Myths and Legends of Alaska — Themes and Context

Creation from Mud and Ivory

Two creation accounts in the excerpts offer contrasting origins. In the preface, a great Bird dips its wings and earth arises; later, a man takes mud from a muskrat’s hands, dries it, crumbles it, and blows dust over the waters to form the world. This second version, attributed to an unspecified source, emphasizes a small, humble substance—mud—transformed by breath. A third account, from the Eskimo of Bering Straits, tells of a man and woman who descend from the sky to the Diomede Islands. The man carves five dolls from walrus ivory and five from wood; overnight they become people. The ivory dolls become men, “therefore they are brave and hardy,” while the wooden dolls become women, “therefore they are soft and timid.” This explicit link between material and character is a rare moment where the text assigns gendered traits based on the origin substance, contrasting with the mud-based creation that lacks such differentiation.

The Divided Woman and Regional Skills

The story “The First Woman” from the Eskimo (Bering Straits) presents a striking origin for gender-based abilities. Initially, only one woman exists, in the south. A northern man marries her, but the son of the headsman also wants her. In a struggle, the two men pull her apart: the son carries the upper body north, the husband keeps the lower body south. Each then carves wood to complete the woman. The southern woman becomes a good dancer but cannot sew fine furs because her hands are wooden; the northern woman sews skillfully but dances poorly because her feet are wooden. The tale concludes that “all the women of the north are skilful with their hands, and all the women of the south are good dancers, even to this day.” This etiological narrative ties regional craft traditions to a violent, literal division of a single body, and the closing line—“Thus you may know that the tale is true”—asserts its explanatory power.

Tears, Seals, and Emotional Origins

“The First Tears,” another Eskimo tale from Bering Straits, offers a spare account of how humans learned to cry. Man hunts seals but fails repeatedly; each time a seal slips away. Finally, after the last seal escapes, “his breast was full of a strange feeling. Water began to drop from his eyes.” He catches the drops, recognizes them as water, and then “loud cries came from his breast.” His son and daughter-in-law witness this, and water also comes from their eyes. The story ends with Man and his son killing a seal and making snares from its skin. The narrative links emotional expression directly to hunting failure—a practical, survival-oriented context. Unlike the creation tales that explain physical origins, this one accounts for a human behavior (crying) through a specific, relatable event: the frustration of losing prey. The cause is not supernatural but experiential, and the resolution (successful hunting) restores order.

Judson’s collection does not smooth over the diversity of its sources. Readers will encounter multiple, sometimes contradictory, accounts of creation, the origin of people, and the workings of the world. The excerpts show that Alaskan Native myths often ground abstract concepts—like the division of labor or the expression of grief—in concrete, physical details: mud, ivory, wood, seals. Pay attention to the recurring role of Raven, who appears in the preface as a creator and trickster, and to the way each story anchors its explanation in a specific landscape or animal. The book rewards a comparative reading, noting how different groups account for similar phenomena.

That rainy afternoon, I kept returning to the Raven stories in Myths and Legends of Alaska—how the trickster’s hunger shaped the world. Close the book, and the same creature lurked in another language entirely, so I found myself tracing animal spirits across continents in Zoological Mythology; or, The Legends of Animals, Volume 2 (of 2) — Themes and Context, and the rain went on outside, patient as a listener.