This box was sold but we may be able to get another similar one. 11" high, yellow and red cedar, hand carved and painted with a traditional Gitxsan Raven design.
| Availability: | Out of stock |
The Gitxsan artist's bio is included with purchase.
The Bentwood box is handmade without nails. The sides are made from on piece of wood wet, steamed and bent. The sides are fitted into the base and glued.
The Raven is a trickster and a shape shifter. He can transform into a human, an animal, a rock, or even a tiny hemlock needle. He is clever, mischievous, selfish, and a troublemaker. There are many stories told of him that teach lessons and values, often about how not to do things. He is also the central figure in stories about how the world became the way it is now.
Raven lived in the land of spirits when the world was a watery darkness. He was bored so he journeyed for years contributing to the creation of the world we live in. Although he acted out of self interest, his actions benefitted the human race. Raven brought light to the world. He discovered and freed the first men and women and placed them on the earth. Raven stole salmon from the Beaver People and deposited them in the streams and rivers up and down the coast to provide food for the People.
Raven has two sides. The one is creative and loving. The other is destructive, lazy and selfish. Raven has many names and identities among Indigenous Nations.
Raven tales are the traditional creation stories of the Indigenous northwest. Following are two well known Raven Tales.
Raven Steals the Sun
The light of the world was kept in a series of bentwood box within each other. An old chief kept it hidden away because he hated people. Raven wanted the ball of light. He watched the chiefs daughter as she got water from a stream. He transformed himself into a hemlock needle and floated down the stream into her dipper and made her thirsty. She drank and swallowed the hemlock needle. She returned home impregnated with Raven inside her. A child was born and accepted into the family. The old chief came to love his grandchild who was actually Raven in disguise. The child cried and cried to play with the bentwood box. The doting grandfather eventually gave in to the child. Raven worked his way through the boxes until he accessed the ball of light. He immediately transformed back into Raven and flew out of the house through the smokehole in the roof taking the light with him. The fiery light burned his beautiful snow white feathers and turned them black. Raven placed the sun in the sky, and the moon and stars in the night sky. Before that time there was only darkness.
Raven and the First Men
When the great flood receded Raven ate shellfish on a beach until he could eat no more. Then he heard and saw some tiny beings inside a giant clam shell. He got curious and approached them. The beings were afraid and sealed the shell shut. Raven was unable to open it so he coaxed the human to come out and play with him. The first men started climbing all over Raven. He got tired of it and flew away. They tickled Raven as he flew until he shook them off. Wherever they landed the first villages were established. Raven got bored with the humans because they were all males so he searched the world for females until he finally found women trapped in giant chiton shells. He freed them and put the women and men together and they built families. Raven began to provide for them with fire, salmon, oolichans, and cedar, and he taught them how to survive and live in the world he created.
