Áłtsé Hastiin (First Man)

In the Diné Bahaneʼ (Navajo creation story), Áłtsé Hastiin (First Man) emerges as one of the original personages who come into the successive worlds of emergence. He appears paired with First Woman (ltse Asdzaa / ltse Asdzayay) and is present across the stages of the mythic sequence (for example, the Yellow World). Tradition links him to the founding landscape of Dinétah; some sources note Huérfano Mountain is thought to be the original home of First Man and First Woman. Áłtsé Hastiin figures in narratives that establish later social and ceremonial life — notably, he and First Woman find and raise Changing Woman, whose rapid growth and coming-of-age occasions the first puberty ceremony in Navajo tradition.

The available sources identify Áłtsé Hastiin by role and name rather than by a consistent physical iconography. Ethnographic and summary accounts cited treat him as a humanlike ancestral person in the creation narrative and do not provide a standardized or detailed physical description for the figure in the material provided.

Sources describe Áłtsé Hastiin chiefly in familial and narrative roles: as a protoplast who participates in emergence episodes, accompanies First Woman and other early personages through the worlds, and raises and teaches Changing Woman. The cited materials do not ascribe explicit magical powers, shape‑shifting, possession, or hostile supernatural abilities to him; he functions as a foundational ancestral actor in mythic events rather than as a trickster or demon.