4. Flood Myths in the Pacific and Oceania
Various cultures across Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia, also preserve flood legends. One Hawaiian story tells of Nu’u, a man who builds a canoe with a house on it to survive a great flood sent by the gods. Some suggest this myth was influenced by Christian missionaries, but native flood stories also predate contact. In Australian Aboriginal mythology, some Dreamtime stories feature floods caused by ancestral beings.
One tells of a woman who breaks a taboo, causing a flood to engulf the land. Others involve the Rainbow Serpent, whose movements cause rivers to flood or reshape the earth. Such myths often serve to explain natural features and convey moral lessons about Aboriginal law and kinship systems.
