Native American creation and origin stories are tales of the creation of the world and the origin of various aspects of it, including plant and animal life – especially corn and buffalo – and death. Some Native American trickster tales are also creation and origin stories, and there are often many different versions of a single nation's creation narrative.
These stories frequently share common features and, most notably, the endless waters that covered the earth before the Creator God sent a series of animal helpers to the bottom of the vast seas to bring up mud, which was then used to fashion land and separate the waters. In some stories, the mud is heaped on the back of a turtle, which is why some Native American nations refer to North America as "Turtle Island."
The belief systems of the Native peoples of North America are monotheistic. They are often misinterpreted as polytheistic because it is understood that there are other supernatural entities that help the Creator maintain order. These other spirits are not gods, however, but manifestations or avatars of the Creator God. Many of the following stories feature this Creator figure – or his avatars, like the Twins in the Navajo story The River of Separation – and are only a small sample of the many creation stories found in Native American literature.
