Summary Of The Raven In Tlingit
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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 the Old Man gave him the Box of Stars. After playing with it for a while, the Raven opened the lid and let the stars escape through the chimney into the skies.
Later Raven Cried for the Box of the Moon, and after some time the Old Man blocked the chimney so moon couldn 't escape, and gave the Box to the child. Raven played with the moon for a while, and then rolled it out the door from where the moon escaped into the sky.
In the end Raven cried for the Box of the Sun, and Old Man, loving his grandson gave the Box to the Raven. Raven was aware that he couldn 't roll it out the door or toss it up the chimney because they were carefully watched now, so hee waited for everyone to fall asleep. Once everyone was