Don’t Know Much About® Mythology (56 page)

 

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or centuries, Africa, the Americas, Australia, and the Pacific islands existed in mysterious solitude, lands completely set apart from the “known” world by vast oceans, jungles, deserts, and wide expanses. Africa’s existence had been acknowledged since ancient times, but it was largely impenetrable due to its forbidding geography. The Americas, which occupy 28 percent of the world’s landmass, spread from the frozen north of one hemisphere to the “bottom of the earth” in the other. Australia and many thousands of islands in the Pacific were beyond the imaginings of the Western world. Yet all of these places were home to ancient peoples, with long-standing societies, myths, religions, and traditions well insulated from foreign influences.

That all changed forever after the fifteenth century. In the European “Age of Discovery,” Portuguese sailors opened up Africa as they made their way to Asia by sea. Christopher Columbus soon followed the Portuguese lead, spurred on by a desire to find still faster routes to the gold, jade, silks, and spicy taste sensations desired by a European palate weary of salted venison. Sailing under the Spanish flag, Columbus set out in 1492 on the first of four voyages that unlocked territories undreamed of and gave Spain the lead in penetrating and then plundering the “New World,” first in the Caribbean, then in both South and North America. Spain’s dominance in the Americas was soon challenged by the English, French, Dutch, and other Europeans—each staking a claim in the names of their kings and their God to large chunks of land already occupied by tens of millions of people. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the “discovery” extended to the Pacific islands, where the “Aborigines” of Australia and other natives of the Pacific would meet a similar fate. Millions of these people would be collectively enslaved, converted, displaced, and almost entirely wiped out, along with much of their mythic legacy.

So the story of these “new worlds” is a story of both beginnings and endings. For the Europeans, it was an extraordinary period of empire-building, colonization, and subjugation. But for the people they “discovered,” it was the end of cherished traditions. Africa was teeming with cultures, religions, and gods when the Portuguese arrived eager to baptize the “heathens” they found on Africa’s West Coast and along the Congo River. But the zealous Portuguese quickly learned that Arabs had already “discovered” much of Africa and begun to import Islam. In time, Africa would become a battleground in the centuries-old conflict between Christianity and Islam, with native myth and belief caught in the deadly crossfire.

The situation was similar in the Americas, where, prior to the European arrival, a stunning array of cultures and civilizations had flourished, from the “Halls of Montezuma” and Mayan pyramids of Central America to the lofty Andean cities of the Incas. Presumably the descendants of the people who wandered from Siberia to the Americas during the waning of the last great Ice Age, the inhabitants of the Americas ranged from the natives of the Arctic region to the tribes of the American Northeast, to the settled farmers of the Southeast, and down to the monumental civilizations of Mexico, Central America, and Peru. But the gods and legends of the Americas, like those of Africa, would soon come crashing headlong before Europe’s Christian soldiers, with devastating results for the natives of America. The same scenario would play out in Australia. Home to hundreds of thousands of Aborigines, Australia became a British experiment in exporting its crime problem by converting a whole continent into a prison colony—until gold was discovered there. As miners swept in, missionaries were never far behind.

Apart from this shared destiny of destruction and decimation, however, there are other fascinating parallels between the people of these “new worlds.”

First, most of their myths reflect a nonliterate or oral tradition that was not recorded until fairly recently, in most cases. The very survival of these myths is a testament to the deep human desire and ability to hold on to what is sacred. When these mythic accounts were recorded, it was after the introduction of Christianity—as was true in the Celtic and Norse worlds. That does not mean we can’t “know” these myths, but we must take into account the prejudices that may have been involved in preserving them, as well as a native desire to conceal and protect their most sacred stories and rituals.
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A second feature often found in many African, Native American, and Pacific Creation stories is a deity who gives shape to the cosmos and then retreats to the background. The African, American, and Pacific-island stories also share a fascination with mischievous animal “tricksters,” and animals often play a larger role in these myths than in many other traditions. All of these cultures have many stories involving twins. And, in worlds filled with spirits, the shaman or “medicine man” is often highly revered as the most significant person in the society.

But finally, we come back to the most important parallel of all. Running through the history of all these cultures is the common theme of destruction. The “discovery” of Africa, the Americas, and the world of the Pacific is pervaded by an overwhelming central tragedy—the concerted effort to replace ancient ideas and languages with the conquerors’ version of god, truth, and civilization. That effort largely—although not completely—succeeded.

In spite of that dark history, the myths of these places and people are not lost, dead stories. As elsewhere, ancient folkways and faiths die hard. And there are vivid reminders of these mythic traditions alive today. One example can be seen in the religions that grew up in the Americas. Both voodoo and Santeria, for instance, remain powerful vestiges of the arrival of ancient African myths and deities in the Caribbean and the Americas, brought by millions of Africans who carried their gods, if nothing else, when they were forced into the holds of slave ships. In Latin America, the sacred remains of ancient myths and beliefs poke their heads through “official” Christianity, like some relentless rain-forest flower breaking through the concrete of a modern street.

Museums around the world are also helping to keep ancient myths alive, increasingly recognizing the rich artistic traditions of all these places and people, as well as their impact on art during the past century. Among others, Picasso and Mexican painter Frida Kahlo were profoundly influenced by the imagery of ancient myths. Hollywood, which is often content to ignore such traditions, has also opened eyes with the infrequent big-budget success, such as Kevin Costner’s paean to the Sioux,
Dances With Wolves
, while smaller, independent foreign filmmakers have contributed
The Gods Must Be Crazy
, set among the San of the Kalahari, and
The Whale Rider
, which lyrically captured a sense of the disappearing traditions of the Maori. A generation of scholars in the United States, Mexico, Guatemala, and Brazil, among many countries, has also expanded an ambitious effort to recognize and revitalize the study of Native American, African, and other indigenous traditions, expressed in such forms as the increasingly popular celebration of the African harvest festival known by its Swahili name “Kwanzaa,” which means “first fruits.”

The fact is that myths—like the human soul they often reflect—can be enduring, tenacious, and transcendent. Myths never die. That basic truth is nowhere clearer than in the very ancient places called the “new worlds.”