Iroquois Creation Story
In the beginning our world was different than we know it to be, but the Sky World was inhabited with human-like people. The earth was inhabited with only animals and animals that flew. The Tree of Life resided in the Sky World and was very important to the people in that world. The trees roots were at the entrance to the world of animals below and the people in the Sky World made sure that no body would mess with the tree since they knew it was highly important to them.
One woman who was about to give birth became curious of the tree and talked with her brother about it, making him uproot the tree. They found that beneath the tree was the entrance hole to the other world. The woman looked down onto the other world and slipped causing herself to fall into the other world below. While falling she grabbed some of the earth from the Sky World. The birds caught the pregnant women as she continued to fall towards the ground. They put her on the back of a great sea turtle because the animals thought she needed land to live on.
The animals tried to gather earth from the water and none was successful except the Muskrat. The earth that he brought began to grow on the back of the sea turtle. The woman then gave birth to a baby girl. She grew faster than the other animals. While there were no males on the Island the West Wind married the daughter of the Sky Woman. The daughter soon gave birth to twins, the Right-Handed and the Left-Handed. While having Left-Handed she died and her mother placed the earth from the Sky World on her daughter's grave and she became the Sacred Tobacco.
Right and Left-Handed twins created the hill, flowers, brooks, butterflies, plants, earth formations, snakes, thorns, thunder, and lightning. Together, they created humans. When Sky Woman died the twins fought over her body, tearing it into pieces and throwing it over the earth. Her head became the moon up in the sky.