A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.
Overview
Batchelor names the world-supporting fish moshiri ikkewe chep, translated as the backbone fish of the world. In his accompanying account, an immense trout inhabits the primordial swamp before the earth is made. The creator turns this living creature into the earth’s foundation. Beneath the world, its intake of seawater produces the ebbing tide, while water expelled from its mouth makes the tide rise. The account does not give a modern zoological species.
A further passage explains exceptional waves by a forceful expulsion of water and earthquakes by the fish’s movements. Gentle motion makes a lesser earthquake; angry, violent motion makes a greater one. Two unnamed deities stand on opposite sides, each keeping one hand on the trout without interruption, even while eating or drinking. Batchelor links this detail with elders rebuking children for eating with only one hand. These are narrative explanations of natural events, not physical causes established by science.
The chapter compares the image with world-bearing creatures in other traditions but does not make those beings identical. Its intervening lake-monster tales are also distinct episodes, including fish that are killed; their deaths are not the death of the foundation beneath the world. Batchelor gives no individual narrator or collection date for the cosmological account, and his English creator terminology remains part of a missionary-mediated witness.
Origins & earliest records
Ainu traditions as reported in John Batchelor’s1901 English account; individual tellers generally unnamed in these passages.
Records & interpretation
Complete chapters V and VI read, including variant legends, contextual comparisons and the attached note; selected original pages inspected.
Selected bibliography
Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.
- 01
The Ainu and their Folk-Lore
V, Matters Cosmological: The Earth and the Depths, pp.51–52 and55; London: Religious Tract Society,1901. Complete chapter context read, not a collation of the indigenous-language original.
Family & connections
A source-supported family tree or inspiration record has not yet been compiled for this profile. Related reading below indicates a connection in subject matter, not a proven lineage or creative influence.
Primary records and illustrations
The Ainu and their Folk-Lore
London: Religious Tract Society,1901. V, Matters Cosmological: The Earth and the Depths, pp.51–52 and55
Full caches batchelor1901-ch5.txt/ch6.txt; original printed52,54,55 at download n83,85,86; printed73–74 at n104–105; original title n10. Collector’s manuscript and unspecified informant claims retained as such. No artwork reused.
References
Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.
- Historical English ethnographic and narrative accountThe Ainu and their Folk-Lore — V, Matters Cosmological: The Earth and the Depths, pp.51–52 and55Research access: 2026-10-05
Image credits
A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.