Cultural depictions of turtles

Due to their long lifespan, slow movement, sturdiness, and wrinkled appearance, they are an emblem of longevity and stability in many cultures around the world.

[6] The turtle has a prominent position as a symbol of important concepts in religion, mythology, and folklore from around the world, including steadfastness and tranquility.

A rock engraved as a turtle, dated to 35,000 years BCE, has been found in the deepest section of Manot Cave in Galilee, Israel.

[7][8] Turtles appear in rock art in many places around the world, including polychrome paintings at Dhambalin in Somaliland, dated to ca 5000-3000 BCE;[9] and petroglyphs at such places as Ute Tribal Park, Mancos Canyon, Colorado (ca 1000 years old),[10] Easter Island or Rapa Nui[11] and Murujuga or the Burrup Peninsula in Western Australia.

[13] Ijapa or Alabahun the tortoise is a trickster, accomplishing heroic deeds or getting into trouble, in a cycle of tales told by the Yoruba of Nigeria and Benin.

[15][16] Turtle fossils are the most common reptiles found in the Fayoum, including Gigantochersina ammon, a tortoise as large as those living on the Galapagos Islands today.

[19] Many relics from the Middle Kingdom such as magical knives depicted turtles and were inscribed to protect the women and children of the house.

Since the XIXth Dynasty, and particularly in the Late and Greco-Roman periods, turtles were ritually speared by kings and nobles as evil creatures.

[16] In an Early Dynastic tomb at Helwan a man was buried beneath the carapace of a tortoise who had lost his feet in an accident.

These animals govern the four points of the compass, with the Black Tortoise the ruler of the north, symbolizing endurance, strength, and longevity.

[13] The Chinese Imperial Army carried flags with images of dragons and tortoises as symbols of unparalleled power and inaccessibility, as these animals fought with each other but both remained alive.

[13] Japanese culture adopted from China the myth of four Guardian Beasts, said in Japan to protect the city of Heian (Kyoto) from threats arising from each of the four cardinal directions.

According to traditional Japanese beliefs, the tortoise is a haven for immortals and the world mountain, and symbolizes longevity, good luck, and support.

An Dương Vương was given a present of Kim Quy Deity's claw to make the trigger (Vietnamese: lẫy), one part of the crossbow (Vietnamese: nỏ) named Linh Quang Kim Trảo Thần Nỏ that was the military secret of victorious Zhao Tuo.

A 15th-century legend tells that Lê Lợi returned his sacred sword named Thuận Thiên (Heaven's Will) to Golden Turtle in Lục Thủy lake after he had defeated the Ming army.

In Taiwanese villages, paste cakes of flour shaped like turtles are made for festivals that are held in honor of the lineage patron deity.

People buy these cakes at their lineage temple and take them home to assure prosperity, harmony, and security for the following year.

Many North American Indigenous groups, mostly in the northern and eastern areas of the continent, have in common a type of creation story called the Earth-Diver Myth in which a supreme being usually sends an animal into the primal waters to find bits of sand or mud with which to build habitable land; in many stories these are then used to build that land upon the base of a turtle's back.

Use of term "Turtle Island" for the North American continent expanded beyond those groups carrying these story traditions into more widespread pan-Indigenous use during Indigenous rights activism in the 1970s.

In many Native American cultural traditions these scutes represented the thirteen full moons in each year, including those of the Haudenosaunee,[43] the Anishinaabe[44] other related Algonquian peoples, and the Wabanaki/Abenaki.

[45] In Cheyenne tradition, the great creator spirit Maheo kneads some mud he takes from a coot's beak until it expands so much that only Old Grandmother Turtle can support it on her back.

In Haudenosaunee tradition, the trembling or shaking of the Earth is thought of as a sign that the World Turtle is stretching beneath the great weight that she carries.

[46]) In most versions of this story, this takes place after a Great Flood covers the world, and the land created on Turtle's back is the first to re-emerge, on which the Anishinaabeg will live from then on.

According to many of these myths, the Jebuti (Portuguese: jabuti, pronounced [ʒabuˈtʃi], "land turtle") obtained its mottled shell in a fall to earth as it attempted to reach the heavens with the help of an eagle in order to play a flute at a celebration there.

[48][page needed] There are Quranic verses related to turtles such as "Extol the name of your Lord, the Highest, who has created and regulated, and has destined and guided" [87:1-3].

The early Christian scholar St Jerome recounted that the tortoise moves sluggishly because it is "burdened and heavy with its own weight ... signifying the grievous sin of the heretics".

[53] In the children's story, Esio Trot by Roald Dahl, a character named Mrs. Silver has a small pet tortoise, Alfie, who she loves very much.

One morning, Mrs. Silver mentions to Mr. Hoppy that even though she has had Alfie for many years, her pet has only grown a tiny bit and has gained only 3 ounces in weight.

Tourists interact with turtles in countries such as France, Australia,[65] Brazil, Costa Rica, Greece, and the United States.

[3] A group of protesters from the Earth Island Institute that focused on the issue of TED use in shrimp trawls wore sea turtle costumes.