Lecture 3.1.3 – The Mi’kmaq Legend of the Great Bear
This lecture is optional.
Lecture Overview
Fiction is people. A story is a story because a character makes it one. Legends are stories that often involve animals or people interacting with animal characters Many cultures have written about the constellations as if the star patterns and their movement represented a story being told in the night sky (recall the poem When I heard the Learn’d Astronomer). Our ancestors relied on the sky, the planets, the sun and the moon for their very existence. We count on the weather report and science to keep us informed and up-to-date. Sky watching was a matter of life and death to our ancestors Moolin and the Seven Hunters - MicMac Tale (JPEG illustration) The story evolves in the sky and tells of Muin (the Mi’kmaq word for Black Bear), as she awakens from her winter sleep and, leaving her celestial den, descends to the ground in search of food. She is chased by the Seven Bird Hunters who pursue her through the spring and summer months, eventually killing her in the autumn and celebrating their success with a feast in winter. Muin’s life-spirit returns to her den in the sky to enter the body of a new bear who, in turn, wakes from her winter sleep, to once again descend to Earth and be pursued by the Hunters, and so the story continues eternally. Teacher reads the Muin legend and models an interpretation.