Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) / A Record of Five Years' Exploration Among the Tribes of the Western Sierra Madre; In the Tierra Caliente of Tepic and Jalisco; and Among the Tarascos of Michoacan

by Carl Lumholtz

The Sun and the Moon in the Beginning of the World

In the beginning the Sun and the Moon were alone, and they were children. They wore dresses made of palm-leaves, and they lived in a house thatched with palm-leaves. They had neither cattle nor sheep. Both the Sun and the Moon were dark, and the Morning Star was the only one that shed any light on the earth. The Moon Was eating lice from the hair of the Sun, and the Morning Star was watching at night. There were 600 Tarahumares at that time, and they were much hampered by the darkness. They could not do their work, and they had to hold each other’s hands, and they were stumbling all the time. Then they cured the Sun and the Moon by dipping small crosses into tesvino, and touching the Sun and the Moon on the chest, on the head, and on the back. Then the Sun and the Moon began to shine and to shed light.