In a primordial world without light, the Creator seeks to retrieve illumination from the Great To’rnarak. After rejecting Raven, he sends Hare, who cunningly decapitates the old man, steals the sun-ball, and releases light into the world. Hare then tricks the To’rnarak’s family by leaving the old man’s corpse in his own clothing, escaping before they discover his deception.
Source
The Jessup North Pacific Expedition
edited by Franz Boas
Memoir of the American Museum
of Natural History – New York
Volume VIII
3. The Eskimo of Siberia
by Waldemar Bogoras
Leiden & New York, 1913
► Themes of the story
Creation: The tale explains how light was introduced into the world.
Trickster: Hare uses cunning and deception to achieve his goal.
Good vs. Evil: The struggle between the Creator’s desire to bring light and To’rnarak’s withholding of it.
► From the same Region or People
Learn more about the Yupik peoples
Told by Ve’nki, an Asiatic Eskimo man, in the village of Cheri’nak (Wute’en), June, 1901
When Creator had made the world, there was no light. Therefore he wanted to send all kinds of animals to the Great To’rnarak to get the light. No one wanted to go. Finally Raven offered to go. “No,” said Creator, “You will find some excrements, and you will forget everything else.” He sent Hare. Hare went there, and saw an old man who was working in front of the house at a new sledge-runner. “Show me your hatchet. I want to look at it.” He took the hatchet, and then said to the old man, “See here, who are the men who are coming there?” The old man looked around, and Hare struck his neck with the hatchet and cut off his head.
Then he entered the house. Oh, the children jumped with joy! “I will eat the head.” — “I will eat the legs.” — “Stay,” said Hare, “I am too cold. I will warm my blood a little.” He began to run around, looking for the light. Then he saw the sun-ball. He kicked it with his foot.
► Continue reading…
The sun-ball flew up through the vent-hole, and light appeared. Hare jumped after it, and was outside. Then he took the body of the old man and put on it his own hare-clothing. This done, he put him down the vent-hole into the house.
“There, eat! I killed a hare!” They caught the body. One took an arm, another a leg. To’rnarak’s wife had the penis. “Oh,” she said, “it is like my husband’s penis!” Then they knew what had happened; but the hare was gone.
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Dreamtime Whispers 