MYTH-601 Lessons

Lit by the flickering light of the floating candles, the Mythology classroom has undergone another of its numerous facelifts. This year -- or at least for this lesson -- the walls are adorned with tapestries which bear richly detailed geometric designs. You get the feeling they are better protected than they seem.

The surprise is not found in the decorations, however, but the fact that there are two blonde women in the front of the classroom. Looking a bit like fire and ice despite their similar stature and coloring, they have taken up very different positions in the room. Professor Wessex lounges disinterestedly in the desk chair while Professor Morgan welcomes students into the classroom with an animated look and a smile. Shortly after the last student enters, the pair shares a wordless glance and convene at the front of the classroom to begin the class and the year.

Greetings, my dears! I am so pleased to welcome you back to Mythology this year. You may have noticed that we have a guest in our classroom today - except that she is not really a guest at all.

Professor Wessex, who many of you will likely know from taking her course, Ancient Runes, will be joining me in teaching Mythology this year. As we each have our own focuses, interests, and pet projects, we will be frequently trading off lessons, which allows us to play to our strengths. However, there will be occasions, such as today, that both of us will be in attendance.

Without further ado, I will let Professor Wessex outline our discussions for the year.

Thank you for the preamble, Liria. I will waste little time on introductions myself. Those who know me have no need of them, and those of you who do not will quickly learn. We have much to cover this year and even with an accelerated pace we will only be able to scratch the surface. Before we truly get started, however, there are a few administrative topics to get out of the way.

Grading, Expectations, and Explanations

Most of what makes this class tick will remain the same. Appeals (though not functioning at the moment), extra credit, plagiarism, the policies for answering questions, and procedures for students with assignment accommodations have not changed at all. However, the grading rules and rubrics have changed from last year.

As always, there will be a mix of essays, quizzes, and extra credit assignments for this class, but do expect the workload to increase. There will be more essays than previous years and more often you will be expected to think critically, apply concepts, and make connections, rather than simply memorizing and regurgitating information. Speaking of essays, below you will find the standard grading rubric to be used this year, complete with slight changes from last year:

Standard Grading Rubric

10% - Spelling, Grammar, Identifying Marks

10% - Word Requirement

(You have a 10% leeway in terms of word count both for going below the minimum or above the maximum. NES and LD students receive a 15% leeway)

80% - Content (Marks are assignment specific and will be outlined in each individual prompt)

This rubric will be used to mark all of the essays submitted for this class, unless otherwise noted in the assignment prompt. As Professor Morgan has stressed to you, questions are welcome. If you find that you don’t understand a question, a lesson topic, or generally need clarification on something, you may owl either of us on site.

Year Six Outline

Barring dramatic changes over the course of the year, or any unwanted surprises, our studies will follow this general outline:

Lesson 1: Intro to the Americas and Inuit

Lesson 2: Mi’kmaq

Lesson 3: Salish

Lesson 4: Navajo

Lesson 5: Aztec, Midterms

Lesson 6: Maya - Part I

Lesson 7: Maya - Part II

Lesson 8: Inca - Part I

Lesson 9: Inca - Part II, Finals

American Mythology

The mythos of various American cultures is quite diverse, due to the large number of tribes and cultural groups that exist in the region. However, there are many overarching themes that can be drawn out and examined.

First of all, there is the concept of harmony in nature. In many cases, American peoples would take great pains not to upset the natural harmony of the world, and many of their rituals, myths, and societal practices reflect this belief. This is not an overly foreign concept to us, of course, as it is a common concept in other ancient societies which you have studied, with the Celts as a notable example.

Another commonality between ethnic groups in the Americas is their associations with animals, both magical and non-magical. Whether we are speaking of the jaguar of the Aztec, the bison of the Lakota, or the caribou of the Inuit, all groups had particular animals which they revered and with which they were closely associated.  This connection, like their reverence for the harmony of nature, was expressed through myths about their societies and well as traditions and rituals based on cultural beliefs. As the year goes on, you will see a number of examples that demonstrate this point.

Finally, much like many other ancient societies, magic, myth, and history were highly intertwined. In some cases, so intertwined as to be indistinguishable from the others. That is to say, a historical account of a tribe’s existence may be completely based on their myths. However, recall that just because something is a myth does not automatically mean that it is untrue. Sometimes there is only the basic kernel of truth expressed at the center of the myth, but at other times, myths may recount actual historical events, people, or places. For example, the myth of Bellerophon and the chimera in Greco-Roman culture is full of references to mythological characters, however Bellerophon is the only wizard to have slain a chimera - which is a historical fact.

Keep your eyes open for similar characters and beliefs as we explore the mythologies of the Americas this year. To start us off, Professor Morgan will be discussing Inuit mythology for the remainder of our class today.

The Long and the Short of Inuit Mythology

Thank you, Venita! We are indeed going to have a fascinating exploration through mythology this year. Traditionally, as I’m certain many of you are aware, this class covers the cultures and civilizations that were discussed in the previous year of Ancient Studies. This year, however, I’m putting in a bit of a bonus! While you may feel a bit disadvantaged if you are not already familiar with the fascinating culture of the Inuit, I assure you that a lack of background will not detract in any way from learning about their mythology.

Inuit mythology focuses strongly on animal associations, just as Professor Wessex has outlined for you above, such as those about the polar bear (nanook, in Inuktitut). What makes the Inuit myths quite fascinating and different from other cultures is that their focus is not on creation and the workings of the gods and the universe (although there are myths that outline these aspects of the world), but are more about survival in the treacherous environment in which they find themselves and the cultural values and experiences of the people themselves.

Now yes, I am speaking primarily of the cold, barren, arctic region of modern day Canada wherein the Inuit culture has flourished for thousands of years. Many of the myths speak of the hazards of the cold, and the dangers of the animals. Nanook, the Great Bear, is said to be almost human, and the greatest prey of all for a hunter. Of course, a polar bear is also the single most dangerous non-magical creature living around the arctic, and can just as easily kill a human as a hunter could kill it (or rather much more easily since polar bears are enormous, strong, and unafraid of humans.)

There are other creatures, however, that may seem mythical in nature to the Muggle population, but bear so many similar traits to known magical creatures that there may be that nugget of truth to them that Professor Wessex alluded to earlier.

The Qalupalik

Take for example, the magical cryptid known as Qalupalik. I see those of you who I assume are not studying Care of Magical Creatures looking blankly at me. Let me explain. A magical cryptid is a creature that is magical in nature, but has been seen so few times, that it is assumed to be merely rumor since no specimens have been recorded or captured to this day. Though mostly anecdotal in nature, there is still the possibility that these creatures do exist.

Back to the Qalupalik.

Yes. They are rather horrid looking, or at least this artist thought so. The myth can be summarized as follows:

The Qalupalik are creatures that live under the ice. They appear to be somewhat humanoid shaped and female. They wear a cloak with a large pouch called an amautiit (which the Inuit use to carry their children around), and make a humming sound audible to human ears from underneath the ice. As a gruesome twist, they eat children, sort of.

The myth states that the Qalupalik will grab children who come to close to the edge of the sea ice - especially those who misbehave and do not listen to their elders (which is what would land them at the edge of the sea ice unattended in the first place). The Qalupalik would snatch the child, shove them into the amautiit, and disappear under the ice.

If the first part of this myth is upsetting, the second part is down-right disturbing. The children were not immediately killed, but placed in a sort of stasis. They would remain in that stasis as the Qalupalik slowly drained off their life force -- I hope you remember the concept of a “life force”, that ever-changing thing which sustains the existence of all creatures, from your Defense Against the Dark Arts classes in Third Year. The child would age, most likely at a greatly accelerated rate, and the Qalupalik would absorb their youthfulness, keeping them more or less immortal.

As the only victims of the Qalupalik are never seen again, nor are there adults around when the creature strikes, it has been very difficult for magizoologists to verify the presence of this creature.

Sedna

Another very prominent myth in Inuit culture is that of the sea goddess. She goes by many names, including Sedna, Nuliayuk, and Taleelayuk, to name a few. The myth changes based on region and period of time, but we will look at one of the more elaborate versions, for reasons I will expound upon later.

The story begins with a young unmarried woman and a cold night, neither of which are uncommon in Inuit life. One evening, a stranger enters the family’s igloo and asks for shelter from the cold. The young man seems odd, and bears a necklace of two sharp canine teeth, but the family offers him hospitality and he spends the night in the family’s bed, where they sleep together for warmth. In the morning, the man has disappeared, and leading away from the house are animal tracks. The daughter of the family is found to be pregnant soon after.

Fearing what will come of such a union, the father forces his pregnant daughter to be dragged out on the ice to an island and abandoned. There, in secret and alone, she bears children, half of which appear normal in every way, and the other half who have canine features such as large ears and noses.

The second part of the myth, after her children are grown, tells of her father’s remorse and his attempt to return her to the village. Unfortunately, the rescue boat becomes trapped by a storm, and the captain, fearing the daughter is either bad luck or dead weight, throws her overboard. She attempts to climb back aboard, but she is cut from the boat many times -- literally -- which results in loss of limbs, to put it gently. These pieces of her are said to change shape and take the form of various sea animals. And while she does not ever make it back to the village, she becomes a powerful goddess of the sea, commanding these creatures of the sea that came from her own body.

In some versions, the woman is said to drown. While, in others, it is the father that forces his daughter to marry a dog due to her refusal to wed. Still others describe a great bird or fulmar that tricks her into marrying him and carries her off to an island away from her family. However, I have chosen this version to help illuminate some of the characteristics and facts this myth is thought to represent. Many a magihistorian has examined the versions of this myth and ultimately been unable to ignore the repeated animal transfigurations that feature throughout the tale. There are various competing schools of thought, some saying that this tale displays parallels to semi-modern “half-breed” prejudice, or distrust of those afflicted with lycanthropy, pointing to the stranger who takes the form as both canine and man as an example of a werewolf. However, others argue that this is potentially a heavily fabricated origin story of the first known Animagi in Inuit history and mythology. It is difficult to be sure, of course, but there is certainly more to this gruesome myth than meets the eye.

Closing

Neither of these myths are terribly pleasant, I realize. However they are typical for the culture, as most of their myths are based off of cautionary tales. Other myths of the Inuit feature cultural values, such as the mosquito myth. This myth, seen below, also holds the record, as far as I am aware, of the shortest myth in the world:

Onto a boy's arm came a mosquito. "Don't hit! Don't hit!" it hummed. "Grandchildren have I to sing to." "Imagine," the boy said, "So small and yet a grandfather."

• Retrieved from: http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/inuit-myth-and-legend/

So short, and yet so thought provoking!

It is these thoughts that will form the basis of our first essay of the year. Yes, an essay for the first class and a quiz. You are advanced students now, my dears, and our expectations of you are much greater than before.

Until we meet again!

Original lesson written by Professors Liria Morgan and Venita Wessex

Sources:

https://www.windows2universe.org/mythology/sedna.html

http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/the-goddess-of-the-sea-the-story-of-sedna/

Image credits here, here and here