The Raven In Tlingit Folklore Summary

In the lore of Tlingit, Haida and other northern Native Americans a raven was both a trickster spirit and the creator of the world. The most interesting story about the raven in Tlingit folklore is the one concerning his responsibility for placement of the Sun in the sky.

The story starts with Naas-sháki Shaan – The Old Man, who was very rich. Among his riches were three legendary boxes. One contained the stars, other contained the moon, and in the third was the sun. The raven decided to steal the stars, the moon and the sun from Naas-sháki Shaan.
He transformed himself into a hemlock needle and dropped into the water cup of the Old Man’s daughter. She became pregnant and gave birth to the raven in form of a boy. The raven in the form of baby cried constantly, until

It is important to understand that brain has to regulate all bodily functions. Animals with larger organs require a larger brain to function properly. Important factor that determines intelligence is the brain size relative to the body mass, and corvids have huge brains relative to their body mass. Other important aspect of the brain of the corvids is its structure. Similar humans, corvids have large forebrain. Forebrain is used to assess the information from sensory organs. In addition forebrain’s function is problem-solving as well as other processes such as imitation and insight.

Experiments I described earlier show us that corvids are known problem solvers. Even if you haven 't heard about those experiments before, you might have noticed them solving some problems they encounter in their native environment. If you live in an area populated with ravens you might have noticed how they use cars to crack walnuts too hard for them to break. I regularly see ravens throwing walnuts on the road next to the traffic lights and waiting for the light to turn red so they can pick up their cracked