The Iroquois Creation Story

The Iroquois Creation Story deals with beginnings of the world. Full of imagery and nature and animals.

The story starts with a women being pregnant with twins and resting. While sleeping she starts to fall into the world of darkness but lands safely on the back of a turtle. This woman is pregnant with twins, the evil of the two bursts through her side instead of being born normally. The twins both live without the mother. the good twin wants to bring light and the evil twin wants the land to stay the way it is. The good twin uses the mothers head for the sun. After some time the two twins fight, each one reveling what will kill them: "Which [the good twin] falsely mentions that by whipping with flags would destroy his temporal life... [the evil twin] relates by the use of deer horns, beating his body he would expire (20-21).". They fight and the good twin wins and the evil twin becomes the Evil Spirit.

This story is interesting because of how late it was recorded. In oral traditions a story changes along with it's narrators. In this case I'll point out that the good twin lies and says that flags will kill him. What is the subtext in post Columbus America? That the good will win but with lies about their weakness, so in order to win one must not be honest about their weaknesses. The part about flags killing a person is directly related to the influence of European cultures on the Native Americans.



<---Good





<---Evil

Cabeza De Vaca

Alvar Nunez Cabeza De Vaca: The Relation of Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca

To big to link but here is the Route Cabeza de Vaca took.

"We got so angry that we went off forgetting the many Turkish-shaped bows, the many pouches, and the five emerald arrow-heads, etc. (47)"

De Vaca had a fantastic story starting with slavers then being abandoned and shipwrecked and forced to wander in the desert and rely on natives for help, who would then enslave him, and finally finding other spanish slavers.

The real question is why was the one telling the story if he was not leading? Because, he was from a famous family. This is probably why he was able to make peace with the Spanish slavers since they would know who he was. Of course he had to act the part of being betrayed in order to save his families name, but the fact that he got all the above items is proof they had some kind of deal in works. Maybe it was payment for the food, or payment in advance for the slaves.

But for sure I can say De Vaca wanted out of the desert. After being in a miserable condition for years he would have, and did, jump at the chance to get out by betraying his followers. But the way De Vaca tells the story makes for a more interesting, but less real, ending to a tale about the hardship and survival.

Columbus and his Mayflower

Christopher Columbus: His letters

"... [I] found an infinity of small hamlets and people without number, but nothing of importance. (33)"

Columbus was Last, that is why he did not find anything of importance. The natives were already decimated and fearful of outsiders. Besides the reason Columbus went was to find wealth.

Although we know nothing of his birth or really anything about him before 1492, lots can be said about afterwards. Even if he was the last to go over and went for all the wrong reasons his adventure made headlines. And now people "knew" there was a whole new world out there and would soon flock over in greater number to exploit it. So in a way Columbus did make a substantial event, even though he did not discover anything, but it lead to the destruction of the Native Americans in the process.

His letters were all about selling America as a place that could be exploited. Columbus mentions how beautiful the land is but nothing about the people except that there is a lot of them. And his letter from the fourth voyage is him pleading to be excused for his actions and let out of prison in Jamaica. So in a way he is selling himself as an important resource that should be secured.