ადამიანი-ჩრდილები
Choctaw mythology
is part of the culture of the Choctaw, a Native American tribe originally occupying a large territory in the present-day Southeastern United States: much of the states of Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana. In the 19th century, the Choctaw were known to European Americans as one of the "Five Civilized Tribes."
Today the Choctaw have three federally recognized tribes: the largest is the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, next is the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, made up of descendants of individuals who did not remove in the 1830s, and the smallest is the Jena Band of Choctaw Indians, located in Louisiana. In addition, the MOWA Band of Choctaw Indians is state-recognized by Alabama, but it has not achieved federal recognition. It, too, is made up of descendants of individuals who remained in the Southeast in the 1830s.
The Choctaw and their ancestors have lived in the Mississippi region for an estimated 4000 to 8000 years. Thousands of years of myth and story-making have contributed to a rich collection of history that spans the centuries. The Choctaw continue to tell and write about their legends based in the what is now known as the American Deep South.
The Choctaw who remain in Mississippi tell the following creation story of their coming to this land, and how Nanih Waiya Mound, built of earthwork by ancestors, came to be.
Two brothers, Chata and Chicksah, led the original people from a land in the far west that had ceased to prosper. The people traveled for a long time, guided by a magical pole or staff. Each night, when the people stopped to camp, the pole was placed in the ground, and in the morning the people would travel in the direction in which the pole leaned.
After travelling for a mind-bogglingly long time, they finally came to a place where the pole stood upright. In this place, they laid to rest the bones of their ancestors, which they had carried in buffalo sacks from the original land in the west.
The earthwork mound developed from that great burial. After the burial, the brothers discovered that the land could not support all the people. Chicksah took half the people and departed to the North, where they eventually emerged as the historic Chickasaw tribe.
Chata and the others remained near the mound, which became known as Nanih Waiya (The mound of all creation), and became known as the Choctaw tribe.[
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