INUVIK
An ancient Babylonian looking at the moon 3,000 years ago saw his gods creating the world, while the Gwich'in see a little boy who knows where the caribou hide.

Researcher Wayne Horowitz gave a presentation Feb. 10 at the Arctic Research Institute about his most recent work with Gwich'in elders in the region to help interpret a traditional tale of the boy in the moon. - photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

For Hebrew University archaeology professor Wayne Horowitz, the way these two cultures have used the moon to understand the world around them demonstrates how different civilizations throughout history have used natural phenomena to construct sets of core values.

Horowitz gave a presentation at the Aurora Research Institute Feb. 10 about the connection between the ancient Babylonians and the Gwich'in through their relationship with the sky. The presentation is based on his work with the Gwich'in Social and Cultural Institute to collect oral history from elders in the Beaufort-Delta, Yukon and Alaska to help reveal how a specific Gwich'in myth about the moon has formed a broad historical narrative about sharing.

The Boy in the Moon is a tale about a community going hungry because there are no caribou. A young boy tells his father he wants to go hunting and can lead them to the caribou. He goes with the men but they don't listen to him and they are unsuccessful.

He asks the men to give him the biggest and fattest caribou if he shows them where to go. They agree but when his uncle catches the best caribou, he won't give it to the boy. Upon returning to camp, the boy cries uncontrollably and the uncle snaps at him because he can't sleep, telling him to go to the moon. The boy does and when he returns to his parents the next day, he tells them that when they see him in the moon with a pack, it will be a good winter with plenty of caribou.

"You begin to see the narrative is part of a complex set of cultural elements," said Horowitz. "It's about the value of sharing in a difficult and harsh part of the world."

What intrigues Horowitz about this myth is that everybody experiences the same natural phenomena - the stars, the moon, rainbows-however, each culture may interpret what they see in a different way. His current research on the Boy in the Moon in comparison to the Babylonian understanding of the same celestial object paints for him a picture of how culture plays a role in different human perceptions of the exact same thing.

"It's about early history and identity," he said. "It's a very core value that's been expressed in the sky. In the Babylon story, when they look at the moon they see the Gods creating the world."

Horowitz said the Gwich'in history is still very much alive, unlike that of Babylon, where there are no surviving members of the culture and research must be completed through ancient documents.

"We're working with a living tradition rather than a dead tradition," he said. "These astronomical narratives are found in all cultures across the world."

Horowitz first visited the Inuvik region in the summer of 1998 with his family. It was there he first became acquainted with the Gwich'in people and they came to mind when he began his current ethno-astronomy project in 2012.

He wanted to research a culture with an astronomical background that has been passed down orally through generations.

Through written documents and oral history, Horowitz plans to write a research paper that will compare the Gwich'in interpretation of the night sky with that of the ancient Mesopotamian city-state of Babylon.