Category Archives: Myths

Sacred narratives

Mami Wata

Interview: “Essentially its like a water spirit that protects people — but she’s kind of like a mermaid-siren fusion. And she is there to protect people and keep people safe, but also she can lure people in that are ignorant, or other people in that are looking for trouble. And then she’ll trap them in the water and then take them.

I think its kind of along the lines of legends like the Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot, like they’re native, and they’re there for the land.

I think the reason, like historically the reason it was probably birthed is because of slavery, but it’s just turned into a thing that people are very afraid of now. Even now like my parents, if I were to text my mommy like: can you tell me about Mami Wata, she’d be like: don’t say that name. So its very taboo.

In Terms of experiences, like stories that I heard from family and friends, you know they’ll be out late walking by the beach when they shouldn’t be, like they’re sneaking out of the house or whatever. They’re near the ocean and they start to hear these chants calling them in, and they’re lured in and they go deeper and further into the water and then they’re attacked.

Context: The informant is from a Nigerian Family, but was raised in the US. She remembers hearing the story on multiple occasions from her parents or other Nigerian friends and family.

Analysis: As mentioned by the informant, the legend seems to bear some similarities to guardian spirits seen commonly in folklore, with Mami Wata apparently interested in protecting both the beaches and the people from dangers, although she is not always friendly. The informant also mentioned the theory that the legend either arose, or took on new meaning with the arrival of the slave trade in Nigeria, as a cautionary tale to keep people away from the shore.

Saint George and the Dragon

Interview:

G: “So St. George [pause] well i dont know what order this happened in, but St George was a Roman soldier, and he was told to start killing people who were Catholic, and then the king tortured him and killed him.
At some point there was, in a town, there was a dragon. And he would come every day and they would pull straws for who he would take. And then St. George came and killed it, and i think saved a princess.”

Interviewer: “Is this a true story, do you think, or more of a fairy tale? Do you think there have ever been dragons?”

G: “Yes. Yes, but not like real dragons, maybe the devil.”

Context: The informant comes from a Catholic family. He first learned the story from his mother.

Analysis: There are some interesting similarities between the Legend with the dragon, and the more plausible story of St George’s Martyrdom, with both stories centering around George confronting a powerful force of evil to stop the slaughter of innocents. Perhaps the story of the dragon emerged as a metaphor for the emperor Diocletian, who is said to have put St. George to death.

牛郎织女: The Weaver Girl and the Cowherd

Text: There was once a poor cowherd, Niulang (牛郎), who lived alone with an old ox. One day the ox spoke, telling him that seven heavenly maidens were coming down to bathe in the river, and that if he hid the youngest one’s robes, the Weaver Girl Zhinü (织女) would not be able to return to the sky and would become his wife. He did, and she did. They had two children and lived happily.

The Queen Mother of the West discovered that her granddaughter had married a mortal. She came down and pulled Zhinü back into the heavens. Niulang followed, with his two children carried in baskets on a shoulder pole. The old ox had told him before dying to wear its hide so he could fly. He came close. But the Queen Mother pulled out her hairpin and drew a line across the sky, and the line became a river of stars: the Milky Way. 

Niulang and Zhinü are now two stars on opposite banks of the river, unable to cross. Once a year, on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month, all the magpies in the world fly up to form a bridge across the heavenly river, and the two of them meet for one night. This has become China’s equivalent to Valentine’s Day. 

Context: Told to me by my mother, IW. She has told it to me in some form since I was small, sometimes as a bedtime story. The story even became a tool to teach me Chinese as I vividly remember reading it from a book of fairytales. For most of her life and for most of mine, the Milky Way that the story turns on has been invisible: we have always lived in areas too light-polluted for it. On a family vacation to Fiji several years ago, on a beach far from any artificial light, we saw the Milky Way clearly for the first time. It did look like a river. 

Analysis: ‘The Weaver Girl and the Cowherd’ is one of the four great Chinese folk tales, with attestations reaching back to the Han dynasty. It explains a visible celestial phenomenon (the Milky Way as a river, with Niulang as Altair and Zhinü as Vega on either side), supplies the etiology for the Qixi festival on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month, and exists in clear regional variation across Han Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Vietnamese traditions. IW’s telling is a standard northern Chinese version. What stays with me about hearing it for years and only later seeing the Milky Way clearly, on a Fijian beach, is that the myth was composed by people who could see the river every clear night. To stand under a sky where the river is visible was to recover the perceptual ground that produced the story. It was a powerful moment for us both. 

Tale of the Selkies

Text:

Selkies are mythical female figures who live as seals in the ocean but transform into gorgeous humans when shedding their seal skin.

One day, a Selkie falls in love with a human fisherman and has a baby with him. After the baby is born, the Selkie steals her seal skin back and swims back to the ocean.

While the above version is the Irish tale—the most commonly known version of the story, there are multiple variations of the story of Selkies.

In the Icelandic version, the Selkies are human women who have suicided and thus become seals in the sea. There is also a much darker version of the story: One day, the Selkie brings her kid (who is also somehow a Selkie) in the form of seals to swim back to the fisherman. However, the fisherman, not knowing they are returning, hunts for seals, who are in fact his wife and kid, and eats them all.

The tale of the Selkies also inspired modern media productions, like the 2014 animation film Song of the Sea.

Context: The interviewee learned this folktale after watching Song of the Sea in 2014 and became curious to find out the original story the film’s plot is based on. She then searched up the Irish version of the story online, while also learning its variations.

Analysis:

Domestic Roles: The Selkie’s story, at its core, reflects the tension between one’s true self and their performance of specific domestic roles, and the cost of choosing one over the other. For example, in the tale, the seal skin is a symbol of the Selkie’s true self, and the ocean symbolizes where she belongs. However, the “human world” is where she performs her domestic roles as the wife of the fisherman and the mother of her child. Selkie’s longing for the sea and stealing her seal skin back becomes a coded articulation of desires for autonomy. However, in this story, choosing one over another (true self vs. domestic roles) has certain costs: choosing to go back to the ocean—to her true self—means leaving her children and family.

Death and Liminality: In the Icelandic Version, where Selkies are suicided women, carries the idea that death is not the termination, but rather a metamorphosis—human women who have suicided continue to exist, just in a different form, apart of the human world.

Chang’e Journey to the Moon, and the Origin of Mid-Autumn Festival

Age: 51

Interviewee:

Hou Yi is an ancient mythical hero who shot down nine of the ten suns in the sky and rescued the entire humanity (in the myth “Hou Yi Shooting Down the Sun”). Because of Hou Yi’s bravery, the ruler of heaven—who we call [Yu Hang Da Di] or “The Jade Emperor”—and his wife decide to give Hou Yi a bag of elixir that could make him immortal. Taking half of the bag would make him immortal, and taking the whole bag would make him transcend the mundane and ascend to heaven to be alongside the Jade Emperor and his wife.

Hou Yi has a wife whom he loved very deeply. Her name is Chang’e. He didn’t want to go to the heaven on his own and leave Chang’e alone in the human world. Therefore, Hou Yi gave Chang’e this bag of elixir for safekeeping. They had a simple and sweet plan: that they would both take a half, and they could live forever with each other on this earth.

However, unluckily, word got out about the elixir. One of Hou Yi’s disciples whose name was Peng Meng was extremely greedy. One day when Hou Yi was away from home hunting, Peng Meng faked an illness and talked his way into staying at Hou Yi’s house. Chang’e kindly let him in, not knowing Peng Meng’s intention was to steal the elixir.  That night, Peng Meng drew his sword and threatened Chang’e, asking her to hand over the elixir.

Chang’e knew that there was no way for her to escape, but she refused to let the elixir fall into the hands of someone wicked and greedy. So she made a split-second decision: she swallowed the entire packet. The elixir took effect immediately, and Chang’e floated to the moon.

Hou Yi was devastated to find this out when he went home. The moon was so far away, and there was nothing he could do to bring her back or revert the effect of the elixir. Therefore, Hou Yi would look up at the night sky all the time, missing Chang’e.Especially when there was a full moon, he would try to figure out Chang’e silhouette on the moon. If you look at the shadows on a full moon, it actually looks like a rabbit—that’s what people believe Chang’e turned into on the moon.

And so, every August 15th on the lunar calendar became the Mid-Autumn Festival. It is the day when the moon is the brightest and the fullest. On this day, Hou Yi would set up an altar in his garden and lay out Chang’e’s favorite fruits and snacks. Over time, ordinary people began to follow his example. They would make offerings to Chang’e by making mooncakes and pray for peace and reunion or togetherness of their families.

(This myth was told in Chinese and translated.)

Context:

The interviewee learned of this myth from both participating in the Mid-Autumn Festival herself and also learning about this myth more systematically at elementary school. She interprets this myth as a warm one about missing someone you love, and she points out that the Mid-Autumn Festival is actually a quite romantic festival—it’s just that, as it was turned into a ritual, many people have now forgotten about the romantic aspect to this traditional festival.

Analysis:

  • This myth is an etiological myth—it looks at natural phenomena using a humanistic lens, explaining that Chang’e lives on the moon, as well as explaining that the shadows on the moon are the contours of this person Chang’e.
  • Greed as the antagonist / villain: in this myth, the antagonist, Peng Meng, is explained as someone who is “very greedy.” This shows the cultural attitude toward “greediness” in Chinese society.
  • Myth as an explanation of ritual: Chang’e’s myth explains the origin of the Mid-Autumn Festival, celebrated by the Chinese annually in September. The exact date of the Mid-Autumn Festival echos the “day when the moon is the brightest and the fullest,” which also gives this festival a deeply humanistic and emotional—explaining that this isn’t just a normal day, it’s the day when Hou Yi can see Chang’e the clearest. This myth thus gives the festival an emotional touch, making it a festival where people who practice the rituals can resonate with Hou Yi’s longing for reunion and family, even across space and time.