Since the beginning of time, humanity has searched to explain how the world was created and how humans began to inhabit it. People have looked for many ways to understand and explain the world’s creation. One of the most common ways that was used by ancient cultures was by “creation stories.” Creation stories are interesting because instead of using known facts, they use a symbolic narrative to explain the creation of the world. There are many types of creation stories, including earth diver stories, emergence stories, sacrifice stories, and secretion stories. These types of stories originate from all across the world, ranging from North America to Asia (Stifler). Even though most ancient cultures had no contact with each other or idea that
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While he was in his mother’s womb, she assisted in creating the world. One day while she was in the water, she spotted a bird who was looking for a resting place. Seeing this, she raised her knees and shoulders up out of the water which allowed the bird to nest and lay eggs. After a while the bird laid seven eggs, and these eggs included six gold eggs and one iron egg. As the bird laid on her eggs and incubated them, Ilmatar’s knees began to become too hot for her to endure and she responded by moving her entire leg. As she did this the seven eggs fell into the water and the different parts of the eggs created the earth. The bottom parts of the eggshells became the land, the sky was formed from the top of the eggshells, the egg whites became the moon and stars, and finally the egg yolk became the sun. Ilmatar was thrilled with what had been created, so she continued to swim around and shape the land by molding it with her hands and feet. All while doing this, she was still pregnant with her baby for seven centuries. After seven centuries, the baby she had inside of her had grown into a wise old man by the name of Väinämöinen. Väinämöinen was exhausted from being trapped inside of his mother, so he prayed to the Great Bear in the sky and was finally born into the world. Once he was finally born, he noticed that the land was barren. As he noticed this he prayed again and was sent to the earth to plant seeds and fill the land with an abundance of plants and wildlife (Finnish
While he was in his mother’s womb, she assisted in creating the world. One day while she was in the water, she spotted a bird who was looking for a resting place. Seeing this, she raised her knees and shoulders up out of the water which allowed the bird to nest and lay eggs. After a while the bird laid seven eggs, and these eggs included six gold eggs and one iron egg. As the bird laid on her eggs and incubated them, Ilmatar’s knees began to become too hot for her to endure and she responded by moving her entire leg. As she did this the seven eggs fell into the water and the different parts of the eggs created the earth. The bottom parts of the eggshells became the land, the sky was formed from the top of the eggshells, the egg whites became the moon and stars, and finally the egg yolk became the sun. Ilmatar was thrilled with what had been created, so she continued to swim around and shape the land by molding it with her hands and feet. All while doing this, she was still pregnant with her baby for seven centuries. After seven centuries, the baby she had inside of her had grown into a wise old man by the name of Väinämöinen. Väinämöinen was exhausted from being trapped inside of his mother, so he prayed to the Great Bear in the sky and was finally born into the world. Once he was finally born, he noticed that the land was barren. As he noticed this he prayed again and was sent to the earth to plant seeds and fill the land with an abundance of plants and wildlife (Finnish