I think it’s just a matter of timing and development. Europeans had the same or similar legends a thousand years ago. Indigenous cultures here in North America have the same folklore but we are more closer to it than our European friends.

I’m Indigenous Canadian in northern Ontario. My first language is Ojibway/Cree and for the first ten years of my life, I was surrounded by my culture and history from my Elders and other traditional people.

Sure it was all stories of how characters saved humanity, how humanity saved itself and all those saviour / hero type story lines. They were fun stories … but over half of those old tales are just messed up freakish stories of death, destruction, fear and horror. The characters of the land, the water, the sky, the gods, the talking animals, good spirits and bad spirits are portrayed as equally good and equally bad. They are seen as more human and they are capable of doing enormous good or conducting terrible evil.

It’s a lot like Greek mythology or Scandinavian mythology … there is superstition, belief and godlike power to everything … but the beings of other worlds and realms can be as good, holy, wholesome, loving and just as we want them to be … but they are also just as flawed, stupid, jealous, angry, violent and terrible as we are.

I still spend a lot of time alone on the land at my wilderness cottage and as much as I like it out there … there are times when it does scare the shit out of me. A quiet still silent bright summer day alone with no other people around can at times be just as frightening as a lonely dark autumn night. Sometimes when you know you are alone out there … you can’t help but feel like someone is watching you.