Crane Wife
JAPAN, JAPANESE FAIRY TALE
There once was a poor woodcutter who came across a beautiful crane caught in a hunter’s trap. He felt sorry for the graceful bird, so he carefully set it free. Once released, the bird looked deep into the man’s eyes before flying away.
Days later, a lovely woman appeared at his door asking for shelter. She was so charming and beautiful that the man asked her to marry him. The mysterious woman readily agreed, for she had fallen in love with the man as well. A short time later, they were married, but life was not easy. The man was still poor, and now he tried to work twice as hard to feed both himself and his beautiful wife.
The woman saw this and offered to make fabric to sell. She asked only that her husband never come into her room while she worked. Confused, he agreed. A few days later, his wife, looking weak and tired, presented him with the most sumptuous fabric he had ever seen. He took the work to market and sold it for a lot of money, which he was able to use to buy them many good things.
From that day on, the couple lived well. The wife would retreat to her room and secretly work, emerging later looking a little more sickly but with fabric even more beautiful than the last. The husband would take the fabric to market and sell it for ever higher prices, returning with goods and gifts that made them very wealthy.
Though his life was easier, the man began to worry for his wife, who was looking ever more frail. Finally, his curiosity could take no more. One night while she was working, he cracked the door open and peered in. He discovered that his wife was a crane—a crane who had been slowly and painfully plucking her own feathers and weaving them to create the beautiful fabric.
He gasped, and she turned to see that he had learned her secret. She was angry that he broke his promise and mortified that he had seen her as a crane. And so she took flight and never returned to her husband.
Timbó Tree
PARAGUAY, GUARANI LEGEND
There once was a man named Saguaa who was the leader of his tribe. He had a single daughter named Tacuaree whom he loved very much. They were both good people beloved by the tribe, so it was not unexpected that Tacuaree had many suitors. But Tacuaree had eyes only for a man from another tribe. Though it saddened Saguaa to have his dear daughter live so far away from him, he also respected her wishes and let her go with his blessing.
Days, weeks, and then months passed, and still Saguaa had not heard from his daughter. He began to fear she was in danger, and finally he set out to see her. He went to the village that Tacuaree had moved to but found nothing but the remnants of ruin where thriving life should have been. The village had been attacked by an unknown enemy, and all the people were missing entirely. Distraught, Saguaa began searching for his daughter.
The trail soon ran cold. With no other leads, Saguaa placed his ear to the ground, hoping to hear the sounds of stomping feet or other noises that could tell him where they had gone. He heard nothing, so he got up, moved on, and then stopped again, listening for anything. He never asked for help and never stopped searching.
Months later, his tribe found him dead, still lying with his ear to the ground listening for his daughter. But a strange thing had happened. A plant had grown out of his ear. The plant grew and stretched and eventually became a tree. The tree flowered, and its fruits looked like human ears.
From that day on, the timbó tree came to represent a father’s undying love for his daughter, for he is still listening for her to this day.
Mohini and Aravan
TAMIL INDIA, HINDU EPIC MAHABHARATA
The Mahabharata, a Hindu mythical and historical epic, primarily documents the five Pandava brothers and their battle with their cousins, the Kauravas, for succession of the throne of Hastinapura in the Indian kingdom of Kuru. The battle was called the Kurukshetra War, and it lasted for eighteen days and resulted in the deaths of millions on both sides.
In the beginning of the battle, the Pandava side was vastly outnumbered, and failure seemed a distinct possibility. Krishna, the eighth incarnation of the Vishnu, the preserver and protector god, supported the Pandavas. He suggested that someone willingly sacrifice themselves to Kali, Goddess of Time and Destruction, in order to ensure a victory for the Pandavas. Aravan volunteered.
Aravan was the son of Arjuna, the third Pandava brother, and Ulupi, the Naga (snake) Princess. He was a great warrior who did not fear death, but he did wish to be married before he died. This is because he wished for the cremation and funerary rites of a married man versus a bachelor, who is buried. Unfortunately, no woman wanted to marry him, as becoming a widow was a terrible fate for anyone. So Krishna agreed to marry him. He took on his rarely seen female form, Mohini, married Aravan, and spent the night with him. (Their wedding is celebrated to this day in Tamil, where Aravan is the patron god of the transgender Hijra communities.)
Aravan then charged forward into the fight knowing he would eventually die on the battlefield. He fought and defeated many key members of the opposing army. Then the eldest Kaurava summoned the giant Alamvusha to fight Aravan. Aravan assumed his serpent form, Shesha, but Alamvusha assumed his Garuda (giant eagle-man) form and ultimately beheaded him. Eventually Aravan was avenged, and the Pandava brothers won the war.
Mohini acknowledged Aravan’s death and her widowhood by breaking her bangles, beating her breasts, and discarding her bridal garments before finally returning to the form of Krishna.
Alexander the Great and the Gordian Knot
TURKEY, GREEK LEGEND
In the western part of Anatolia, there once lay a kingdom called Phrygia. Legends say that at that time, the Phrygians were without a king, so the oracle Telmissus told the people that the next man to enter their capital city driving an oxcart should become king. The people agreed, and when a farmer, Gordias, entered on an oxcart, they declared him king. The city was named Gordium, and Gordias’s son, Midas, who would later become King Midas of the golden touch, dedicated the oxcart to Zeus. Midas tied the cart to a post with a giant and intricate knot that was so complicated and entangled it was impossible to see how it was fastened. It was called the Gordian Knot.
Generations passed, and Phrygia was no longer its own country but a province of the Achaemenid, or Persian, Empire. In this time, a new oracle prophesied that whoever could unravel the Gordian Knot would be destined to become the ruler of all of Asia. The knot sat impossibly tangled until the arrival of Alexander the Great.
Alexander the Great was born to the king of Macedon, Phillip II, and his wife, Olympias. His father was assassinated when Alexander was only twenty, and he became the king of Macedon shortly after. He then consolidated his power and was awarded the generalship of Greece. He took his huge army, pushed into the Achaemenid Empire, and won neighboring lands Sardis and Caria before taking Gordium.
Arriving in his newly conquered city, Alexander found the cart still tied to the post with the giant, impossible knot. And though Alexander tried, he could not untangle the giant mess. Finally, Alexander stepped back and reasoned that it made no difference how the knot was loosened, just that the cart was freed. So he drew his sword and sliced the rope in half with a single stroke.
Alexander went on to fulfill the prophecy, conquering Asia as far as the Indus and Oxus and living forever as one of the greatest generals in all of history.
Our Lady of Guadalupe
MEXICO, CATHOLIC SAINT
One December morning, a woman of mixed heritage appeared before native Mexican peasant Juan Diego and spoke to him in his native tongue, Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs. She said she was the mother of the very true deity, the Virgin Mary, and asked for a church to be built in her honor on that very hill.
Juan Diego sought the archbishop of Mexico City, Friar Juan de Zumárraga, to tell him of the occurrence. The archbishop was skeptical, but when Juan Diego saw the woman again, and she again told him to build the church, the archbishop asked for a miracle to b
e performed to prove her identity. She agreed and told Juan Diego to return to the hill the next day. But the next day Juan Diego was forced to go to his dying uncle, Juan Bernardino. The day after, the woman caught Juan Diego trying to sneak around the hill he was supposed to meet her on. When he guiltily admitted to his reasons, the woman chided him, saying, “Am I not here, I who am your mother?” She told him to climb the hill and gather the flowers there.
The hill, normally barren in December, was bursting with Castilian roses, native to Spain, not Mexico. The woman helped Juan Diego gather the roses in his cloak. When he presented the full blooms to the archbishop, they found the cloak covered in the image of the woman. Juan Diego returned to his uncle and found Juan Bernardino fully healed by the gifted woman. She then asked to be known as Guadalupe. The archbishop accepted these miracles and began construction of a chapel on Tepeyac Hill.
Our Lady of Guadalupe has come to represent mestizos, or people of mixed native and European heritage. She is a symbol of peace, healing, and unity.
Tam Lin
SCOTLAND, SCOTTISH FAIRY TALE
There once was a girl named Janet who used to take a shortcut through the woods of a deserted estate. One evening while taking this shortcut, she met a man so beautiful and dressed so grandly, she thought he was a fairy prince. They started talking and then flirting all through the night, and Janet went home very well pleased. But a few months later, she realized she was pregnant. Her family told her she had only a couple of options: to get rid of the baby or to get married. Janet ignored this and went in search of the father of her child.
Finding him in the same forest, Janet confronted him. He told her his name was Tam Lin and that he wasn’t a fairy but had owned the estate before being captured by the Fae. Upon further inquiry, Tam Lin said he could be freed but only if Janet grabbed him off his horse and didn’t let him go.
Janet agreed, and the next night she waited and watched as the Fairy royal procession passed. She saw many beautiful courtiers and the Fairy Queen who had trapped Tam Lin, and finally Tam Lin himself. Leaping from her hiding place, Janet grabbed Tam Lin and held him tight. The Fairy Queen laughed and proceeded to transform Tam Lin into every animal imaginable, and even a few that were never before seen by Janet. One was Ammit, a creature that was part lion, part hippopotamus, and part crocodile and who ate impure hearts.
After hours of this, and just as Janet didn’t think she could hold on any longer, the dawn rose, the Fae vanished, and the spell was broken. Janet let go of Tam Lin, human and free again, and the two soon wed and had many more children in Tam Lin’s restored estate.
The Monkey King, Sun Wukong
CHINA, CHINESE MYTHOLOGY
There once was a magic rock on top of a mountain that split open to reveal a monkey inside. The magic monkey joined a band of normal monkeys and soon became their king, naming himself the Handsome Monkey King, Sun Wukong. He proceeded to defeat the dragons of the four seas in battle. In his victory, he was given the magical golden-banded staff, Ruyi Jingu Bang; a golden chainmail shirt; a phoenix-feather cap; and cloud-walking boots. With all his new power, he established himself as an invincible demon, even going so far as to storm into Hell and erase his name from the Book of Life and Death.
Heaven was impressed enough to invite him to the celestial court but not enough to treat him with respect. Furious, Sun Wukong ate the peaches of immortality and the pills of longevity and drank the royal wine. He gained even more powers and abilities and proceeded to single-handedly defeat every warrior in Heaven. Heaven finally asked Buddha for help.
Buddha bet Sun Wukong that he couldn’t escape the Buddha. The Monkey King smugly accepted and flew to the ends of the earth, where he graffitied the five pillars. He leapt back and landed in the Buddha’s palm. There he was surprised to find that the five “pillars” he had painted were in fact the fingers of the Buddha’s hand.
Buddha then trapped Sun Wukong beneath a mountain for five hundred years, releasing him only to assist the monk Tang Sanzang on a journey to the West to retrieve the Buddhist sutras. The two were joined by two others who had to atone for their crimes. The small group experienced many tribulations and trials, during which Sun Wukong learned many virtues and the teachings of Buddha, before successfully accomplishing their mission and returning to China. Finally, Sun Wukong faced Buddha once again. At last he was freed and granted Buddhahood for his service and strength.
The Pandavas
INDIA, HINDU EPIC MAHABHARATA
The king of Hastinapur, named Pandu, once accidentally shot and killed Sage Rishi Kindama and his wife, who were making love in the form of deer. With his dying breath, the sage cursed the king, declaring that he would die if he ever loved his wives or any other woman. In penance, King Pandu renounced his throne and went into exile with his wives, Kunti and Madri.
With King Pandu unable to father children, Kunti asked the gods Yama, Vayu, Svarga, and the Ashvin twins to father her and Madri’s children. They gave birth to five sons, and these five brothers—Yudhisthira, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula, and Sahadeva—became known as the Pandavas.
One day Pandu coveted his wife Madri and, just as the curse promised, he died. The Pandava brothers then returned to Hastinapur in order to reclaim the throne for their brother Yudhisthira. But Pandu’s brother Dhritarashtra had been reigning in their absence. During those years, Dhritarashtra and his wife, Gandhari, had one hundred sons, known as the Kauravas, with the eldest, named Duryodhana, intending to inherit the kingdom.
Sensing a rivalry, Duryodhana built a flammable house and asked the Pandavas to stay in it. The brothers managed to escape through a tunnel and into the forest before Duryodhana set fire to the house. In the forest, they soon heard about an archery contest to win the beautiful Princess Draupadi. Arjuna then won the archery contest, and by their mother’s desire that the brothers share everything equally among them, all five Pandavas married Draupadi.
The Pandavas returned home, and Dhritarashtra split the kingdom in two, giving the prosperous half to his son, Duryodhana, and the barren half to his nephew Yudhisthira. The Pandava brothers developed their half so well that the lands began to rival the heavens, and Duryodhana became jealous. Using magical dice, Duryodhana managed to trick Yudhisthira into condemning the Pandavas and their wife into thirteen years of exile. The Pandavas were furious with their brother, but they managed to stay unified and used the time to prepare for war. Upon returning from exile, they initiated the Kurukshetra War, which ended with the death of all one hundred Kauravas and the ascension of Yudhisthira to the throne.
Yemoja
NIGERIA, YORUBA DEITY
Yemoja is a Yoruban orisha, or deity, of rivers and surface ocean waters. Though originally worshipped in Nigeria as part of the African diaspora, she is celebrated in places in the Americas such as Cuba, Brazil, and Uruguay, all with different stories and powers attributed to her.
Yemoja existed at the beginning of creation, and all life and all orishas come from her waters. At the very start, she married Oko, the orisha of farming. But she became unhappy with him and left him to live in the sea, where the orisha Olokun initiated her to the way of the oceans. She became in charge of rivers and surface waters, the parts teeming with life, and was named Yeye omo eja, or “mother of fishes,” for her countless progeny. Olokun, for his part, became in charge of the deep dark ocean, and only Yemoja is able to soothe his wrath when he creates tidal waves and storms.
After a time, Yemoja returned to the surface seeking a new husband and more children. She at various points married Obatala, Orula, Babalu, Aye, Orisha, and in some stories, Oyun. She then married the orisha Aganyu, and they had a son named Orungan. Unfortunately, Orungan began to covet Yemoja and tried to force himself on his mother. She refused him, and instead her water broke and she flooded the world while giving birth to fourteen orishas and the first humans. She then returned to the ocean and is now seen only rarely by people.
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br /> Though she is infrequently seen, Yemoja still cares deeply for her worshippers, especially women and children. She governs conception, childbirth, infertility, parenting, child safety, love, and healing. She oversees secrets, wisdom, the moon, and the unconscious. Her particular symbols are cowrie shells and the color blue. She is known to be particularly kind to those who drown at sea in her waters, including those who were taken far from their homes.
Osiris, Set, and Isis
EGYPT, EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY
In the beginning, Ra rose and created the world. He created the earth god, Geb, and the sky goddess, Nut, and together they produced the gods Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys. Ra ruled Egypt for a while, but eventually his kingship passed to Osiris. Osiris ruled with his queen, Isis, and they ruled by the rule of maat, or natural and righteous order. But Set brought chaos and destruction, murdered Osiris, chopped him up, and scattered the pieces of his body throughout Egypt.
Isis cried, and her tears flooded the Nile, bringing life to its banks. She fled from Set and, with the help of Nephthys, flew as a falcon to find the pieces of her husband. When all the pieces were collected, Isis called upon Thoth, god of magical healing, and Anubis, god of funerary rights, to restore her husband. They came together and used their powers to turn Osiris into the first mummy.
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