Good question! But when you stop to ponder it, it's a bit like asking, "Is there a 'European' mythology?" A Greek and an Irishman are both called "Europeans," but share little in the way of ancient myth or national history-or appearance. Similarly, Africa is filled with people who fall under the collective nametag "African," but who look very different and also have an expansive range of traditions and myths.

The wide variety of mythologies that developed among the people living south of the Sahara was a result of constant movement by nomadic populations across enormous geographic barriers in a vast and varied landscape. Occupying a fifth of the world's land-an area three times the size of the continental United States-Africa is a staggering 11,657,000 square miles of territory, divided by deserts, mountains, rain forests, winding rivers, and a massive savannah. Sheer size alone kept myth-mingling to a minimum. As mythologist Arthur Cotterel notes, "Mythologies abound in Africa. Tribes possess their own traditions, and even where they share a language with their neighbors...it is the diversity of local belief that surprises rather than the evidence of a common heritage." While Islam and Christianity are widespread today among the more than 850 million Africans, more than 100 million people still practice forms of traditional ethnic religions, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica Book of the Year (2004); other estimates of the number of traditional believers in Africa are twice that.

This rich range of ancient beliefs makes it difficult to draw simple conclusions, but some broad parallels can be found in Africa's many traditions. "Central to these," author Chris Romann notes about African religions in A World of Ideas, "is a strong sense of the oneness of creation, in which the interconnection between the natural and the supernatural, the physical and the spiritual, the visible and the invisible, the living and the dead are far more important than the differences between them." Traditionally, the majority of African people believe that gods exist everywhere in nature, and that such natural presences as mountains, rivers, and the sun contain a deity or spirit. African religions also tend to be more "here and now," focusing on earthly life instead of an afterlife.

So, put the "oneness of creation" and nature worship at the top of a list of similarities in Africa's many mythic traditions. And bear in mind these other important common characteristics: A Supreme God. The existence of a supreme being who is omniscient and omnipresent but often disappears from the scene out of annoyance with mankind is a very common theme. For instance, Wulbari, the creator god of the Krachi of Togo in West Africa, gets tired of people asking him for favors and is annoyed by the cook-smoke constantly getting in his eyes, so he leaves the village of people and sets up a heavenly court composed entirely of animals. Another god, We, is irritated because an old woman cuts a piece of him each day to make a good soup. Nyame of the Ashanti (or Asante) of modern Ghana is constantly disturbed by a woman pounding yams who keeps banging on the overhanging floor of heaven. In a move that any New York apartment-dweller with a noisy neighbor can appreciate, Nyame retreats to the sky, and when the people try to build a ladder of calabash gourds to reach him, they tumble down-another common African narrative which mirrors the Tower of Babel story.

A Pantheon of Gods. In many African traditions, the supreme creator may withdraw, but there is still a pantheon of more active and available gods who can be called upon through prayer, sacrifice, or the offering of gifts to gain favors. One of the best examples of this pantheon is the 1,700 divinities-known as orishas-of modern Nigeria's Yoruba, who are part of one of the world's oldest practiced religions, sometimes called Orisha after its gods. Orisha is headed by the supreme god, Olorun (or Olodumare), who couples with Olokun, goddess of the sea, and has two sons, Obatala and Oduduwa. Olorun sends his sons, along with a great palm tree, to create the world, but one of them makes wine from the palm sap, gets drunk, and falls asleep. (The biblical Noah, first man after the Flood, did exactly the same thing.) The other son, Oduduwa, creates earth and separates the land from the seas by having his hen scratch the ground. Oduduwa calls the place he creates Ile-Ife ("wide house"). In time it becomes a great city of the Yoruba, and it is still a major university center in modern Nigeria.*

Also in the Yoruban pantheon is the god of storms and thunder, Shango. According to legend, Shango is a ruler on earth who flees to the forest to escape his enemies but winds up committing suicide and then later being deified. Shango and another orisha, the trickster Eshu, are among the most important gods carried to the Americas by Africans taken as slaves, and are prominent in the African-based fusion religions, such as Santeria, which emerged in the Caribbean, and the voodoo of Brazil, Haiti, and Cuba.

A Guardian Spirit. Many Africans-like the Chinese and other ancestor-worshipping cultures-believe that the souls of their deceased forebears serve as guardians and sources of wisdom for the living. Some believe that ancestors are reborn in living things or in objects. The Zulus, for example, traditionally refuse to kill certain kinds of snakes, because they believe the souls of their ancestors live in these reptiles. In the modern Kwanzaa celebration, ancestor worship plays a part in a ritual that includes pouring a glass of clear water and lighting a candle while praying to the departed ancestor for help and guidance.

The Trickster. One of the most widespread and popular African mythic characters, the trickster often appears in many stories as an animal. The clever, clownish trickster is both a troublemaking hero and a schemer who shows little concern for the consequences of his mischief and fantastic adventures. A typical trickster in African traditions is Ture, the spiderman of the Pygmies, whose loincloth catches on fire from a spark at a blacksmith's shop. Madly dashing through the forest, Ture asks the fire to enter the trees. This explains how humans got fire and why rubbing wooden sticks together produces it. Another famed animal trickster is Anansi the Spider, who was once a Creator god but who now lives by his wits, fooling other animals and mankind. And then there is Hare, whose ability to outwit other animals-and humans-made him the model for Br'er Rabbit, the mischievous rabbit who constantly outwits Br'er Bear and Br'er Fox in the stories told by plantation slaves in the American South and recorded by Joel Chandler Harris in his Uncle Remus stories (see below).

Eshu, another important African trickster, is not an animal but a god-like the Norse Loki, in many respects-who brings chaos. In one story, Eshu steals vegetables from the Creator god and covers up his theft by making footprints in the garden with the god's own sandals. When the Creator realizes what has happened, he is so angry that he withdraws from earth.

Explanations for Death. In many African traditions, a "mixed message" brings death into the world, usually when an animal courier fails to deliver some important information from the gods to mankind. This is the case in the story of a bird sent by the Creator to tell people that when they get old they should just peel off their skins. On the way to deliver this message, the bird sees a snake eating a dead animal. In return for some of the meat, the bird tells the snake that it can obtain a new life by shedding its skin. While snakes gain the secret of immortality, the message is never delivered to humans-which is why people are mortal. For its failure, the bird is afflicted with a terrible disease. That's why its painful cry is often heard in the tops of trees.

In a Zulu tale of the origin of death, a lizard carrying the news of death outraces a chameleon who has the message of eternal life. The chameleon arrives only to find that people have accepted the lizard's words as the truth.

People with Special Spiritual Abilities. Magic played a major role in many traditional African religions in which the only way an average person could approach the divine was thought to be through priests or medicine men. As the historian of religion Huston Smith writes, "We can think of shamans as spiritual savants...exceptional to the point of belonging to a different order of magnitude. Subject to severe physical and emotional trauma in their early years, shamans are able to heal themselves and reintegrate their lives in ways that place psychic if not cosmic powers at their disposal. Those powers enable them to engage with spirits, both good and evil."

These healers and shamans were usually elders and other individuals singled out for some remarkable ability, and typically were responsible for healing, divination, exorcisms, and escorting the dead to the underworld. As true of shamans in many traditions, the tribal priests of Africa usually performed in an ecstatic trance induced by dancing, drumming, chanting, or with the use of a drug or alcohol. Since there was no established church or clergy in ancient Africa, the appointment of these priests was often hereditary. Among the Masai of eastern Africa, for example, the medicine men all came from one clan.

According to Paul Devereux, an authority on ancient mysteries, "The shaman* was the person who acted as the intermediary between the tribe and the otherworlds of spirits. A shaman would heal the sick tribal members by locating their lost souls, perhaps entering the spirit world to reclaim them, or by deflecting bad spirits and invisible influences. There were also a variety of other reasons for entering the spirit realms, such as accompanying the souls of dying people or seeking information from the spirits or ancestors."

Fetishes. Bones, carved statues, or unusual stones were thought to be inhabited by spirits and contain magical powers, but they were more closely associated with dead ancestors and seen as an integral aspect of ancestor worship in many African traditions. The word "fetish" was coined by Portuguese sailors, some of the first Europeans to encounter these figures among the Yoruba and the Dogon of western Africa. But the use of fetishes was widespread throughout Africa, and in the Congo, for instance, included elaborate, nail-studded statues called nkisi nkondi ("power figures").

Don't snicker if you happen to be one of those people with a "lucky coin" or a rabbit's foot in your pocket. They are "fetishes," too.

What role did myth play in African villages?

It may take "a village to raise a child,"* but what does it take to hold a village together? Just as the temple complexes of Egypt and Mesopotamia, and the agoras of Greece, were the pulsing centers of those cultures, the African village was-and in many places, remains-the heartbeat of Africa. And the myths and stories of African tradition are the connective tissue that hold the village together.

In societies like ancient Africa, where there were no written records, myth played an important role in maintaining a sense of history and cohesion. Just as the bard provided the collective memory of the Greeks, Celts, and Norse, the African storyteller always helped unite the village with sacred stories. These storytellers weren't mere entertainment, trotted out for a once-a-week religious service. Their performances, combining story and song, drumming and dancing, were an integral part of daily village life and helped to convey important messages about the value of family ties, the feats of famous ancestors, the heroes of the past, and the individual's place in society. As folklorist Roger Abrahams explains in African Folktales, "In the village the question of the individual in the family and community arises constantly, as does the issue of initiative in a world that must stress the subordination of the individual will to the good of the group."

The good of the group was often tied to the question of food. In a landscape where growing conditions were always challenging, the constant possibility of drought, crop failures, and food shortages was a persistent fear, and social cooperation and collective farming were crucial to survival. African myths and stories were both preoccupied with this theme, as Roger Abrahams notes. "Nothing strains the web of culture so much as the threat of starvation.... We see [that] through these tales. Bonds are repeatedly strained because someone steals food, or because children are neglected when crops fail. Therefore no theme is more important or receives more attention than the building of families and friendship ties to provide that strength which, even in the face of natural disaster or perilous human responses to it, ensures a community's survival.... One realizes how great the achievement of family and community is, and how constantly that achievement must be recreated again."

The importance of communal action is clear in a story about the trickster Hare told by the Ewe (of Ghana and Togo) that also appears in other versions in many African traditions. While just an amusing tale on the surface, it underscores the fundamental need for cooperation. When a drought dries up the earth, the animals assemble in a council and all agree to cut off a piece of their ears and extract the fat, which they will sell to buy a hoe to dig a well. All do as they promise except for Hare, the trickster, who reneges. The other animals are surprised, but still manage to buy the hoe and dig until they hit water. Along comes Hare, who first draws some water and then takes a bath, muddying the well. When the other animals realize that Hare has ruined their water, they hatch a plan that involves covering a small statue with "bird lime." Hare comes along and speaks to this "dummy," which, of course, does not respond. Angrily, Hare hits the statue and gets one paw stuck to it, then the other. Next, he kicks at the sticky statue, but only succeeds in getting both feet stuck as well. The other animals, watching from hiding, come out and give Hare a beating, before letting him go. From that day on, Hare never leaves the safety of the grass.*

Given the central importance of communal cooperation, something as seemingly simple as a "work song" takes on a vital role in African mythology. Sung in unison by laborers harvesting crops or hoeing fields, the work song was not just a pleasant diversion from otherwise dreary labor, but a fundamental, cohesive force in tribal life. These songs, still very much alive in Africa today, made their way from thousands of African villages to America for centuries, aboard slave ships, and found voice in the work songs of the plantation slaves as well as in the rhythmic songs of chain-gangs (brilliantly displayed in the opening scene of the film O Brother, Where Art Thou?). These, in turn, powerfully influenced American gospel, rhythm and blues, jazz, and, eventually, rock and roll and Motown. That's just one reason this mythic tradition deserves some R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

MYTHIC VOICES.

In the beginning, in the dark, there was nothing but water. And Bumba was alone.

One day Bumba was in terrible pain. He retched and strained and vomited up the sun. After that light spread over everything, The heat of the sun dried up the water until the black edges of the world began to show. Black sandbanks and reefs could be seen, but there were no living things.

Bumba vomited up the moon and then the stars, and after that the night had its own light also.

Still Bumba was in pain. He strained again and nine living creatures came forth: the leopard...and the crested eagle, the crocodile...and one little fish named Yo; next...the tortoise and Tsetse, the lightning, swift, deadly, beautiful like the leopard, then the white heron...also one beetle, and the goat.

Last of all came forth men. There were many men, but only one was white like Bumba...

...When at last the work of creation was finished, Bumba walked through the peaceful village and said to the people, "Behold these wonders. They belong to you." Thus from Bumba, the Creator, the first Ancestor, came forth all the wonders that we see and hold and use, and all the brotherhood of beasts and man.

-a Bantu Creation tale, "The Beginning," Maria Leach The world was created by one god, who is at the same time both male and female...named Nana-Buluku. In time, Nana-Buluku gave birth to twins, who were named Mawu and Liza, and to whom eventually dominion over the realm thus created was ceded. To Mawu, the woman, was given command of the night; to Liza, the man, was given command of the day. Mawu, therefore, is the moon and inhabits the west, while Liza, who is the sun, inhabits the east. At the time their respective domains were assigned to them, no children had as yet been born to this pair, though at night the man was in the habit of giving a "rendezvous" to the woman, and eventually she bore him offspring. This is why, when there is an eclipse of the moon, it is said that the celestial couple are engaged in love-making....

-Creation tale of the Fon of Dahomey From Dahomey, Melville J. Herskovits Is there an African Creation myth?

The Garden of Eden was in Mesopotamia. The Egyptian Creation emerged from the Nile's waters. The Chinese believed that people came from the clay of China's Yellow River. But surely, they all had it wrong. After all, humanity was born in Africa. So it would make complete sense that Africa's Creation stories would be particularly significant.

But myth in a preliterate society can be tricky. Though very old, Africa's myths were not collected or written down until the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Even then, they were recorded by missionaries or colonial administrators, who often had their own agendas. Perhaps this is why the Creator god Bumba is described as white. And why parallels with the Old Testament pop up in African Creation myths. These agendas acknowledged, there are still hundreds of different African stories about how the universe began and humans were created. While few complete narratives exist in a form that can be considered "authentic," many brief tales survive, which contain some common characteristics.

Many stories, for instance, involve a cosmic egg that breaks open and lets out a primeval serpent, typically a python. The world and every living thing in it are made from the body of the snake, so common on the African continent. In many other world myths, snakes have often played some fascinating-and contradictory-roles. Dangerous yet intriguing, they shed their skins, seemingly able to take on new life, an idea found in countless stories, including Gilgamesh. Their phallic connection only adds to this view of snakes as a mystical life-force. On the other hand, they are silently deadly and are often the supreme symbol of disorder and evil, whether in the Bible or ancient Egypt, where the serpent Apep tries to kill the sun each night. But in African myth, the concept of snake as a life-force predominates. According to the Creation story of the Fon of Dahomey, the serpent Aido-Hwedo serves the Creator goddess Mawu, daughter of the older, remote Creator Nana-Buluku. The rivers of the world wind around like the serpent's body, and the mountains are formed by great piles of the serpent's excrement. Mawu makes the serpent lie down in the waters surrounding the earth in a perfect circle with his tail in his mouth-a widely shared symbol of eternity. Sometimes he shifts, which explains earthquakes. And someday, when he swallows his tail, the world will come to an end.

Another primordial snake in southern and central African myths is Chinawezi. Called "the mother of all things," this female serpent shares the world with her husband, Nkuba, who sits up in the sky and waters the earth with the beneficial rain of his urine. Chinawezi rules the earth, and whenever the thunder rumbles in the sky, it is believed that she replies by making the rivers swell.

In many traditions, a supreme god begins the work of making the cosmos but then leaves others in charge, or leaves earth altogether in annoyance with human behavior. In still other Creation tales, the world already exists, and it is only the creation of humanity that is of interest. Some of these stories reflect the influence of Christian missionaries as the old stories were merged with the biblical tradition. The Efe of Zaire, for instance, have a story in which the female moon helps the supreme Creator make the first man, Baatsi, from clay covered with skin and filled with blood. When the Creator makes a female companion for Baatsi, the couple are instructed to make children but are warned not to eat from the "Tahu tree." They obey, and for many years everyone lives an idyllic existence until they get old and tired, and simply go straight to heaven without dying. But later on, when a pregnant woman has a craving for Tahu fruit and convinces her husband to pick some for her, the Creator decides that men and women must suffer the punishment of death.

Another Eve-like story, from the Dinka of southern Sudan, is about Abuk, the first woman. In the beginning, the High God allows the first man and woman to plant a grain of millet each day. When Abuk greedily decides to plant more, she accidentally whacks the High God on the toe with her tool, making him so angry he retreats to the sky and cuts the rope that links heaven and earth. Since then, humans have had to work hard to grow food, and suffer sickness and death.

Some of the other most prominent African Creation accounts, which also come down in fragments, are included in the first part of this "Who's Who" directory, which lists the god's principal tribal association and location. The second part of the list includes the other most significant group of African gods, the "tricksters," who are responsible for a mixture of good things and amusement, but more often bring mischief, chaos, and disaster.

WHO'S WHO OF AFRICAN DEITIES Creator Gods Amma (the Dogon of Mali) In Mali (western Africa), the Dogon revere a single god, Amma, the chief creator of all things. In one of their Creation myths, Amma exists at the beginning of time as a great egg that contains all the elements of creation-fire, earth, water, and air. In a series of great explosions, these all combine to make life.

In another version, Amma is a divine potter who casts the sun, moon, and stars out of clay that he flings into the sky. When the heavens are complete, he forms a woman-earth-and produces a jackal monster and two serpentlike twins with her. The twins invent speech and cover the bare earth with vegetation. Amma then couples with the earth, producing another set of twins, who become the ancestors of the Dogon.

Bumba (the Bushongo of the Congo) The chief Creator god of the Bushongo (central Africa), Bumba vomits the earth, sun, moon, and stars into existence. These are followed by the animals, from which all life descends. Described in some traditions as "white," Bumba gives fire to a man named Kerikeri, who charges a high price for embers to make fires for cooking. The king's daughter entices Kerikeri into marrying her, so she can learn the secret of fire from him. One night, she pretends to be cold and watches as Kerikeri builds the fire. After learning his secret, she deserts him. It is another story underscoring the widely shared African distaste for selfishness.

A similar Creation story of the Kuba of the rain forests of Zaire (central Africa) is about Mbombo, a spirit who, during the dark hours of the first day of Creation, has sharp pains in his stomach and vomits, producing the sun, moon, and stars. As the sun shines, the primordial water recedes, and the hills and plains of the earth are revealed. In a second convulsion, he sends forth a stream of vomit that produces the rest of Creation, including all of the animals and the first man and woman.

Cagn (San of the Kalahari) The chief creator of the San (once called Bushmen) of the Kalahari Desert region in southern Africa, Cagn is a wizard of great power, whose magical strength resides in one of his teeth. A shape-shifter, he can assume the forms of different animals, including a praying mantis and an antelope. He also has a pair of sandals that can turn into attack dogs. At various times, Cagn is eaten by ants and by an ogre, but he always comes back to life when his bones rejoin.

The San have a myth about another creator, Dxui, who takes the form of a different flower or plant every day and becomes a man at night, until he creates all the plants and flowers that exist. Afterwards, Dxui becomes a fly, water, and a bird, until he is finally transformed into a lizard, which, the San believe, is the oldest creature of all.

Chuku (Ibo of Eastern Nigeria) The Ibo (or Igbo) believe that the supreme creator, the benevolent Chuku ("great spirit"), creates an earthly paradise in which there is neither evil nor death. In a very typically "confused message" story, Chuku sends a dog to earth to tell people that those who die accidentally can be brought back to life if they are laid on the ground and sprinkled with ashes. But the dog carrying this message is too slow in delivering it, so Chuku next dispatches a sheep with the same message. But the sheep stops to eat along the way, and by the time it finally reaches mankind, the message is confused-the sheep tells the people to bury their dead. Because of this foolish sheep, death comes into the world.

Imana (the Banyarwanda people of Rwanda) In Rwanda (central Africa), the omniscient creator Imana has very long arms and is benevolent to mankind, but likes to keep his distance. One legend describes how Imana is hunting down Death in order to rid the world of it. But Death begs an old woman for protection, and she agrees to hide Death under her skirt. For this, Imana decides that Death should live with mankind, after all.

Kalumba (the Luba of Zaire) The creator of the Luba tribe (central Africa), Kalumba creates mankind and then wants to protect people from death and disease. He sends a goat and a dog to guard the road on which Life and Death are traveling. The animals have been instructed to only allow Life to pass, but they argue and split up. While the dog sleeps, Death is able to sneak past. Then, while the goat is on guard, Life gets turned away, so people cannot be saved from Death.

Leza (the Kaonde of southern Africa) Leza is a supreme god who rules the sky, sits on the backs of all people, and is supposedly growing old, so he cannot hear prayers as well as he once did. In one tale of the Kaonde, Leza gives a bird three calabash gourds to deliver to humans. Inside two of the gourds are the seeds to grow food, but the third is not to be opened. Like Pandora, the bird can't restrain its curiosity and looks inside the gourd, releasing all the evils of the world, which are contained inside. Leza and the bird are unable to recapture the evils once they are set loose.

Mawu and Liza (Fon of Benin) This pair of twin creator gods may have belonged to another tribe that was conquered by the Fon (western Africa), who possessed superior iron-working skills and probably had superior weapons. The defeated tribe's gods were then absorbed by the Fon. Mawu and Liza are born from an older creator god, Nana-Buluku, who is a sexless primeval creator, and Aido-Hwedo, the rainbow-colored snake who holds up the earth. The male god Liza is associated with the sun, power, the daytime, work, and strength; the goddess Mawu is associated with the moon, nighttime, fertility, motherhood, and joy. This divine pair shape the universe from preexisting material and then create all the other gods in the sky and on earth.

In one of the Fon Creation stories, these two come together during eclipses to create the other gods. They have a set of twins, Sagbata and Sogo, who, like most mythic twins, get into a dispute over which of them will rule. When the elder twin, Sagbata, is given precedence over the younger twin, Sogo, Sagbata angrily stops the rain, and soon all of creation is starving and thirsty.

On the second day of Creation, they send down their son, Gua (or Gu), the god of thunder, blacksmiths, and farmers, to help mankind. Gua does not anticipate that his tools will later be used for warlike purposes. In a separate version of this myth, Gua helps make the first people out of divine excrement.

'Ngai (Masai of southeastern Africa) A creator god of the cattle-herding Masai, 'Ngai gives every man a guardian spirit to ward off danger and carry him away at death. The good go to a rich pasture land, while the evil are carried off to a desert.

In the beginning of Creation, there is only one man on earth, Kintu. When 'Ngai's daughter Nambi sees Kintu, she falls in love with him, and they marry after he passes a series of challenges. Promising not to return to the sky, they go to earth with plants and animals in Nambi's dowry. But Nambi forgets to bring along grain to feed her chickens, and when she returns to the sky to get some, she meets Death, who follows Nambi home and then kills the couple's children. Death remains on earth after that. As in many African myths, the connection between heaven and earth is destroyed by human error or foolishness.

Nyame (Ashanti of Ghana) Supreme god of heaven and earth, as well as the sun and moon, Nyame is Creator of all the realms-heaven, earth, and the underworld. Nyame gives each soul its destiny at birth, and washes it in a golden bath. But Nyame is one of those gods for whom living with humans gets to be too much of a nuisance. After an old woman preparing yams keeps hitting Nyame with her pole, he goes away to seek a more peaceful home in the sky.

Unkulunkulu (Zulu, Xhosa) Known as "Old, Old One," Unkulunkulu is both the creator, a god of earth who has nothing to do with the heavens, and the first man. According to the Zulu (southern Africa) Creation myth, he evolves alone in the emptiness, and, once he comes into being, creates the first men out of grass. Unkulunkulu orders a chameleon to tell men that they will be immortal. But the creature lingers so long that the god angrily sends a lizard with the opposite message, and the lizard arrives with the news of death first.