B80. Measuring the world. .17.23.26.27.51.52.62.
The creation process involves measuring the size of the earth or the world as a whole.
Western Asia. Old Testament: Job 38:4-5: Who measured water with a handful, measured the sky with an inch, tripled the ashes of the earth, weighed mountains and hills on the scales? Job 28:24-26: Weighing the wind and measuring water by measure.
South Asia. Kuttia [Nirantali asked Bhimenja to measure the world; he tied threads to the arrows, shot in all directions, then compared the length of the threads; N. wanted to marry B., but he went to heaven , his bow is a rainbow]: Elwin 1954, No. 16:88-89.
China - Korea. Ancient China: Yuan Ke 1987 [After suppressing the flood, Yu began to measure the land; it turned out to be square; the henchmen of the gods Taizhang and Shuhai went one from east to west, the other from west to east, both counted 200,333,500 li and 75 steps]: 178; Yanshina 1977:93-94 [Catalog of Central Mountains; Yu said: "The sacred mountains of China that I have traveled, 5370, they stretch for 64,056 li; say that the world is from the east 28,000 li to the west and 26,000 li from south to north; rivers flowing down from the mountains stretch for 8,000 li; the rivers into which they flow stretch for 8,000 li; mountains from which copper is extracted, 467; mountains in which they extract iron, 3690"], 101 [Catalog of the Overseas of the East; The Lord (Uncle) of the River lives north of the Rainbows; has the appearance of a yellow-green animal with eight heads (each with a human face), eight legs and eight tails; the kingdom of the Green Hills is north of it; the Fox has four legs and nine tails; the ancestor ordered the speedboat Shuhai to travel the land from the eastern end to the west; it turned out 519,800 "steps"; S. holds a counting board in his right hand and points north of the Green Hills with his left hand]; Miao (SE Guizhou) [at first heaven and earth were close to each other; the river could not flow east, gold and silver could not be transported to the west; if you stand up, you would rest your head against the sky; grandparents, the creators of the sky, melted what was in the huge crucible, white particles rose up, blacks went down; but Heaven also claimed to be bigger than (Earth) and Earth bigger than (Heaven); Heaven fell, Earth rose, they met on seven mountains; grandfather Ha Liong's son-in-law killed With a Li Bo sword in heaven, grandmother Vong E's son shot Li Qe on the ground; each of those killed was left with a widow; but Heaven and Earth continued to argue which of them was bigger; long-legged, long-armed grandmother Niu Dliang called to measure heaven and earth, she measured the east in girths, the west in steps; it turned out that the Earth was slightly longer and the Sky was slightly wider; nowadays golden pillars firmly support Heaven, and silver pillars firmly support Heaven, and silver pillars The earth, and then the sky, was supported by birch pillars, the earth by wubei wood, Heaven and Earth were wobbling, people ran to the sides seven times; Je Sang Ngang's grandfather, whose body was seven iron thick barrel hoops, raised the sky, but it split, a crack appeared; Grandma Yu and Grandpa Sang Ngang were crushed by the Sky; this grandfather became a cicada; the white-nosed pig undermined the supports, the white chicken flew east and west, a gust of wind knocked over the supports; the Yang Yu family was rich enough to replace the wooden supports with 12 gold ones, each made for 12 years; (more about the places where the supports were placed ); it became light; but the day and hour of installing the supports were poorly chosen and they fell; they were reinstalled, but one support broke; it took the fruit of immortality to take its initiative; the sky is firmly established; Hxu Niu paved riverbeds, Bu Pa cut through mountains; Hxu Nu's body is like a buffalo, head like a lion, tail like a palm front, four legs like an iron rake]: Bender et al. 2006:11-19; Chuan Miao [Toad and The Sky Bird tells each other how each of them measures the sky; the bird says it has measured the sky completely, the Toad says it could not reach its edge]: Graham 1954:288; asi [brother tells her sister how the sky was created from a butterfly, sister tells her brother how the earth was created from another butterfly; the "river of the night sky" served as the rocker arm of the scales on which heaven and earth were weighed; the sky it turned out to be easier, it rose up in the void; the earth fell down in the void]: Vakhtin, Eats 1956:17-24, 168 [comment].
The Balkans. Romanians [when creating the earth, God took a ball of duck threads and another ball of base threads; while he was measuring the sky, gave a ball of base Hedgehog, he dropped it, as a result, the earth was larger than the sky; God became think what to do; The bee flew to Hell, overheard him say to himself that you just have to squeeze the ground with his hands; God did so, mountains formed; Damn managed to hit the Bee with a whip, almost cut in half (thin waist)]: Gaster 1916:64-68 in Beza 1928:123-124, in Johns 2005:269; (cf. Ancient Greece [Theogony by Hesiod (8th-7th centuries BC): "The underground of them {Titans} was thrown as deep as it was to the sky, /For so far from us is the multi-dark Tartar:/If only, Taking a copper anvil, throwing it from the sky, /At nine days and nights, it would have reached the ground; /If, taking a copper anvil, it would be thrown off the ground, /At nine days and nights, the weight would reach Tartar" (per. V.V. Veresaeva)]: Hes. Theog. 720-725).
NW Mexico. Huichol [one of the Sun's children, a fly, flew into the world to measure it to see if the Sun had enough room to enter it; for this, Father Sun turned him into a red parrot tau kukui ("heart suns"); The sun spat, a small woodpecker and mako formed, mako feathers parrots; the feathers of these birds are used in rituals; spat again, a royal eagle, a hawk, a black kite, a rattlesnake appeared, "sea jaguar" (shark?) , a jaguar, a green parrot; they all protect the Sun when it is sitting on its bench; Kauymáli was commissioned to make a sacred rod for the Sun; they put seeds inside, it turned out to be a rattle like a sound rattlesnake; only the moon shone before the Sun appeared; if K. hadn't created parafernalia for Solnets, the world would have remained dark; the goddesses of the sea tried to shoot the Sun's parrots, but the Sun's rays were stronger; the parrots shouted five times, the sun rose; the goddesses of the sea tried to guess the name of the Sun, but only the sunbird Turkey guessed, "Tau! Tau! Tau!" ("sun" on Huichol); the Sun advanced four ways and then rose; the sea turned blue; the gods of the sea were afraid that the Sun would not appear regularly and protect them from bad animals; so they told K. to make his bench for the Sun]: Zingg 1938:516-517.
Mesoamerica Mixteci [Our Creator Father (BUT) learns that the mistress of a temazcal (steam bath) owns a ball of threads to measure the world; she comes ashore, where she washes, fires miniature arrows at her, she thinks flies bite; he turns into a baby, gets out of the water; she brings him home, tells her twin sons that they have a little brother; goes to take food to her husband, who works in forest; when he returns, he feeds the baby with his milk; the next day, the boy asks the twins to let him play with their mother's ball; it is stored in a vessel; BUT pulls a thread, measures the world, puts a ball back, lies down in the cradle, cries; a woman scolds the twins for not caring for her brother or comforting him; on the fourth day she returns when BUT is still measuring the world; he explains what she is looking for meat to eat; goes for a walk, she warns not to go right; he goes screams, Go get some food, dad!" A deer appears, BUT kills it with an arrow, makes a scarecrow, fills it with wasps and bees; brings meat to a woman; she eats it with her twins; when she brings food to her husband, he does not answer, she hits him with a stick, Wasps and bees fly out, bite it; BUT drowns the temazcal to treat it, closes the exit; it stays inside; it takes the twins and takes it away]: Solano González 1985:172-177; quiche [in progress the creatures of the world were formed and marked by the four corners of the earth and the four main points; the earth and sky were dismembered; a rope was delivered to measure and stretched in heaven and earth, at four corners, on four main points, as it was called by the Creator and Creator]: Popol-Vuh 1959:9-10; Maya Yucatana (Chilam-Balam books from Chumayel) [13 Etznab (day) when the earth was formed; 13 Cheneb ( date), when they (the gods) measured the cathedral with steps - a dark house of study, a gathering in heaven; in steps, everything here (on earth) was measured]: Borodatova 2006:232.
NW Amazon. Makuna [Romi Kumu (Female Shaman) gave birth to Yurupari; she and male heroes (Ayawa masa) created space and Yurupari (Gegeko mesa) was the measure of peace; the creators measured the radius of the world and based it on it space levels; all living things "got Yurupari" (he boca amire)]: Århem 1980:21; kabiyari [Yakamukute (Sky) did not have an anus; (his umbilical cord connected to the navel, the vine Banesteriopsis caapi; Jaguar Hehechu was her process; this is only in the paraphrase Bonnemère 2001:40); Hechechu is associated with the land; I came to dance with H.'s children, killed them; one escaped, became a bird; Y. threw the other into boiling water like a worm; H. collected pieces of his body, joined him with cotton wool, he turned into a monkey (mico); I pretended to know nothing; invited Y. to dance; let the winds go loudly; I. asked him to make an anus too; H. pierced his anus, he died; his body exploded, becoming heaven, i.e. the sky separated from the earth; the remains of H. turn into a hill, blood became clay; other remains arose Y.'s sons are Munully's four cultural heroes; they measure land to determine where its center is; they build the first maloka by cutting down the only Teviji tree, there are no others yet; the roof is flat after the first but the rain falls; M. takes the night at the Karu toad; at first they do not pay, K. hands them a vessel with wounds; demands gold; after night, M. carelessly open the vessel, darkness sets in; M. create nocturnal animals, screaming at a certain time; when dawn comes, the sun rises; M. receives a vessel with earth from the Mapitare worm, inadvertently opened, the earth is dispersed; the water in Pira-Parana is hot, fish cannot be eaten, it causes diseases, and there are no other rivers yet; M. come to a tree with water and fish, owned by Kamanatana, the wife of the Mapitare worm; brothers eat ants, and Kamanatana feeds them with tapioca; the youngest of M. (his name is Mamitiri) spies, sees that this tapioca is Mapitare sperm; Mamitiri, in the form of a hummingbird, finds a tree owned by Kamanatana; M. opens a hole in which she kept animals and animals spread through the forest; M. dazzle Kamanatana, send them down the river to the rapids; they cut down trees that turn into different rivers; when a tree owned by Kamanatana is cut down, it does not fall, it is suspended for the vines; they send the white Maniritare squirrel to cut them down; the fallen tree turns into Apaporis, the vine turns into the Cananarí River; the sky at sunset is colored with squirrel's blood; the brothers tell the snake to make a channel rivers winding; brothers turn into parrots, fly to Thunder, replace its lightning with a parrot's tail, carry it away, distribute it to all communities]: Bourgue 1976:121-131 [exposition with comments and interpretations] 138-143 [exact summary].