Home » New Year » South American Indian mythology. Read online "myths of the Indians of South America" Myths and legends of South America

South American Indian mythology. Read online "myths of the Indians of South America" Myths and legends of South America

Indian epic Myths of the Indians of South America

Epics, legends and tales

A book for adults.

At the beginning of time, the earth was barren and men did not grow beards. Only later did trees begin to appear. At the beginning of time, foam was black. At the beginning of time there was no food or medicine. At the beginning of time, people had tails.

Pot of meat

1.Black man

A woman was walking through the forest. She tore her way through the bushes and tore her legs bloody. Finally, the path appeared. The woman stopped, squatted down and relieved herself. Then she moved on.

All this time, Dick was watching her. As soon as the woman disappeared around the bend in the path, he ran up and carefully scraped off the dirt - underneath it was clearly visible the imprint of a tapir's foot. Dick even shook with pleasure. He rushed into the forest, caught up with the tapir and turned him into a large black man.

The woman was already approaching the house when someone’s dark figure blocked the road.

The black man threw the woman onto the path. Having satisfied the desire, he stood up, grabbed the captive by the hands and dragged her along with him.

The woman had a chance to see a lot of amazing things this week. She was especially struck by how her tapir husband caught fish. He went into the water and defecated. After this, the fish floated up on its belly and all that remained was to pick it up.

Although the new husband fed the woman well, she was impatient to go home. After all, the little daughter was left completely alone. One night the woman ran away. Trying not to stray from the path, she stumbled and fell more than once, sometimes thinking that she would not make it: her huge belly was in the way. It seemed that the woman was pregnant, although the pregnancy did not last that long. But here is the house. Preparing for the worst, the woman opened the door. The daughter was lying in a hammock. She was alive, but looked exhausted: huge tapir lice were crawling all over her body. The mother sat down next to her and began to look for insects in the girl’s head. Exhausted, mother and daughter dozed off slightly. Then an unborn child began to stir in the womb - a baby tapir. He stuck out his trunk-like nose, groped the girl’s genitals, and so in an unusual way deprived her of her innocence.

The woman's husband's younger brother burst into the hut.

- I killed the tapir, I took revenge on him! - he shouted.

- It's time for me to give birth! – the woman moaned.

The baby tapir climbed out, tearing the mother in half.

2. Box

The man went hunting for viscachas. After walking a few hundred meters, he saw many animals and shot a bag full of them. But returning to the same place the next time, I did not find any game there and moved on.

Eventually he reached an unfamiliar village. There was a crowd of people in the square: a cow had been slaughtered, everyone was preparing for the holiday. People noticed the stranger and began to wonder who he was. The men were frying meat.

“Go and ask,” they told their comrade, “where he is from; and invite him to us - let him eat too. And let him go to the leader!

The man was afraid to go to the leader, but those around him began to encourage him. Then the hunter approached the chief's house and shouted a polite greeting.

“Be kind,” replied the leader, “go and chop some wood.” Here's an axe. Pour water into the cauldron, light the fire and prepare wood. Set the water to boil. But bring more fuel so that the water warms up faster. As soon as it boils, we will throw you into the cauldron!

A little boy standing nearby whispered to the man:

- Try to grab the axe, because the leader is going to finish you off!

- How can I chop, leader? – the man asked, approaching the tree.

The leader began to show, and the man hit him on the neck with an ax and killed him. And then he began to think about what he should do with the leader’s children. He noticed a large box and called the kids:

- Well, quickly hide here, otherwise the cold wind will blow!

The children climbed into the box, and the man hammered the lid with nails. A cold wind blew and the children in the box died.

3.Skull

Nofuetoma was a good sorcerer. He managed to create a lot of things, but he considered the Karai plant to be the pinnacle of his own ingenuity. Some people think that such a plant does not exist in nature, because if you ask the Indians what Karai is, any of them will indicate some of their vines or grass. Some karamas are false and weak - there is no arguing with that. However, anyone who smears themselves with the juice of real karam sees in the dark.

Since the night became brighter than day for Nofuetoma, he began to wander in the forest from dusk to dawn and rake tree frogs, which are nocturnal, from the hollow. My wife then served them fried along with cassava cakes. Nofuetoma now also did fishing exclusively at night: he lit a torch and speared as many fish as he wanted.

Not surprisingly, discontent spread through the forest. The toads volunteered to take revenge on Nofuetoma, who created the witchcraft plant. They quietly entered his home and settled down, some under a log, some under a stone, some under an abandoned old basket. Whenever Nofuetoma went into the forest, toads crawled out of the dark corners and surrounded the mistress of the house. Stepping slowly, they approached the unfortunate woman, who had completely lost the ability to move. The toads climbed onto it and began to slowly eat it. The skin, meat and blood melted, the carcass fell apart.

When approaching the house, Nofuetoma used to knock on the root of a tree that grew along the path. By this he wanted to remind his wife that it was time to serve her husband cakes and beer. He didn't know that he was sending a warning to the toads. Hearing the knock, they restored the woman from the remains and took away her memory. When her husband came in, she only complained of a terrible headache and, losing weight day by day, refused to eat.

One day Nofuetoma was returning from hunting later than usual and in his haste he forgot to hit the root. Opening the door, he saw a pile of bloody bones on the floor, and in the hammock a completely gnawed skull. While the hunter was considering what to do, the skull jumped up and grabbed his sword. Nofuetoma tried to throw the skull to the floor, but it bit his hand. Each new attempt to get rid of the skull entailed more and more severe punishment. Nofuetoma realized that it was stupid to resist - the enemy would gnaw his throat. All that was left was to come to terms with it.

- What, don’t like it? – the skull grinned, seeing the success of the training. - You'll get used to it! This is for letting the toads eat me!

From now on, Nofuetoma's life turned into torture. He now constantly experienced acute hunger, since the skull intercepted almost all the food that the person brought to his mouth. The skull spewed its impurities onto Nofuetoma’s body. The back and shoulder turned black and began to rot alive, a thick swarm of flies accompanied the hunter wherever he went. When Nofuetoma tried to wash off the dirt, the skull bit him painfully on the cheek, making it clear that the next attempt to wash himself would cost the man his life.

Nofuetoma felt that he would not last long unless he came up with some trick. For a long time, all rescue plans failed: the skull showed remarkable insight and dexterity. And yet it was not for nothing that Nofuetoma was known as a sorcerer. One night he managed to talk to his amulets in secret from the skull. The guardian spirits gave advice: promise to feed the skull with fish, and then ask him to get down - they say, you need to check the top.

- Give me back my cassava grater!

The man opened the door and stuck a grater through the crack. Seeing a familiar object, the skull merged with it into a shapeless lump. The lump flew up and turned into a night parrot that screams in the moonlight. The parrot sat on the roof and then flew off into the forest.

4. Head

Kuimenare lived in the village of Ozairikasekwan with his two wives. They were sisters. The eldest was called Zoma-Zomairo, the youngest was Kamalalo. Zama-Zomairo had three children.

One day Kuimenare said to his eldest wife:

- I'll go fishing. I'll be back on the third day. Watch your sister so that she does not enter into conversation with Akui-Khalava; You know, probably, such a forest person - long hair, all white, handsome, an ogre himself, and he sings amm-lalala, amm-lalala! He settled down on the way to our garden and eats wild plums there.

Kamalalo's younger wife heard these words. So, Cuimenare went to the river. A little later, Zoma-3omairo went with the children to the garden. As she walked along the path, Akui-Halava began throwing plum pits at her, but the woman did not seem to notice this.

The next day Kamalalo took the basket and said:

- I’ll go to the garden now.

- Go, only our husband ordered not to enter into conversations with Akui-Khalava.

- Well, what are you talking about, I’ll start doing business with him!

Kamalalo reached a tree under which the ground was covered with a carpet of fruit seeds.

“Listen, Akui-Halava,” the young woman began, “throw me a plum, okay?” He threw down a handful of seeds.

“No, I don’t want that, I need drainage,” Kamalalo said playfully. He threw the bones again.

- Well, listen, stop it, are you sorry?

“Okay, okay, now I’ll really give you the plum.”

Eating sweet...

Indians of South America

Myths of the Indians of South America

Book for adults

POT WITH MEAT

1.Black man

The woman was already approaching the house when someone’s dark figure blocked the road.

The black man threw the woman onto the path. Having satisfied the desire, he stood up, grabbed the captive by the hands and dragged her along with him.

Although the new husband fed the woman well, she was impatient to go home. After all, the little daughter was left completely alone. One night the woman ran away. Trying not to stray from the path, she stumbled and fell more than once, sometimes thinking that she would not make it: her huge belly was in the way. It seemed that the woman was pregnant, although the pregnancy did not last that long. But here is the house. Preparing for the worst, the woman opened the door. The daughter was lying in a hammock. She was alive, but looked exhausted: huge tapir lice were crawling all over her body. The mother sat down next to her and began to look for insects in the girl’s head. Exhausted, mother and daughter dozed off slightly. Then an unborn child began to stir in the womb - a baby tapir. He stuck out his trunk-like nose, groped the girl’s genitals and in such an unusual way deprived her of her innocence.

The woman's husband's younger brother burst into the hut.

- I killed the tapir, I took revenge on him! - he shouted.

- It's time for me to give birth! – the woman moaned.

The baby tapir climbed out, tearing the mother in half.

“Go and ask,” they told their comrade, “where he is from; and invite him to us - let him eat too. And let him go to the leader!

The man was afraid to go to the leader, but those around him began to encourage him. Then the hunter approached the chief's house and shouted a polite greeting.

A little boy standing nearby whispered to the man:

- Try to grab the axe, because the leader is going to finish you off!

- How can I chop, leader? – the man asked, approaching the tree.

- Well, quickly hide here, otherwise the cold wind will blow!

The children climbed into the box, and the man hammered the lid with nails. A cold wind blew and the children in the box died.

- What, don’t like it? – the skull grinned, seeing the success of the training. - You'll get used to it! This is for letting the toads eat me!

The desire to feast overcame caution: the skull reluctantly jumped from its living perch onto a fallen tree trunk. At the same instant, Nofuetoma jumped into the river and swam under water as long as his breath allowed. Then he climbed onto the bank and ran towards the house. Slamming the door, he closed it with a pole. The skull galloped after him, stopped and suddenly shouted in the voice of his wife: “Give me back my cassava grater!” The man opened the door and stuck a grater through the crack. Seeing a familiar object, the skull merged with it into a shapeless lump. The lump flew up and turned into a night parrot that screams in the moonlight. The parrot sat on the roof and then flew off into the forest.

Kuimenare lived in the village of Ozairikasekwan with his two wives. They were sisters. The eldest was called Zoma-Zomairo, the youngest was Kamalalo. Zama-Zomairo had three children.

One day Kuimenare said to his eldest wife: “I’ll go fishing.” I'll be back on the third day. Watch your sister so that she does not enter into conversation with Akui-Khalava; You know, probably, such a forest person - long hair, all white, handsome, an ogre himself, and he sings amm-lalala, amm-lalala! He settled down on the way to our garden and eats wild plums there.

The next day Kamalalo took the basket and said:

- I’ll go to the garden now.

- Go, only our husband ordered not to enter into conversations with Akui-Khalava.

- Well, what are you talking about, I’ll start doing business with him! Kamalalo reached a tree under which the ground was covered with a carpet of fruit seeds.

Thirty years ago, geneticists discovered that the ancestors of modern humans came from Africa. Around the same time, Yuri Berezkin began compiling a database of world folklore and mythology.

“When I reached Africa from South America, I was surprised to find that tropical Africa had many common motifs with South America, as well as with Australia, Melanesia and the Indo-Pacific coasts of Asia.”

Yuri Berezkin

Here are three examples of motifs found in these territories:

1. Contrasting mortal people with immortal snakes, the reborn Moon or other entities possessing immortality.
2. Identifying a rainbow with a snake or something similar.
3. The origin of people (and many people, and not a pair of first ancestors) from underground or from some containers located near the earth.

But South America is farthest from Africa than all other continents. The Atlantic Ocean was first crossed by Columbus, and the path from Africa to South America along the coasts of different seas takes 20 thousand kilometers. How did it happen that the same motifs, and such specific ones, are found in South America and Africa?

“The assumption is this (and it is unlikely to be wrong): the fact is that in South America those cultural elements that were characteristic of people who came out of Africa and further populated the Indo-Pacific coasts of Asia were preserved.”

Yuri Berezkin

That is, in East Asia, these motifs existed before the settlement of the New World, 15-20 thousand years ago. Moreover, in North America they are found much less frequently than in South America: there they were displaced by later waves of migrations that arrived 10-12 thousand years ago.

There are motifs that connect Latin America with the tropical regions of the Old World, but are not found in Africa. They probably originated somewhere in the territories of India, China and Indonesia. But these motives, with rare exceptions, are not found in Eurasia.

“The fact is that this part of the world was also inhabited by people from Africa, but they took a different path. Those people who went east to India and further to America, and those people who populated continental Eurasia, separated approximately 50 thousand years ago. And so their mythology became different.”

Yuri Berezkin

It is in South America that we find motifs that can be considered relics of ancient mythology that existed 50-70 thousand years ago,
before modern humans left Africa.

Abstract

In South and Central America, there are often stories that cultivated plants originated from various parts of the body of a certain character, usually killed or deceased. The same plot appears
in Southeast Asia and Japan. Another origin story cultivated plants- that all cultivated plants originally grew on a tree, and people found them by felling this tree - is found in the myths of South America, Indonesia and Oceania.

How could these stories spread along two Pacific coasts?

Version 1. Some peoples sailed across the Pacific Ocean and transported these myths.

“The Polynesians actually sailed and reached the shores of Southern California and, probably, South America. But these contacts were very episodic and not with the peoples among whom these myths are found. In addition, the Polynesians themselves do not have many of these stories.”

Yuri Berezkin

Version 2. These myths were passed down by slaves who were brought to Micronesia
from Panama and from the island of Palau.

“These stories are found not only in Panama and on the island of Palau, they are very widespread. Therefore, these explanations due to late contacts are absolutely unsuitable.”

Yuri Berezkin

Version 3. In both South America and Indonesia, most cultivated plants reproduce not through seeds, but through tubers, from pieces of which individual plants grow. This nature of agriculture could lead
to the independent emergence of the same plots.

“To test this hypothesis, it is enough to turn to African material, where the natural conditions are very similar to those that are characteristic of Indonesia or South America, and the cultivated species are also largely similar. But what's amazing? In Africa there were no myths at all explaining the origin of cultivated plants.<…>Sometimes there are stories about how agriculture appeared, how people dug up the earth, but not about where the plants themselves came from.”

Yuri Berezkin

Version 4. In Indonesia, these myths existed in ancient times, before the first stream of migration left East Asia through Alaska to South America.

For this to happen, agriculture must have existed in Indonesia 15 thousand years ago. But that's not true.

We have one clue: There have been several recorded stories in Alaska of a murdered woman turning into blueberries and strawberries. Therefore, we can assume the following.

Version 5. Initially, this plot was associated with the origin of wild edible species. Then the people went north. There are tropical species
it turned out not to be, and these plots were adapted to the berries growing there.
Then people went further to South America and transferred these stories
to South American species. These stories then developed into myths.
about the origin of cultivated species in parallel in Indonesia and South America.

“Of course, the hypothesis is a little risky, because we have to go from yams to blueberries, and then from blueberries back to yams. Them
However, to date, no other explanations arise.
In a sense, this is such an anthropological mystery."

Yuri Berezkin

Abstract

Among the Indians of the north and north-west of South America - that is,
in the territories of modern Peru, Guiana and Colombia—myths are popular
about what before women they had to cut their stomachs to get the children out, and then a certain character taught them how to give birth.

Such myths (or their variant - a person ends up in some place where women do not know how to give birth) are also found in Western Canada and the northwestern United States, from Northern California to Alaska, among many Polynesians, Micronesians and most peoples of Indonesia .
In South America, stories about people who have no mouth or anus are very common - this may happen in the past, or
in the underworld, or in some distant land. The same stories occur sporadically in North America, Indonesia and the Indo-Pacific margin of Asia. There are isolated texts of this kind recorded in continental Eurasia, but there are very few of them there. There are none in Africa at all.

“These kinds of stories about a closed body that had to be opened, or such a strange anatomy that had to be changed, are extremely characteristic of South America, North America, and the Indo-Pacific fringes of Asia.”

Yuri Berezkin

In approximately the same territories - in South and North America, in the Arctic
and within the Indo-Pacific margin of Eurasia — stories meet
about women who cheat on men with different animals: in South America - with crocodiles or tapirs, in North America - with bears,
in the Arctic - with whales or with strange creatures that are simply a male genital organ. Usually this story ends with
that the husband, brother or sons of this woman kill her lover and everything returns to normal.

There is also a widespread motif of the toothy womb: a woman had teeth in her womb with which she killed men, until a certain hero put a stone or poison there, as a result of which the teeth fell out and women became safe.

There is something similar in Afanasyev’s Treasured Tales (these are Russian stories)
and among Ukrainians. But, firstly, they are very rare, and secondly, there these are jokes, and not mythology, as in Japan, Thailand or South America, where these stories were sincerely believed, and perhaps they still are.

Probably, this plot was also found in Western Europe, it’s just that no one there
didn't write it down. But in Africa, where people (at least until recently) did not have such excessive ideas about modesty, there are no stories either
about the toothy bosom.

“There can be only one conclusion from this comparison: the motif of the toothy womb most likely appeared not so long ago as the story about the origin of death. Most likely, it appeared somewhere in Southeast Asia, about 15-20-30 thousand years later. From there he came to America."

Yuri Berezkin

Abstract

In areas of South America far from the coasts, there are still rituals for evoking spirits, during which men put on costumes and masks and at some points hide from women and blow trumpets and flutes. At these moments, women are strictly forbidden to see them: they must believe that these are not men, but spirits who have come to the village. Already in the second half of the 20th century, episodes were recorded when women who accidentally or intentionally saw forbidden parts of the ritual were subjected to punishment, sometimes very cruel.

These rituals are associated with a certain group of myths, for example: initially, power belonged to women, and men had to hunt, nurse children and do all the housework. Women told men that they were calling spirits. They demanded that men bring food to these spirits, and then eat it themselves.

“One day, a man accidentally noticed that in reality everything was wrong and that men were being deceived. Men staged a coup, women's power was overthrown. As a rule, they were killed, leaving the girls behind.
And girls have already been raised to believe that it is spirits that come to men. Boys are told this story during their initiation rites. The boys must first tremble and believe that some kind of monster is coming out of the ground. Then it turns out that this is not a monster, but a familiar uncle who has put on all these masks. Well, they take oaths that they will never talk about it.”

Yuri Berezkin

In North America, such rituals are practically not recorded. But they are typical for Australia and Melanesia. There are also stories reminiscent of this plot in West Africa and the Congo Basin: for example, women once found a spirit mask and began to make them themselves, but they were not very good at it - because only men should make these masks and arrange the corresponding rituals .

It seems that these rituals and myths are a relic of very deep antiquity, they were widespread even before our ancestors came out
from Africa. But they survived only in the interior of South America, New Guinea and Australia, that is, in isolated areas,
least exposed to impacts from continental Eurasia. Why?

“Apparently, this kind of social structure is not very competitive. It's redundant.<…>Women can be oppressed at the family level without any problems. And so it turns out: already before the eyes of ethnographers in both New Guinea and South America, some groups simply demonstratively refused these rituals - and nothing
hasn't changed. The sky didn't fall, the spirits didn't kill anyone.<…>As soon as a new type of culture appeared, in which there was no institutional opposition between the sexes, this type of culture began to disappear.”

Yuri Berezkin

In North America, rituals of this kind are not recorded - with one striking exception. In the Aleutian Islands in the 19th century, it was described how local hunters go hunting, and then return in the form of devils and scare the Aleut women.

“There are quite a lot of such relics in North America. They indicate that, indeed, such rituals
and myths were widespread not only in South America
and not only in New Guinea, but also in North America
and in East Asia, where they disappeared safely.”

Yuri Berezkin

Abstract

About 15-16 thousand years ago, the first migration flow came to Latin America and there it was divided into two: some people populated the west (the Andes and the steppes of Patagonia), and others settled the tropical forests and savannas of Brazil and Guiana. Archaeological data shows that there were several such waves.

“As a result of such settlement of the continent, a situation has arisen where there are folklore and mythological plots and motifs that are the same
in the west and east of South America, and there are, on the contrary, those that are found only in the east or only in the west.”

Yuri Berezkin

Among the stories recorded only in the West - in Argentina and Chile - there are stories about how birds and animals argue about how many months there should be in winter or hours in the night, how many feathered body parts a partridge has, or how many claws a hare has on its paws, how many stripes does an ostrich have on its neck, and so on. Stories of this kind are also typical throughout North America, where actors become a bear, a chipmunk and a frog. Amazingly, such stories are also common in Southern Siberia - in the Altai and Sayan Mountains. There, a chipmunk and a bear are arguing with each other. Their argument ends with the bear, getting angry, scratching the chipmunk with its paw, and stripes remain on the chipmunk’s skin. This dispute ends in the same way somewhere among the Indians of the states of Kentucky or Tennessee, or somewhere among the Indians of British Columbia in western Canada.

“This is a very interesting parallel - it immediately shows where the Indians came from. Not the first groups that came from somewhere in East Asia, but later ones that came from the Sayan-Altai region, from the territory of Southern Siberia.”

Yuri Berezkin

In North America, there is a whole series of stories involving a coyote who acts as a trickster. In Siberia, there is usually a fox in this place, and in the west of South America (in Patagonia, in the Andes) there is a fox. There are no real tricksters in eastern South America.

For example, a coyote challenges a rock (or a stump, or a fire) to race it. He runs, and the stone begins to roll slowly down the slope, but gradually accelerates and eventually crushes this fox or coyote. Or a porcupine asks an elk to carry it across the river and climbs inside it to do this. Having reached the other bank, the porcupine cuts the moose and climbs out. But then a coyote appears and tries to outwit the porcupine and take the carcass from him. In the end, the porcupine proves to be more cunning and kills the coyote. Last example: Coyote wants to marry his daughters. He pretends that he died, and after the funeral he returns, somehow changing his appearance, and takes his daughters as his wife. But they recognize him, run away to heaven and turn into the Pleiades. In South America, such stories also occur, but they do not have such a dramatic escalation of episodes as in North American ones.

“To summarize this lecture, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that Indian mythology, just like the mythology of any other country, is not only solemn stories about the emergence of the world, but to a large extent also anecdotal folklore. Indians or Eskimos are people just like us.”

Yuri Berezkin

Abstract

Apart from relatively short stories or a series of individual episodes,
in South America there are stories comparable in length and complexity to the fairy tales of the peoples of Western Eurasia or
with the epic works of some Mongolians. They are distributed mainly in Guiana and Brazil.

A typical Caribbean plot of this kind goes like this: a certain woman meets a deity. Having been with her, the deity leaves and tells her to follow him after some time. She, pregnant, sets off on her journey. The way is shown to her by the twins who are in her stomach. But one day she is bitten by a wasp. To hit the wasp, she slaps herself on the stomach, and the children decide that she hit them, get offended and fall silent. A woman goes astray and ends up
to the village of jaguars.

“We must keep in mind that in all these stories it is not very clear whether we are talking about people or animals. Let's say this woman, the heroine of the myth, is anthropomorphic, she is a person. But in some episodes the jaguars begin to cook it, and it turns out that they are cooking a turtle. And when she hits
to jaguars, then these are at the same time people: they live in a village, they
there are bows and arrows.<…>This is generally typical of Indian
mythology. In the mythology of the Old World, at least Siberia
and Central Asia, this is impossible. There if someone turns
into a dog, then he turns into a dog. And so that he is either a dog or a man, of course, there is no such thing.”

Yuri Berezkin

The jaguars eat the woman and give the offal to an old woman who finds two babies inside. An old woman raises them until some bird tells them the truth. After this they kill the jaguars. Then some other events happen to them, and in the end the brothers rise into the sky: one becomes the sun, and the other the moon. The endings can be different, it doesn’t matter. In some cases, brothers begin to quarrel with each other, and nothing significant happens to them anymore - there is no end.

“I spoke for quite a long time and described only the most basic episodes that are found in dozens of texts. There could be many more of these episodes."

Yuri Berezkin

A similar story is recorded in the Central American epic Popol Vuh; The peoples of Central Asia and Southern Siberia have a lot of this - especially those who speak Turkic and Mongolian languages. But everywhere except South America, at the beginning of this story in most cases it is the father who dies, not the mother.

The first part of this plot - a woman goes to look for her husband - often lives her own separate life in South and North America. Perhaps this is the most common plot among American Indians. A girl (or two sisters) meet some deity and go looking for him, but end up
to some unpleasant characters. For example, to jaguars or possums. The girl has to get along with the possum, and therefore, of her two twin sons, one turns out to be the son of a deity, and the other the son of a possum.
In one of the North American versions of this myth, the girls are looking for a leader, but end up with a jester who pretends to be the leader. When the girls find out the truth and go to the real leader, the jester kills him. These stories are very logical: they have a plot, an intrigue, a hero or heroine. But if in the stories that are familiar to us, characteristic of Europe and Asia, the hero achieves success - he marries the princess, defeats his opponents, prevents a crime -
and this is where the story comes to an end, then in Indian texts this is the ending
not only optional, but quite rare.

“Why does this happen? ...This means that such stories with good ending, with a wedding to a princess appeared relatively recently.
This is the result of a gradual adjustment, a gradual selection of the most logical and easy to remember stories that are satisfactory in content. The Indians, one might say, have not grown up to this. If they had lived without Europeans for a few more millennia, they would probably have had some kind of fairy tale of their own. But, of course, it is impossible to prove this, because their natural development was interrupted."

Yuri Berezkin

Abstract

“In the mythologies we are familiar with, primarily in the biblical one, the world is created by a deity: he first creates the world, and then what is in it.<…>But in many mythologies outside of Eurasia the situation is different. Very often there is no mention at all of the creation of the world, the creation of the earth. There is no such thing as that the earth and the world will be eternal; no one thinks about this topic at all.”

Yuri Berezkin

In mythologies recorded outside of Eurasia, we immediately talk about
about the appearance of some elements of this world, in particular the sun and moon. Many nations have such stories. And in all territories adjacent to the Pacific Ocean, they are very similar.

In Peru and Bolivia they say that the sun appeared as a punishment to people for their behavior. Moreover, these people thought that the sun would rise from the west, and they built stone houses with an entrance from the east in order to hide from it. But the sun rose from the east and they died.

One of the Brazilian tribes has the idea that the sun did not exist at first, and then it appeared, and the creatures that lived in the pre-solar era either died or turned into some kind of animals, or
into sacred pipes and flutes that women are not allowed to see, or into masks that symbolize the inhabitants of the eternal world. Only those who hid survived, and then gradually came out of their hiding place and got used to it.
to the light.

In Mexico, Ecuador and Colombia, stories are written about how the first ancestors decided to choose the sun. But in order to become the sun, you had to jump into the fire. Only the son of a poor widow decided to do this. When the fire cooled down, a noble man jumped into it. He also ascended to heaven, but in the form of the moon.

In Costa Rica and Panama, a poor woman gives birth to twins. From time to time they go to some holiday and there they turn
into handsome men. Gradually the mother begins to understand that they have some other nature. She ends up making them cocoa, they drink it and turn into the moon and the sun.

In the north of the American continent (Canada, Alaska) there is a version of the myth associated with the raven. A very rich man keeps the sun, moon and stars. Then the raven turns into a needle, which the rich man’s daughter drinks along with the water—and gives birth to a boy, the incarnation of a raven. The rich man loves this child very much and when he asks for the sun, moon and stars to play with, he agrees. Then the boy turns into a raven
and flies out of the house along with the luminaries. The world is flooded with light. All the people inhabiting the world turn into animals or fish - in general, they disappear.
The world is populated by new people.

This idea of a certain boundary dividing mythical history into two parts is characteristic not only of South and North American Indians,
but in general for mythology. The anthropologist Eleazar Meletinsky proposed calling the creatures that lived before this milestone the first ancestors.

“This [the world before the frontier] is an imitation of the world.<…>In this world everything is possible.
And as a result of this rehearsal, all options that
no good. In that world, women had teeth in their genitals, people ate steam, and were either human or animal. And after this milestone, our world began - no longer myths and legends, but history. And this is a completely different era.”

Yuri Berezkin

Abstract

From the late 1920s to the present day, many stories have been recorded in Peru about a boy and a girl who ended up with a cannibal. The cannibal eats the boy, and the girl runs away, taking his bones with her. In the end, a rope is lowered to the girl, along which she climbs into the sky. There children turn into the sun and moon. A rope also goes down to the cannibal, but when she begins to climb up, the rope breaks, the cannibal falls and turns into blackberries, nettles, some cultivated plant, or, for example, the Andes.

Neither in Spanish nor in European folklore in general is there a motif of children turning into the sun and moon. And none of the researchers doubted that this was a Peruvian myth dating back to pre-Columbian times. True, not in all texts a boy and a girl turn into the sun and the moon: sometimes a girl turns into the moon, and a boy into a dog. And the further north you go, the less pronounced this motive of becoming a luminary becomes. Additionally, in many records, children are saved by the Virgin Mary. In general, there were reasons to doubt that this plot was completely Indian.

Stories similar to this are recorded in Western and Eastern Europe, as well as in the Middle East and North Africa. The stepmother is tired of her husband's children. She killed her stepson and made cutlets out of him, and ordered her stepdaughter to take them to her father. On the way, the Virgin Mary came out to meet the girl and taught her what to do—and as a result, the uneaten or half-eaten cutlets turned into a bird, which began to sing: “My stepmother killed me, and my father ate me.” These stories are similar to those recorded in Peru: apparently the fairy tales brought by the Spaniards influenced Peruvian myths.

“But if in Europe this is a fairy tale, then here it is not quite: it is still a solemn myth, because here we are talking about the appearance of modern relief, blackberries or even cultivated plants. And where do the sun and moon come from? In a European fairy tale<…>there is no transformation into the sun and moon. And not only in European fairy tales: this does not exist either in Africa, or in Western Asia, or in the Caucasus.”

Yuri Berezkin

The motif of children becoming luminaries is found in other parts of America. For example, in Mexico there is a story about a boy and a girl who killed the father of the woman they were staying with. She got angry, and then they locked her in a bathhouse and burned her, and they themselves ran away, took away the eyes of a bird or a snake and became the sun and the moon. But there is no persecution motive here. The sixth episode was about a story recorded in the Amazon where two twin boys killed jaguars to avenge the death of their mother and then turned into the sun and moon. But no one followed them there either. Stories about children being pursued by a cannibal are not typical for Indian texts, except for the territory of Peru.

As it turns out, texts whose endings completely coincide with the Peruvian ones are common in Japan, Korea and northern Burma. Usually, at the beginning, a widow lives there with children (usually three). She goes about her business, and when she returns, she sings a song to the children - and they open the door for her. One day she meets an ogress (or tiger), who swallows her and takes her form. The children open the door, this character ends up in the same room with them for the night and eats the youngest child. And the two older children (usually two girls) ask to go into the yard and climb a tree. At the end, one way or another, a rope comes down to them from the sky, along which they rise to the sky and turn into the sun and moon. A rope also comes down to this character, but it turns out to be rotten.

Such a plot is unknown in China, but for a long time there were forbidden texts there that were not allowed to be published in a non-Chinese language and exported outside of China, so perhaps they were written down there too.

“But where is China and where is Peru. The first idea that came to my mind when I became acquainted with these texts was that this was some very ancient motif that was known to the Paleo-Indians 15 thousand years ago. They circled Alaska, went south and eventually ended up in Peru, where the story surfaced again. However, it was suspicious that there were no such parallels anywhere else. The combination of motives is very specific: the cannibal eats a boy while in the same room with the children; two ropes - one rope is good, and the other is rotten.”

Yuri Berezkin

The fact is that in the second half of the 19th century, workers from China came en masse to Peru to work on the plantations. Most of them later left, but several tens of thousands integrated into local communities. Therefore, it is very likely that Chinese workers transmitted this story to the Indian communities of Northern Peru, which then overlapped with some pre-Columbian ideas and a Spanish fairy tale, and by the 1920-1930s this myth appeared there. This also explains the fact that stories of this kind were not recorded in Peru in the 16th-17th centuries, and, apparently, the Andean mythological system was completely different before the 20th century.

Most likely, until the 20th century, the sun and the moon were opposed there as antagonists: in the Andes the sun is always a man, and the moon is a woman. In Tierra del Fuego, they become characters in the myth of the first coup, in which the moon commanded women and terrorized men, and then the sun (representing masculinity) overthrew her. After that, they both ascended to heaven, and the first ancestors turned into animals. Among the ancient images of the Mochica culture, there is a scene of confrontation between the sun and the moon: during a solar eclipse, the moon became the leader of a riot of things, when the warriors were attacked by items of clothing and weapons. This plot ends with the sun returning to the sky and the mythical story turning into the present.

“Folklorists rarely deal with ancient texts: 99% of texts were written down in our time. And we must always analyze what this all relates to. The stories recorded down to the present day may have originated in deep Paleolithic antiquity and even go back to the era before the dispersal from Africa. But other texts that look exactly the same to an untrained observer turn out to be of recent origin.”

Yuri Berezkin

Indian epic

Myths of the Indians of South America

Pot of meat

1.Black man

The woman was already approaching the house when someone’s dark figure blocked the road.

The black man threw the woman onto the path. Having satisfied the desire, he stood up, grabbed the captive by the hands and dragged her along with him.

Although the new husband fed the woman well, she was impatient to go home. After all, the little daughter was left completely alone. One night the woman ran away. Trying not to stray from the path, she stumbled and fell more than once, sometimes thinking that she would not make it: her huge belly was in the way. It seemed that the woman was pregnant, although the pregnancy did not last that long. But here is the house. Preparing for the worst, the woman opened the door. The daughter was lying in a hammock. She was alive, but looked exhausted: huge tapir lice were crawling all over her body. The mother sat down next to her and began to look for insects in the girl’s head. Exhausted, mother and daughter dozed off slightly. Then an unborn child began to stir in the womb - a baby tapir. He stuck out his trunk-like nose, groped the girl’s genitals and in such an unusual way deprived her of her innocence.

The woman's husband's younger brother burst into the hut.

- I killed the tapir, I took revenge on him! - he shouted.

- It's time for me to give birth! – the woman moaned.

The baby tapir climbed out, tearing the mother in half.

“Go and ask,” they told their comrade, “where he is from; and invite him to us - let him eat too. And let him go to the leader!

The man was afraid to go to the leader, but those around him began to encourage him. Then the hunter approached the chief's house and shouted a polite greeting.

A little boy standing nearby whispered to the man:

- Try to grab the axe, because the leader is going to finish you off!

- How can I chop, leader? – the man asked, approaching the tree.

- Well, quickly hide here, otherwise the cold wind will blow!

The children climbed into the box, and the man hammered the lid with nails. A cold wind blew and the children in the box died.

- What, don’t like it? – the skull grinned, seeing the success of the training. - You'll get used to it! This is for letting the toads eat me!

Indian epic

Myths of the Indians of South America

Pot of meat

1.Black man

The woman was already approaching the house when someone’s dark figure blocked the road.

The black man threw the woman onto the path. Having satisfied the desire, he stood up, grabbed the captive by the hands and dragged her along with him.

Although the new husband fed the woman well, she was impatient to go home. After all, the little daughter was left completely alone. One night the woman ran away. Trying not to stray from the path, she stumbled and fell more than once, sometimes thinking that she would not make it: her huge belly was in the way. It seemed that the woman was pregnant, although the pregnancy did not last that long. But here is the house. Preparing for the worst, the woman opened the door. The daughter was lying in a hammock. She was alive, but looked exhausted: huge tapir lice were crawling all over her body. The mother sat down next to her and began to look for insects in the girl’s head. Exhausted, mother and daughter dozed off slightly. Then an unborn child began to stir in the womb - a baby tapir. He stuck out his trunk-like nose, groped the girl’s genitals and in such an unusual way deprived her of her innocence.

The woman's husband's younger brother burst into the hut.

- I killed the tapir, I took revenge on him! - he shouted.

- It's time for me to give birth! – the woman moaned.

The baby tapir climbed out, tearing the mother in half.

“Go and ask,” they told their comrade, “where he is from; and invite him to us - let him eat too. And let him go to the leader!

The man was afraid to go to the leader, but those around him began to encourage him. Then the hunter approached the chief's house and shouted a polite greeting.

A little boy standing nearby whispered to the man:

- Try to grab the axe, because the leader is going to finish you off!

- How can I chop, leader? – the man asked, approaching the tree.

- Well, quickly hide here, otherwise the cold wind will blow!

The children climbed into the box, and the man hammered the lid with nails. A cold wind blew and the children in the box died.

- What, don’t like it? – the skull grinned, seeing the success of the training. - You'll get used to it! This is for letting the toads eat me!

- Give me back my cassava grater!

Kuimenare lived in the village of Ozairikasekwan with his two wives. They were sisters. The eldest was called Zoma-Zomairo, the youngest was Kamalalo. Zama-Zomairo had three children.

One day Kuimenare said to his eldest wife:

The next day Kamalalo took the basket and said:

- I’ll go to the garden now.

- Go, only our husband ordered not to enter into conversations with Akui-Khalava.

- Well, what are you talking about, I’ll start doing business with him!

Kamalalo reached a tree under which the ground was covered with a carpet of fruit seeds.

“Listen, Akui-Halava,” the young woman began, “throw me a plum, okay?” He threw down a handful of seeds.

“No, I don’t want that, I need drainage,” Kamalalo said playfully. He threw the bones again.

South American Indian mythology. Read online "myths of the Indians of South America" ​​Myths and legends of South America

Abstract

Abstract

Abstract

Abstract

Abstract

Abstract

Abstract

Popular

South American Indian mythology. Read online "myths of the Indians of South America" Myths and legends of South America