Predicting Weather By The Moon - Xavier University Libraries

The Moon in Ancient History
could insert fleas. Irritated by the insects, the Sun and Moon
raced up into the heavens.
‘Once on a time Ke´so, the Sun, and his sister,
Tipä´ke‘so, the Moon (“last-night sun”) lived
together in a wigwam in the east. The Sun dressed
himself to go hunting, took his bow and arrows and
left. He was absent such a long time that when his
sister c ame out into the sky to look for her brother
she became alarmed. She traveled twenty days
looking for the Sun; but finally he returned,
bringing with him a bear which he had shot. The
sun’s sister still comes up into the sky and travels
for twenty days; then she dies, and for four days
nothing is seen of her. At the end of that time,
however, she returns to life and travels twenty days
more.
The Sun is a being like ourselves. Whenever an
Indian dreams of him he plucks out his hair and
wears an otter skin about his head, over the
forehead. This the Indian does because the Sun
wears an otter skin about his head.’
- Native American folktale
But in a North East Indian legend, the Moon was a
brother lusting for his beautiful sister, the Sun. Both were
of equal size and brightness. She repelled his advances by
flinging ashes in his face, thus resulting in the cool planet
we see today and explaining the universal taboo on incest.
In Greenland, the Moon is again a brother, Annigan,
who chases his sister, the Sun Goddess Malina across the
sky. So intent is he on the chase that he forgets to eat and
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