Thunderbird: Haudenosaunee, Lakota, Anishinaabe, and Pacific Northwest Traditions Compared

The Thunderbird appears in Haudenosaunee tradition (J.N.B. Hewitt, Iroquoian Cosmology, 1903), Lakota tradition (Frances Densmore, Teton Sioux Music, 1918; wakinyan), Anishinaabe tradition (Basil Johnston, Ojibway Heritage, 1976; Animikiig), and Pacific Northwest traditions (Franz Boas, 1895; John Swanton, 1905). These are distinct traditions of different nations with different specific forms, narrative roles, and ceremonial contexts. The common element (a powerful supernatural bird-entity associated with thunder and lightning) does not make them the same creature. Pan-Indian collapsing of these traditions into a single 'Thunderbird' category is a category error.

The English word "Thunderbird" translates a dozen different concepts from a dozen different nations into one category, which then becomes a single entry in New Age spirit-animal guides. What actually exists behind that single word is a remarkable diversity of specific traditions, each documented in its own primary sources, each doing specific cosmological and ceremonial work within its nation, and each named differently, with different narrative roles, by the people who actually hold the tradition.

Haudenosaunee: the sky-battle tradition

J.N.B. Hewitt's Iroquoian Cosmology (BAE Annual Report 21, 1903) documents the Haudenosaunee thunder beings as powerful sky entities whose conflicts produce storms. Hewitt's informants don't consistently render them as birds at all, unlike the fixed eagle-form of the Pacific Northwest tradition; the thunder beings come through as sky-forces more than as a specific animal shape. In several Haudenosaunee narratives, the thunder beings battle the Great Horned Serpent, an underworld entity; this sky-versus-underworld battle produces the storms that humans observe. The eagle atop the Tree of Peace in the Great Law of Peace (Gayanashagowa) is related but distinct from the thunder beings. The Haudenosaunee tradition's thunder beings are not personal spirit guides; they are cosmological forces.

Lakota: the wakinyan

The Lakota wakinyan (thunder being) is documented by Frances Densmore in Teton Sioux Music (1918) and elaborated in James Walker's Lakota Belief and Ritual (1980). Walker's Oglala consultants described the wakinyan as living above the clouds, having the form of a large bird with powerful wings, and producing thunder through wing-beats and lightning through eye-flashes. The wakinyan had a specific ceremonial relationship with Lakota warriors: the hawk (čhetán) was the accessible form of the wakinyan-cluster for human ceremonial practice, while the wakinyan itself was more remote and more powerful. Walker's material also includes vision-quest accounts, and a wakinyan appearance in one of those visions ranked among the most powerful a seeker could receive.

Anishinaabe: the Animikiig

Basil Johnston's Ojibway Heritage (McClelland & Stewart, 1976) documents the Anishinaabe Animikiig (thunder beings) of the Great Lakes region. Johnston, an Anishinaabe scholar and novelist, provides one of the few insider-authored accounts of this tradition. The Animikiig in Anishinaabe cosmology are powerful supernatural beings associated with the manitou of the sky. They conflict with the underwater manitou (Mishibizhii, the Great Lynx) in a cosmic opposition that parallels the Haudenosaunee sky-versus-underworld battle. The Animikiig appear in the Midéwiwin (Grand Medicine Society) ceremonial complex as powerful forces that require respect.

Pacific Northwest: the totem-pole Thunderbird

The Pacific Northwest Thunderbird traditions, documented by Franz Boas in the Kwakwaka'wakw context (1895) and by John Swanton in the Haida context (1905), are visually the most familiar forms, because Pacific Northwest formline art and totem-pole carving are widely reproduced. The Thunderbird in these traditions is typically an enormous eagle-like being depicted at the top of a totem pole with spread wings, prominent eyes, and a curled beak. It is a crest figure, meaning it identifies a specific clan lineage that has the right to use the Thunderbird figure in ceremonial contexts. This is a fundamentally different function from the Haudenosaunee or Lakota cosmological thunder beings.

Sources

1. PRIMARY J.N.B. Hewitt, Iroquoian Cosmology . Smithsonian Bureau of American Ethnology Annual Report 21, 1903. Haudenosaunee Thunderbird traditions — the storm-beings as distinct supernatural entities.
2. PRIMARY Frances Densmore, Teton Sioux Music . Smithsonian Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 61, 1918. Lakota wakinyan (thunder beings) documented in ceremonial song context.
3. PRIMARY Franz Boas, The Social Organization and the Secret Societies of the Kwakiutl Indians . Smithsonian Institution Annual Report 1895. Thunderbird in Kwakwaka'wakw (Kwakiutl) ceremonial tradition on the Pacific Northwest Coast.
4. PRIMARY John R. Swanton, Haida Texts and Myths . Smithsonian Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 29, 1905. Haida supernatural beings including the Thunderbird in totem-pole iconography.
5. PRIMARY Basil Johnston, Ojibway Heritage . McClelland & Stewart, 1976. Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) Animikiig (thunder beings) traditions in the Great Lakes region.
6. PEER-REVIEWED Mark Aldenderfer et al., 'Thunderbird' in Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 15 (Northeast) . Smithsonian Institution, 1978. Comparative survey of Thunderbird traditions across North American nations.