The spider myth is a symbol of resistance and survival by turning the force of powerful oppression to the shoulders of unexpected individuals by using cunning and trickery speeches, but at the end the truth always is set to free those who lost their freedom by the hand of the treacherous.
This is an Anansi story that explains how his name became attached to the whole corpus of tales:
There was once an African king who had the finest ram in the world. When this ram happened to be grazing on Anansi's crops one day, he threw a rock towards the animal, hitting the ram between the eyes and killing him.
Anansi knew that the king would punish him for what he had done to his prized ram, and he schemed how to get out of the situation. Anansi resorted to trickery as always.
Anansi went to sat under a tree to think of an escape plan when, all of a sudden, a nut fell and struck him on the head. He immediately had an idea.
First, Anansi took the dead ram and tied the animal to the nut tree. Then he went to a spider and told the insect of a wonderful tree laden with nuts. The spider was delighted and immediately went to the tree.
Anansi then went to the king and told him that the spider had killed the prized ram. The ramm was hanging from a tree where the spider was spinning webs.
The king flew into a rage and demanded the death penalty for the spider. Then he thanked Anansi and offered him a great reward.
Anansi returned to the spider and warned the insect of the king's wrath, crying out to the whole world that the spider had killed his precious ram. The spider was very confused. Then Anansi told the spider to go to the king and plead for mercy, and perhaps the insect's life would be spared.
Meanwhile, the king had gone home for lunch and told his wife what happened. The wife just laughed and said, "Have you lost your mind? How on earth a little spider make a thread strong enough to hold a ram? How in the world could that little spider hoist the ram up there? Don't you know, Anansi obviously killed your ram! By now you should know, he is a trickster!"
The king was angry that he had been deceived and told his court to fetch Anansi immediately. When the king's men came for him, Anansi assumed that it was to bring him to the palace for his reward for turning in the spider. So he went along willingly. Anansi walked into the palace as if he owned the place and then said to the king, "Well, what is my reward for the killer of your ram?" This enraged the king so much that he kicked Anansi very, very hard, splitting him into 2 pieces; he was no longer a man but a spider with long legs.
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