Thunderbirds carved in sandstone wall at Twin Bluff, Juneau County, Wisconsin, by prehistoric artist(s)Īmerican science historian and folklorist Adrienne Mayor and British historian Tom Holland have both suggested that indigenous thunderbird stories are based on discoveries of pterosaur fossils by Native Americans. Thunderbirds in this tradition may be depicted as a spreadeagled bird (wings horizontal head in profile), but also quite common with the head facing forward, thus presenting an X-shaped appearance overall (see under §Iconography below). The thunderbird creates not just thunder (with its wing-flapping) but lightning bolts, which it casts at the underworld creatures. In Algonquian mythology, the thunderbird controls the upper world while the underworld is governed by the underwater panther or Great Horned Serpent. Midwest states (e.g., Ojibwe in Minnesota ). The discussion of the 'Northeast' region has included Algonquian-speaking people in the Lakes-bordering U.S. The thunderbird myth and motif is prevalent among Algonquian peoples in the 'Northeast', i.e., Eastern Canada ( Ontario, Quebec, and eastward) and Northeastern United States, and the Iroquois peoples (surrounding the Great Lakes). Tribal signatures using thunderbirds on the Great Peace of Montreal