What Animals Are Considered Most Sacred To Native Americans

From fourth dimension to time people ask me about the relationship between Ethnic peoples and animals. For some, the cognition of the natural world - the land, plants, animals, seasons and cycles of nature - has been a central tenet of their lives and worldviews since the dawn of time. Their understanding of the natural world is sophisticated and comprehensive. The natural world, now normally referred to as the "environment", is not viewed as a dissever entity only i, interconnected aspect of the whole. This interconnectedness equates to a moral responsibility to care for, live in harmony with, and respect the natural globe.

Many Indigenous Peoples believe that "the Animal People have spirits and enter the man world to give their bodies to supply men with food, fur and other materials. Subsequently their mankind is used the animals render home, put on new mankind and re-enter the human world whenever they choose." [1].

Animals, in many Indigenous cultures, are imbued with great spiritual significance. In the Vii Sacred Teachings "the traditional concepts of respect and sharing that course the foundation of the Aboriginal mode of life are congenital around the seven natural laws, or sacred teachings. Each teaching honours 1 of the basic virtues intrinsic to a full and healthy life. Each police force is embodied past an animal to underscore the betoken that all actions and decisions made by human being are manifest on a physical obviously. The creature globe taught human being how to live close to the earth, and the connection that has been established between the animal world and that of homo has instilled a respect for all life in those who follow the traditional Aboriginal way." [ 2]

Honey - Hawkeye
Respect - Buffalo
Courage - Bear
Honesty - Bigfoot
Wisdom - Beaver
Humility - Wolf
Truth - Turtle

Given this interconnected relationship between animals and humans, Indigenous Peoples were careful and respectful of the natural lifecycles of the animals they shared the Earth with - they made efforts to not over-fish, over-chase or over-harvest. They hunted, fished and collected what was needed to sustain their families, tribes, or clans. Every part of the animal was used, and in many cultures in that location were accompanying celebrations and rituals of appreciation. There was no stock or species depletion due to over-harvesting - this came with the Europeans and a prime number case is the sad fate of the buffalo.

There was also no need for artificial management of wildlife, which is an conflicting concept to numerous Ethnic cultures. "Many Yukon First Nations people find the assumption of command inherent in the agricultural metaphor cool, perhaps fifty-fifty offensive to the animals. At wild fauna management meetings, one Kluane Outset Nation hunter regularly objected to use of the term wildlife management itself. Humans cannot "manage" wildlife populations, he said. Animals manage themselves; they make their own decisions virtually when to reproduce, and where to go, decisions that are quite independent of any human desires. Wildlife management, he said, is not most managing animals; it is most managing people." [three] Hard to argue with that logic!

While there is a great diversity between cultures, animals frequently effigy prominently in cosmos stories, legends, ceremonies and art. In Northwest coast fine art, the animals of particular significance are the orca, deport, wolf, beaver, dragonfly, owl, eagle and salmon. Over again, every bit in the animals in the 7 Sacred Teachings, each animate being is imbued with spiritual significance.

[1] Ruth Kirk, Tradition and Alter on the Northwest Declension: The Makah, Nuu-chah-nulth, Southern Kwakiutl and Nuxalk. Seattle: University of Washington, 1986. Print.

[ 2] The Sharing Circle website

[3] Paul Nadasdy, Hunters and Bureaucrats: Power, Knowledge, and Aboriginal-State Relations in the Southwest Yukon

If y'all would like to larn about the realities of some of the most common myths about Indigenous Peoples, download a copy of our ebook in which we take a look at nine myths and present the reality of each.