North America — Northeastern Woodlands
Haudenosaunee (the "People of the Longhouse," also known as the Iroquois Confederacy) — the Mohawk (Kanien'kehá:ka), Oneida (Onʌyoteʼá·ka), Onondaga (Onöñda'gega'), Cayuga (Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫ'), Seneca (Onöndowa'ga:'), and later the Tuscarora (Ska:rù:rę') — of what is now upstate New York and the surrounding Great Lakes and St. Lawrence regions.
Cosmological Structure. A world understood as a web of relations — all beings (human, animal, plant, the elements, the spirit powers) bound in reciprocal relationship and mutual obligation. The earth itself rests on the back of a turtle (Turtle Island), formed on the turtle's back from a handful of earth. Above is the Sky World from which Sky Woman fell; the cosmos is layered but deeply interconnected, and the governing principle is right relationship among all the members of creation.
Creation. Sky Woman fell from the Sky World through a hole where a great tree had been uprooted. As she fell, the water birds caught her and the animals dove to bring up earth from beneath the primordial waters; the muskrat succeeded, and the earth was placed on the turtle's back, growing into the land. Sky Woman's descendants — including her daughter and the twin grandsons (the good-minded Sky Holder / Sapling and his brother Flint) — shaped the world, its balance of powers established through their relationship.
Time. Cyclical through the seasons and the ceremonies of thanksgiving, and oriented by the principle of the seventh generation — decisions are to be made considering their impact seven generations into the future. Time is woven through the ongoing web of relations and obligations across generations, past and future held together in the present.
The Sacred. The web of relations itself — right relationship among all beings, maintained through gratitude and reciprocity. The Thanksgiving Address, which gives thanks to all the members of creation. The Great Law of Peace (Kaianere'kó:wa), which binds the nations into one confederacy. The Tree of Peace and the wampum. Gratitude as the fundamental sacred posture. The Three Sisters (corn, beans, squash), grown together in mutual relationship.
Death / Afterlife. The dead are honored and their passing marked by the condolence ceremony, which restores the web of relations torn by grief — a central Haudenosaunee institution. The soul continues; the emphasis is on the restoration of the community's balance and relationships after loss, the reweaving of the web that death has strained. The condolence and the requickening (the passing of a leader's name and role to a successor) keep the web whole across death. ---
Sacred Objects. Wampum — belts and strings of shell beads that record law, history, and agreements, and carry condolence. The Tree of Peace (a great white pine) under which the weapons of war were buried. The Three Sisters (corn, beans, squash). The false face and other ceremonial elements. The eagle atop the Tree of Peace, watching for danger.
Sacred Places. The longhouse — both the literal dwelling and the metaphor for the Confederacy (the "extended house" stretching across the nations). Turtle Island (the earth itself). The council fire at Onondaga, the central hearth of the Confederacy. The lands and waters of the homeland.
Sacred Practices. The Thanksgiving Address (Ohén:ton Karihwatéhkwen), given before and after gatherings, greeting and thanking all the members of creation. The condolence ceremony, restoring the web after death. The recitation of the Great Law. The ceremonies of the seasonal cycle (Midwinter, Green Corn, Strawberry, and others). The keeping of the wampum.
Sacred Prohibitions. The web of relations must be honored — gratitude and reciprocity are owed to all beings, and their neglect breaks the web. The Great Law's principles of peace, righteousness, and the good mind must be upheld. Decisions must consider the seventh generation. Grief must be addressed through condolence, not allowed to fester and tear the web. ---
`web`
The Haudenosaunee worldview is explicitly a web of relations — all beings bound in reciprocal relationship and mutual obligation, the health of the whole depending on the right relationship of every strand. Story moves not toward the defeat of an enemy but toward the weaving or restoration of the web: the transformation of grief into consolation (the condolence), of war into peace (the Great Law), of scattered nations into one longhouse. A story in this architecture establishes a web of relations, suffers a tearing of that web (grief, conflict, broken relationship), and moves toward its restoration and strengthening — the reweaving that makes the whole stronger. The Great Law itself is the supreme image: the binding of contending nations into one web of peace.
The establishment, tearing, and restoration of a web of relations. The problem is not an enemy but a broken or torn relationship (grief, war, division); the resolution is not victory but the reweaving of the web — the restoration and strengthening of right relationship among all its members. Gratitude and reciprocity are the means; peace and the good mind are the end.
Sky Woman's Fall (the origin — the web of life established on the turtle's back) → the Web of Relations (all beings bound in reciprocal relationship, gratitude owed to all) → the Tearing (grief, conflict, or broken relationship tears the web) → the Depth of Grief (the tearing felt fully, the mind darkened by loss or war) → the Condolence (the reaching-out, the consolation, the beginning of restoration) → the Great Law (the reweaving — right relationship and peace re-established, the web made whole) → the Longhouse (the strengthened web — all bound into one, the whole made stronger for the seventh generation). ---