The Thunderbird
Menominee · deity · Menominee traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
The Thunderbird, imagined as a great golden eagle, is the foremost of the Thunderers, the martial powers of the upper world whose wing-beats are thunder and whose glance is lightning. In the Menominee clan-origin the first Thunderbird descended at the summons of the ancestral bear to become his brother and the founding ancestor of the Thunder, or Eagle, phratry. As a class the Thunderers are the standing enemies of the horned underwater powers, whom they hunt with the lightning; this cosmic war between the beings of the sky and the beings beneath the water frames much of Menominee myth and ritual.
Domains
- sky thunder
- war
Powers
- hunts the underwater powers with lightning
Relations
- sibling: The Great White BearCalled down by the ancestral bear to become his brother and found the Thunder phratry.Skinner, A. (1913). Social Life and Ceremonial Bundles of the Menomini Indians. AP-AMNH 13(1). (secondary)
- enemy: The Underwater PantherHoffman, W. J. (1896). The Menomini Indians. 14th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, pp. 88-89. (secondary)
- enemy: MisikinubikHoffman, W. J. (1896). The Menomini Indians. 14th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, pp. 88-89. (secondary)
Sources
- The Thunderbird, chief of the Thunderers, is the golden-eagle sky power, founder of the Thunder phratry and enemy of the underwater monsters.: Skinner, A. (1913). Social Life and Ceremonial Bundles of the Menomini Indians. AP-AMNH 13(1), origin of the clans. (secondary); Hoffman, W. J. (1896). The Menomini Indians. 14th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, pp. 88-89. (secondary)