A depiction of Cernunnos holding a horned serpent

Part of the collection of god and goddess statues from Magical Omaha

Bibliography
Book: Cherokee Myths
Author: James Mooney
Year: 1900
Read the stories here!

Week 9 Reading A: Cherokee Myths

I used the crystal ball to decide which myths to read this time (I hadn’t used it up until now) - and it chose Cherokee myths! I found this pretty amusing and special because I supposedly have a smidgen of Cherokee somewhere down my ancestral line.

The Journey to the Sunrise

A bunch of bored young men decide to go on a journey to discover where the Sun lives and what the Sun is like. They meet many different tribes along the way with customs different than theirs. A tribe of acorn eaters and a tribe that lived in the pines. They witness a woman being lowered into the grave with her dead husband. I wonder which tribe this was? I honestly have no clue and they don’t give names to any of the tribes.

They finally come to where the sky touches the ground and discover that the sky is actually made of rock and a hidden door is where the Sun comes in and out of.

One of the members tries to go in through the door but the rock comes down and crush him. The rest of his friends are like, “Nuh-uh,” and decide to go back home. It’s a pretty long journey because by the time they get back they’re old men.

I’m really curious what’s on the other side of that door. Space? A parallel universe? Another planet? Who knows?


The Moon and the Thunders

This is a compilation of origin stories of the moon, the sun, and thunder.

In this story, Sun and Moon are siblings. Sun is a woman and her brother is Moon. I always find it interesting how different cultures determine the genders of celestial bodies. Some equate feminine energy with the moon, mysterious and alluring, while others view it as the sun, radiant and nurturing.

Sun is courted by a stranger during the dark phases of the moon. She cannot see his face because it is so dark, so she cleverly puts ashes on his face to identify him. The next time the moon comes out she can see the ash on his face and he hides from her from shame.

Another origin story says that the moon is from a ball that was accidentally thrown up into the sky and stuck to the stone that the sky is made of.

This story also describes the different kinds of thunder. Thunder and his sons who live up in the sky, whose robes are made of rainbow, are benevolent and kind. However there are other thunders in waterfalls, in cliffs and mountains, and other secret places of nature. These thunders are mischievous and tricksters.

I think it’s interesting how there a multiple kinds of thunders. Now that I actually think about it, it does sound like thunder where a waterfall comes down, or in the echoes of a mountain.


How They Brought Back the Tobacco

It’s hard to imagine tobacco as having medicinal qualities and not being regarded as an addictive substance with how it's been advertised in our generation. Personally, I’m fine with tobacco as long as it’s not stuffed in a paper with a bunch of other things I don’t know about. The Cherokee appear to have held tobacco at high value for its medicinal and spiritual purposes.

In this story, the Geese (mean, mean animals) stole the only tobacco plant in the world and hoarded it for themselves. One old woman became very sick and frail without the tobacco medicine, so the animals auditioned to go get back the plant. The Geese killed every animal because they’re heartless creatures.

Geese are jerks

Image: Canadian Expat

Hummingbird offered and was at first laughed at because of his size. Once he demonstrated his incredible speed, however, there was no question about him going. He brought back some leaves and seeds just as the old woman fainted. Smoke was blown into her face and she was revived.

Bibliography

Book: Cherokee Myths

Author: James Mooney

Year: 1900

Read the stories here!

Extra Reading Week 7: Nigerian Folk Tales

This time I read some stories that were completely foreign to me - folk tales from Nigeria. I have never read folk tales from Africa (except for the ones about Anansi) and was pleasantly surprised to find these stories so original and strange. Here are notes on just a couple of stories, but I highly suggest everyone go and give them a read here!

The Rebellious Daughter Who Married a Skull:
This tale reminds me a lot of the one I read earlier this week about Anansi and his friend Nothing going into town to get wives. Both of these stories show just how foolish it is to marry someone without first actually getting to know them - something I would think is common sense, but apparently needs to be re-iterated in a folk tale.
This girl is the daughter of the king and is the most beautiful in all the land. She won’t take any man’s hand in marriage who isn’t beautiful like she is. This poses a problem because there isn’t any man in the country who can counter her beauty.
So this skull - yes, a skull - from the spirit land decides to go get her hand. He borrows body parts from his friends and creates a pretty attractive meatsuit and goes off to get the princess’ hand in marriage. She agrees upon seeing his beautiful face, but her parents are hesitant. Eventually she declares that she is going to live with him in his own country. Of course, once she’s there he sheds all of his borrowed parts and she sees him for what he truly is - a skull. Mortified, but helpless, she resigns herself to her fate.
Like all good wives, she takes care of his decrepit mother. The mother grows fond of her and knows the spirits of the land will eventually come to get her, so she asks a rogue wind to take the girl away back to her own home. The wind complies, first coming as a tornado and then a soft breeze. When the girl is back home a party is held for 8 days, celebrating her return.
I suppose the true moral of this story is, ‘don’t trust a book by its cover,’ but really. I think the best moral found here is to be kind and respectful to your elders. You never know just how they might be able to help you.

The Elephant and the Tortoise:
This story was very bizarre. This is a story explaining why the elephant has such small eyes in proportion to its body. I would think it’s because living out in the savannah, with so much sun, it would be more beneficial to have small eyes that couldn’t so easily be burned. But that’s not the case.
The elephant comes to feasts held by the king of the land and always eats too much. In that time, the elephant had huge eyes, much more fitting for the proportion of his body. The tortoise sets about to put a stop to this by tricking the elephant into letting him cut out his own eyes, claiming that they are a sweet treat. Thus the elephant goes about blind for a few days, asking fellow animals to lend him their eyes, but of course they’re like, “Uh, no. I need my eyes.” So then, a worm comes along one morning and greets the elephant. The elephant, being blind (but not deaf) replies with another greeting. The worm is flattered that so mighty a creature would pay attention to him, that he agrees to let the elephant borrow his eyes for a day. 

Unfortunately, the elephant’s eye sockets seal shut around the worms tiny eyes, and worm is blind forever and the elephant has tiny eyes in proportion to his body.

The elephant and his tiny eyes

Image: Wikipedia

Reading A Week 7: Anansi

For this reading I chose stories about Anansi from the West African Folktales Unit and got to know the trickster of African legend a little better. Bottom line: he's pretty much a selfish jerk.

How Wisdom Became Property of the Human Race:
In this short story, the people of the world upset Anansi and so he vows to punish them by taking wisdom away from them and hanging it up high in a tree. He puts all the wisdom in a pot and tries to climb the tallest tree he can find with the pot hanging in front of him. Of course, this gets in the way and he finds himself frustrated because he can’t get more than a little ways up without becoming hindered.
His son, Kweku Tsin, watches for a while and then says, “Did you ever think about hanging the pot on your back?”
Anansi, irritated and tired, throws the pot on the ground out of frustration because apparently his son has more wisdom than he does.
And that’s how the humans acquired wisdom. See, it’s okay to be a smart-alec every once in a while. Look how it benefitted us!

Anansi (MrPsMythopedia)

Anansi and Nothing:
This story was clever in its own little way. In some ways it reminded me of the myth of Odysseus and his men tricking the cyclops and escaping, but not entirely.

Anansi lives in a crappy little hut while his neighbor, Nothing, lives in a great palace. Somehow they’re friends they decide to go get wives from a nearby town one day. Nothing, of course, is decked in full regalia. Anansi is in his rags. Because Anansi is Anansi, he convinces Nothing to let the two of them exchange clothes. Nothing does so, and when the two of them stroll into town, Anansi has women practically begging to become his wife. Nothing, still dressed in rags, has pity taken on him by a woman and she gives him his daughter. They all go back to their homes and Anansi’s wives are shocked to discover that he actually lives in a hovel. Nothing is greeted by his servants and his wife is looked upon with much envy.
After a few days, Nothing’s wife takes pity on the women because all they can afford to eat is unripe bananas and peppers (what a strange combo) and she invites them over for a feast. Of course, his wives decide to stay in the palace.
Enraged, Anansi enlists the help of his rat friends to dig a hole in front of the palace doors, where he then fills it with sharp knives and broken bottles. Then he tricks Nothing into coming outside, where he trips and falls into the death pit.
Nothing’s wife, distraught, mashes yams and feeds them to the children of the city to help her cry for her husband.
SO NOW… whenever a child is crying and they’re asked what they’re crying about, they say they are crying for nothing! See? Hahaha… cute little origin story right there.

Thunder and Anansi:
In this tale we learn that Anansi is greedy and selfish. After attempting to get some coconuts, Anansi throws himself into the sea rather than go home empty handed. He finds himself on the sea-floor in front of the cottage of Thunder. Thunder asks him why he has come and Anansi tells him that he and his family are starving. Thunder, taking pity on him, gives him a magic cooking pot.
Eager to test it out, Anansi brings it back onto shore and recites the magic words: “What you used to do for your old master, now do for me.” Lo and behold, food appears! He scarfs it down and thinks to keep it only for himself and not share any with his family, lest the magic wears off too quickly.
His family soon becomes suspicious as to why they keep getting thinner as Anansi gets plumper. His clever son, Kweku Tsin, rummages around Anansi’s room while he’s gone and discovers the cooking pot. He shares the pot with his entire family and to punish Anansi, they bring it down to the village to cook for everyone. The pot gets too hot from cooking all these meals and melts, so the family decides not to say anything about it.
Anansi comes home, can’t find his pot and, knowing his family had something to do with it, goes out to to Thunder’s place again, telling him a sad tale of why he no longer has the pot. Thunder, being wise and immune to false truths, gives Anansi a stick. This time when Anansi recites the magic words, the stick starts to beat him.
I thought this was a great story on the morals of greediness. As I read these stories, I find myself disliking Anansi more and more. How could you keep food from your starving family? I guess that must be a trait of tricksters.

Week 6 Reading B: Tibetan Folk Tales

I no almost nothing about Tibet, but I've always been drawn to it. Maybe because it's such a quiet place shrouded in simple mystery. I would like to visit someday and traverse the little mountain towns if the altitude doesn't kill me first. The fairy tale stories from this little-known country offer good morals (for the most part). Others are just that - fairy tales.

Covetousness:

This story was short, but was packed full of morals. In the end, almost all the characters featured in it died due to their lack of foresight and good morals. Keep in mind that all these stories are taking place in the same vicinity.
A hunter strings up a bow which will kill any animal that triggers the string loosing. First it kills a bear. A fox comes along, rejoices at all the meat he can eat (bear meat is pretty good; I can testify to this), and tries to undo the bow string so no other animals are killed. In doing this, he himself is killed. The moral of this is that, ‘one should not be greedy when there is already plenty.’ Personally, I think this is a poor way of presenting this lesson, but I didn’t write the tale.
The second moral comes in the form of an elephant attempting to jump like a rabbit he sees hopping along in a gulley. In doing this, his immense weight causes a large boulder to fall and crush him. The moral of this is, ‘Don’t do what you are not fit enough for (fitted for).” While this might be harder to view in terms of humans (seeing as how we’re of one single species, whereas the elephant and rabbit are not), it is nonetheless a good moral that (hopefully) stems from common sense.
The third moral is basically, ‘Work together, don’t be lazy.’ Seven robbers come across all these dead animals, rejoice at the meat, and start the cook it. Seeing as how they need water, they gripe and fight about who is going to go get it. Finally, four men agree to it and go to fetch the water while three stay back and cook the meat. Both parties decide to poison the other and nobody survives. The area becomes a massive multi-species graveyard.
Overall, I was pleased with this story. In 500 words it summed up three great morals, all having to do with the perils and consequences of covetousness.

Now just imagine this guy trying to hop like a bunny. 

Image: Audubon Institute

The Man With Five Friends with Different Colored Eyes

This story was… odd. I didn’t like the way it was told because it transitioned too quickly from one event to the next without much leeway. The morals weren’t nearly as good as the first story either.
A man is told by his dying father two rules he should live by to be happy in life. The first is to not trust his wife with any secrets until after she has borne him ten children. Ten children? Yikes. Ain’t nobody got time for that. The second is that he should not trust a man if he has light colored eyes.
So his father dies, he marries a woman and she soon bears him a son. So pleased is he by this, he tells her some secrets anyway. He also has five friends, only one of which who has dark-colored eyes.
Wanting to see if what his father told him was true, he spends good money on a hog on the way home, kills it, puts it in trousers and tells his wife he’s killed a man when he gets home. They bury him in the pond together. Soon thereafter they get into a fight and she tells the official about the man he killed. He’s soon put in jail and the only one of his friends to bail him out is the dark-eyed one (with some pretty heavy bail money).
The man, once freed, tells the official that it’s really just a hog in the lake and he talks about the test he put his wife and friends through to see if they were trustworthy. The official, so impressed by his wisdom, gives the man presents and praise. How is any of this realistic? A guy plays an elaborate prank on his wife and friends and gets promoted to be a chief? Out of most of the fairy tales I’ve read, this story is not only lacking in moral, but also the most unrealistic. Good thing it's just a fairy tale. 

Bibliography

Title: "Covetousness" and "The Man with Five Friends with different colored eyes"

Book: Tibetan Folk Tales

Author: A.L Shelton

Year: 1925

Read the stories here!  

Week 6 Reading A: Japanese Fairy Tales

For my first reading this week, I went straight for the Japanese fairy tales (by Lang). I've never really had the chance to read fairy tales from Japan, so I was really interested to see what of their culture spilled over into their writings. I have to say, they were certainly entertaining and definitely carried that 'fairy tale' vibe.

Schippeitaro: 

A young man comes of age and goes off looking for adventure! He vows to not come back until he’s made a name of himself doing some heroic deed.
Alright, so men get to choose what they want to do, but what about the women? Are they just stuck at home tending to the chickens or weaving (or whatever someone would do during that time period in Japan)? I wonder if there are any stories about girls coming of age, dressing up as men, and going to have their own adventures in Japan.
Anyway, the young man goes into this dense forest and finds a chapel to stay the night in. He’s woken up late in the night by the clamor of a bunch of cats dancing in the full moon. They keep yelling, “Don’t tell Schippeitaro!” He watches them and tries to get back to sleep. Anyone who has ever heard a cat yowling knows that this is a difficult feat.
Waking up in the morning, he finds a town nearby and sees a woman weeping. Curious, he asks what’s going on. Apparently, an annual sacrifice is made where a maiden is chosen to be offered up to the Spirit of the Mountain, who will eat her in return for keeping the town safe. The maiden will be offered to the Spirit in a casket. He then learns that Schippeitaro is a dog owned by the prince of the land.
The young man convinces the prince to let him borrow his dog for the night and tricks the Spirit of the Mountain into thinking he’s about to eat the maiden in the casket when, lo and behold, Schippeitaro is there instead! Both the young man and Schippeitaro kill many of the evil cat creatures and have a celebratory feast from the town in their name.
So here’s what I don’t understand - did the cat demon-creatures have a run-in with Schippeitaro before and that’s why they fear him, or do they just know the prince has this big dog named Schippeitaro that will most likely eat them? Either way, it wasn’t highlighted very well in the story. I was confused about just that, mostly. Other than that bit of confusion, this was a fun, light-hearted story to read.

Schippeitaro, by Frederick Richardson

Uraschimataro and the Turtle:

This story was a classic fairy tale. A young man who is very good with navigating his little ship through turbulent waves catches a little turtle one day among his full net of fish. The little turtle implores him to let her go, and, having a kind heart, the young man obliges.
One day, many years later, his ship is caught up in whirlwind and crashes. He struggles to get out of the wreckage, succeeds, and starts to swim for shore. But the turtle he saved all those years ago is huge now, and tells him to get onto her back and she’ll take him to shore.
That doesn’t happen. She instead takes him to see all the beautiful wonders of the ocean and finally, to the palace of the Princess of the Sea, Otohime. Uraschimataro falls in love with the beautiful princess and ends up spending an unknown amount of time with her.
Of course, as is the case with all fairy tales, he wants to go back to his loving parents and see them, but the princess begs him not to. Finally, after lots of convincing and promising he’ll come back, the princess concedes and gives him a golden box. As with all fairy tales, there’s just one condition. If Uraschimataro opens the box, he can never return to her.
So he goes back to his hometown and discovers three hundred years have passed in all his time with the princess. And as with most tragic fairy tales, he opens the golden box and is engulfed by a violet mist, withering him and turning him into an old man. He is soon taken by death, but not before telling his story to the village children.
So my thought the entire time during this story was, “Is this guy even human?” A sea turtle takes him down into the depths of the ocean for THREE DAYS and he doesn’t even have to come up for air. Maybe this guy was a fairy to begin with and he didn’t even realize it. Regardless, this was a good, classic example of a tragic fairytale.

Urashima Taro by Edmund Dulac

Bibliography

Title: "Schippeitaro" and "Uraschimataro and the Sea Turtle"

Book: "The Violet Fairy Book" and "The Pink Fairy Book"

Author: Andrew Lang

Year: 1897

Read the stories here!

Extra reading Week 5: Khasi fairytales

While I did read more than just one story, this blog post is mainly about the fairytale, "The Tiger and the Monkeys" because it was so similar to one of my favorite stories from the Norse myths.

The Tiger and the Monkeys:

So as people may know, I’m really into Norse mythology. As I was reading this tale, I kept referring back to a similar Norse tale with Thor and Loki fooling the giants.

The tale begins with Tiger, king of all the animals, taking a leisurely stroll through the jungle. He hears this beautiful music, and can’t find the source of it because it’s coming from a tiny insect. Because he’s an insolent and ignorant king, he doesn’t realize it’s coming from Shalymmen, the tiny insect. Instead, he asks the monkeys above where the music is coming from and, because one of the younger monkeys is a clown, he says it’s his sisters’ singing.

Tiger’s like, “Alright then, you’re now my brother-in-law because I’m going to marry your sister.”

I’ve never understood this type of logic in fairytales. “Oh, I’m enraptured by your beauty, I shall marry you! Your voice is beautiful, I shall marry you!” You’re going to spend the rest of your life with someone you barely know based on one character quality? Come on. I guess that’s why they call them fairy tales.

Long story short, the monkeys trick tiger by decorating a clay image of a monkey in wedding finery, making sure the head is loose. Tiger comes along, puts a string of Betel-nuts around her neck (I guess Betel-nuts are part of some sort of wedding ritual among the Khasi people), pulls too hard on the necklace and takes the head clean off.

Truly, who could resist a bride so beautiful?

Image: Susan Bowswer's Pinterest

The monkeys gang up on Tiger and a bloody battle ensues. And that’s why, to this day, Tiger fears only the monkeys in the jungle.

This is very similar to the story, “How Thor Lost His Hammer” in Norse mythology. Thor’s hammer, Mjolnir, is stolen by the Jotuns (giants), and when he and Loki go to bargain with the Jotuns to get it back they’re like, “Yeah, you can have it, as long as our king can marry Freyja.”

Freyja, of course, is like, “No.” 

So all the gods and goddesses of Asgard come up with a plan to steal back the hammer.

Thor gets decked out in wedding garb, impersonating Freyja, and Loki acts as one of his handmaidens. 

The beard is so inconspicuous.

Image: Wikipedia

They go to the hall of the Jotun king and a great wedding feast is held. Thor’s face is kept veiled the entire time so the Jotun king doesn’t see ‘Freyja’s’ beautiful face. So when the time comes for the ceremony and the ‘I do’s,’ the hammer is brought to the bride and Thor snatches it, revealing himself and laying waste to the Jotun king’s great hall.

While the story varies, the plot is almost the same. In both cases the family of the bride-to-be tricks the groom and has their revenge.

Week 5 Reading A: Life of the Buddha (Little Prince Siddhartha)

This week for my reading I chose to read about ‘The Life of Buddha’. I took the Indian Epics class a year ago and had my fill of the Ramayana and Mahabharata, so I decided to stray away from traditional fairytales and read about the famed Siddhartha. I’ve also always been curious about buddhism in general, so I figured these stories would be good to read.

Maya’s Dream:

So Queen Maya and King Suddhodhana are the parents of Siddhartha. Before his birth, Queen Maya is visited in a dream by many Gods and Goddesses, singing and praising, and having a grand ‘ol time.

She awakes feeling freed from all earthly troubles and worries, completely blissful. She tells her husband about the dream in private in the wood outside their palace. He calls upon the brahmans (wise men) to interpret the dream and they proclaim that the King and Queen will birth a son who will grow in nobility and then go to see the suffering of the world and strive to put an end to it. The King and Queen rejoice and there is much celebration - the poor are given food, the thirsty are given drink, and all the women receive nice perfumes and flowers. Reading this, I imagined it in my mind like a grand Bollywood movie. Flower petals falling from the air, smiling faces everywhere, the sitar playing gaily in the distance… The way the celebration is described in the story, it’s no wonder Bollywood films are so colorful.

This is how I imagine Siddhartha's birth was celebrated.

Image: The Merchants of Bollywood

The Birth of Siddhartha:

Most of these stories are reading like a grand Bollywood dream. Queen Maya somehow knows her son is about to be born and wants him to be born surrounded by flowers in bloom. So the King sends his servants out to drape silver and gold ornaments on the trees outside, his wife dresses in fine silks (a poor choice for a woman about to give birth, if you ask me), and everyone in attendance is decked in their best. So she goes out, wanders about the trees, stops to sniff a blossom, and poof - baby Siddhartha is born. No pain, no fuss. Birds sing, the sick are cured, the world is rid of all its sorrows. Just by this little prince-baby being born. Incredible. Cue more colorful Bollywood dancing.

Asita’s Prediction:

Asita, a wise and learned man in the ways of the spirit, comes to visit the baby-prince Siddhartha. He tells the King that his son will indeed seek to end suffering in the world, and he is sad because he will not be alive to hear the teachings of the Buddha. Honestly, to be burdened with such knowledge, to know that you’ve missed your chance to learn from one of the best teachers of all time… that would sadden me quite a bit, too.

Siddhartha’s First Meditation:

Little prince Siddhartha is told to go learn from Viswamithra, the wisest sage (gurus) in the land. I’ve read about Viswamithra before in the Ramayana - he’s a very popular choice for teaching young princes. There seem to have been so many wonderful teachers in Hindu mythology. I think I would have liked to study under them.

Seeing Siddhartha’s brillaince, Viswamithra is stunned and decides there is nothing he can teach him. So little prince Siddhartha goes to sit in a field under a clump of trees and meditate. He emits some sort of glow when doing this - I’m not sure why (or how for that matter). Many people stop to stare in awe at him and praise him. I’m also not sure why this is happening, either. I also notice it doesn’t mention which tree he meditates under. I’m pretty sure it’s important to know what kind of tree the Buddha meditates under in case I want to replicate the same results.

An ivory carving depicting Siddhartha meditating

Image: Wikipedia

Bilbiography: 'Life of Buddha,' by Andre Ferdinand Herold (1922). 

Read the stories here!

Week 4 Extra Reading: Sindbad the Sailor!

The Voyages of Sindbad

The voyages of Sindbad are told from a first-person narrative. Reading these, I tried to calculate the probability of the tall-tale actually taking place.

Voyage 1:

In this voyage, Sindbad and his men set up camp on an island out in the middle of the ocean for the night. But when they try starting a fire, the island reveals itself to actually be the back of a ginormous whale! Many of the men try to escape, but many more die. Sindbad is left behind by his crew and clings to a single plank of wood as life support until he drifts up to an (actual) island and happens upon some of the King’s men grazing his horses. The men take him to the king, he is reunited with his crew who has come to trade with the king, and everybody has a happy ending.

Now I’m not sure an entire crew would be able to make camp on the back of a whale, but I wonder if the resting back of a whale could be enough room for at least a few people. The awakening would still be rude, of course, but maybe it would be fun to camp on a whale for a night.

Voyage 2:

This voyage is definitely a bit harder to believe because Sindbad ends up stranded on an island with giant eagle birds. Because he’s crafty, he sneaks up to one and uses his turban to tie himself to the leg of the bird. Then, he’s carried across the island and unties himself in a valley of diamonds! Unfortunately, the diamonds appear to be in a land of giant snakes.

I’m all for believing giant animals still exist, but diamonds? Out in the open on the ground? No way. I don’t know much about crystal chemistry, but I’m pretty sure diamonds are harvested from veins of coal that have seen too much pressure and heat. They don’t just pop up out of the ground like that.

Sindbad plans his escape from the roc nest

Image: Virginia Frances Sterrett

Voyage 3:

This tale sounds a lot like the one I read in ‘The Odyssey’, when Odysseus and his men land on the island of Cyclops. In this tale, Sindbad and his crew land upon an uncharted island where these hairy dwarves hijack their ship and strand them on another island. Sindbad and his crew wander the island and find a castle that they venture into. They soon discover it’s littered with human bones, and then I giant comes in and eats the captain. I don’t know what it is, but something humanoid cannibalizing another human just gives me the major creeps.

They escape the same way Odysseus and his men did - stabbing the giant in the eye with a red hot poker. Then they escape on driftwood rafts with the other giants trying to avenge their giant brother and throwing large boulders at the escaping sailors. I suppose this in itself is another great example of storytelling!

The giant from the third voyage decides which sailor he will eat that night.

Image: visiteveryday

Bibliography
Book: Arabian Nights' Entertainments
Author: Andrew Lang
Year: 1898
Read the stories here!