Long, Long Ago

Arundhuti Dasgupta and Utkarsh Patel recount obscure creation myths from around the world, many echoing each other

- Arundhuti Dasgupta and Utkarsh Patel

Izanagi and Izanami C. 1900 CE Nishikawa Sukenobu

THE GREEK WORD MYTHOS ORIGINALLY meant ‘word’ or ‘story’. But time wrought new meaning into it, limit-ing both its reach and scope. As Herodotus (Greek, 4c BCE) established the concept of historical fact, ‘mythos’ was debunked. It came to stand for fiction, or that which was not (entirely) true, a matter of conjecture that had been handed down anonymously, standing apart from ‘logos’, which came to us from an authorised source.

Over time mythos was further disenfranchised. History, science, philosophy, literature and other formal disciplines separated themselves from the jumble of ideas that gave the word its power and meaning. Even so, even with its frontiers breached, mythos/myth/mythology has held its own. Preserved as sacred stories, they are often seen as markers for civilisational identity and early human thought.

Myths reveal humankind’s perennial quest for meaning. They bind us in a web of common themes and anxieties, revealing the imprint of a shared intangible inheritance of big ideas. Nothing illustrates this more effectively than myths about the creation of the universe and that of mankind. How the universe came to be is a puzzle that every civilisation has struggled to solve.

Into the light, out of darkness

The Zuni, a Native American tribe, believe the world began in darkness. All beings lived in the dark, were made of slime and had webbed feet, hands and horns and tails. The Zuni imagination recalls an original being called Áwonawílona, who contained the world within him. He began the act of creation by projecting his inner thoughts onto the outside world and, as he did that, manifested himself as a mist-filled space and a self-realising image, the sun.