Iroquois Culture

Many stories have been created, told and passed down through generations about how the earth came to be. Some of these stories have not only differences, but also similarities. African and Iroquois cultures seem on the surface to have nothing in common, especially because they are from different parts of the world. However, they both share fundamental values. The myths “The Golden Chain” from Africa and “The World on the Turtle’s Back” from the Iroquois culture, are similar in the fact that they both value simplicity and a deity figure. Iroquois and African myths both include the presence of basic forms of nature, examples are soil, sand, water, plants, and earth. These basic elements are instrumental in the creation of Earth and eventually
Without the roots and soil, plants could not have grown on Earth and life could not have been created, therefore life flows from the basic building blocks of the soil and roots. Representing a goddess, the woman who descends from Skyworld not only helps create the Earth by planting the roots on the turtle’s back, but also by helping to maintain the Earth. In order to maintain the Earth, the woman and her daughter must keep “walking in a circle around the earth, so that the earth and plants would continue to grow” (Iroquois 1). In addition to the soil and roots, the woman from Skyworld plays a significant role in creating the world and creating life because she first has the idea of how to create the world and then continues to maintain it, which leads to the creation of life. In “The Golden Chain”, an African creation myth, basic materials are used to create more complex landscapes and eventually, Earth. Only one material was needed to make the world in this creation myth, which is sand. Obatala goes down to the Earth and pours out a seashell filled with sand and “the sand hit the water, and to his surprise it spread and solidified to make a vast land” (African 1). The simple element of sand creates an
In the Iroquois myth, the woman falls to the Earth and is saved by the sea birds. She does not make the journey voluntarily. The woman from the Skyworld is forced into her journey to Earth, as she “frantically grabbed” at the edge of the Skyworld, but failed to hang on and plunged to the world below (Iroquois 1). The language the Iroquois uses suggests that the woman does not wish to leave her home and join the new world. The woman from the Skyworld started the process of creating life as she was pregnant during her journey to Earth, and her daughter soon became pregnant too with twins. The Iroquois call them the right-handed twin and the left-handed twin, and together, they “built balance into the world” (1). Because the twins created the world and man, or life, and they are descended from the woman from the Skyworld, the woman is the beginning of life and the beginning of the Earth, even though creating life was not her intention when she fell from the Skyworld. In the African myth, Obatala creates a Golden Chain and descends upon the world below to discover what is there. In contrast to the Iroquois myth, he makes the journey voluntarily, but both myths still include a deity figure traveling down to the world below and creating the world. In the story, “Obatala went to