sobota, 5 września 2026

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Rhpisunt was the daughter of a chieftain, who, according to the northwestern peoples, married the son of a bear. While gathering berries, she met two young men who led her to the house of the bear people. Bearskin cloaks hung everywhere, as these creatures had human form, but they always wore cloaks when leaving the house. The girl married the son of the bear chief and gave birth to two cubs. After some time, Rhpisunt's brothers came to the bear cave, and when they left, the girl and cubs followed them. Upon returning to their family home, the two bear cubs took off their cloaks and revealed themselves to be two young, beautiful boys who became great hunters. When Rhpisunt grew old and died, the boys returned to the bear people. But Rhpisunt's tribesmen, remembering their kinship with the bears, always had good hunting.

Wakan - in the tradition of the Sioux Indians, an invisible power, a spirit inherent in nature.

Wakonda - the equivalent of Manito among the Dakota tribes.

Wolf – a creator figure from the mythology of the Shoshone people of North America. In ancient times, Wolf and Coyote were the most important of people, but Coyote always tried to oppose Wolf. One day, they were discussing death. Wolf said that dead people could be brought back to life by shooting an arrow at them, but Coyote disagreed, claiming that if that were true, there would soon be no room left on Earth. So Wolf decided that Coyote's son would die first. Distraught, Coyote went to Wolf and asked him to revive him, as he had previously proposed. However, Wolf reminded him of a comment he had made earlier, that dead people should stay dead. And so it has remained ever since.

Wisakedjak – Trickster in Krik folklore, also known by the Anglicized name "Whiskey Jack." The supreme being, Manitu, asked Wisakedjak to teach animals and humans to live in harmony, but instead he sowed chaos. Enraged, Manitu sent a great flood, which only Wisakedjak and a few animals survived. However, the world and its inhabitants were recreated.
Earth Diver – a creature that dives to the ocean floor to bring up mud, from which the first land will arise. According to Cheyenne mythology, the supreme being Maheo ("Great Spirit") created the Great Water along with other aquatic creatures. The waterfowl quickly tired of flying and began diving in search of solid land. Finally, the coot returned with a small lump of mud, which she dropped into Maheo's hand. When Maheo began kneading it, it grew so large that only Grandmother Turtle could lift it. The mud continued to grow on her back—thus, the first land was created.

Inuit mythology

Adliwun - the underwater land of the dead.

Anguta - Sedna's father.

The Moon Spirit is one of the three greatest spiritual forces, alongside the Air Spirit and the Sea Spirit. The Moon Spirit is a male deity and a great hunter. He inhabits the heavenly realm, presiding over fertility, mortality, and, according to the Inuit of Alaska, animals. The Moon Spirit is essentially benevolent, but is perceived as a threatening deity, reacting to human misdeeds by sending bad weather, as well as numerous failures during hunting and war.

The Sea Spirit – the most important of the three spirits. The sea spirit, known as Sedna and Nuliajuk, patronizes all creatures that humans feed on. She takes the form of a woman and dwells in the depths of the sea, sending forth creatures to be caught as food. According to one Inuit myth, the Sea Spirit was originally a girl whose father forced her to marry a dog. When the marriage broke up, she married a storm petrel (bird), but her father took her away from him. The petrel tracked them down and brought a storm that nearly capsized their kayak. The terrified father tried to throw the girl to the sea bird, but she clung to the side, so he chopped off her fingers. The girl sank to the seabed and became the Sea Spirit. Her severed fingers transformed into seals and walruses.
The Spirit of Air – one of the three greatest spiritual forces. Known in the far regions of the North as Sila ("Weather," "Intelligence"), the Spirit of Air lives high above the earth and exercises power over rain, snow, wind, and sea. He is generally benign, but is perceived as a dangerous deity because he is sensitive to the evil deeds of humans, sending illness upon them.

Main – the guardian of the sun. One day, in the upper world, a moose ran to the top of a hill, took the sun on its antlers, and fled into the forest. Darkness fell in the middle world, where humans live, so Main donned winged skis and flew to the upper world, where at midnight he killed the moose with an arrow. The sun returned above the hill, and with it the light. Since then, the story has repeated itself every night.

Nuliajuk - one of the Inuit names for the Spirit of the Sea.

Sedna, Arnaknagsak - goddess of marine life, ruler of the sea depths and dangerous forces of nature. Ghostly goddess of the underworld. Enemy of humans.

Sila - spirit of air, light and climate.

The Bladder Festival is a winter celebration of the Alaskan Inuit during which the inflated bladders of all the marine mammals hunted during the year are stuffed into ice holes. This supposedly allows the animal spirits to return to the spirit world, where they dwell among the animals and from where they can be sent back to earth as game.

Tornak - in Eskimo mythology, an incompetent creation of the first father-raven deity (Tukungersak), an evil spirit, the father of all the demons of the world.

Tukungersak – an Inuit hero-civilizer. A bird-man, his raven father created a failed human who turned out to be the demon Tornak. He then molded real people from clay and brought them to life.

Tunia - an Eskimo terrible evil spirit.

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