What started fire?

Answer 1

Billy Joel keeps insisting that we didn't start the fire and it was always burning since the world was turning. Bruce Springsteen seems to think that Romeo and Juliet and Sampson and Delilah might have and then he changes his mind and decides its when he kisses his baby that...oooh fire! An old Cherokee legend says that at first there was no fire and the Earth was pretty chilly until Thunder from the world above sent down Lightning to put a fire in a hallow sycamore tree out on the island. The animals of the middle world could see the smoke created by this gift but did not know what to do so a counsel was convened and it was decided that Raven would be sent to bring back fire. Raven flew over to the island and upon landing on the hallow tree the fire engulfed him and singed him so that to this day Raven has black wings. Raven flew back to the counsel without any fire. Then the counsel sent Owl who even before landing on the tree was scorched by the fire and this is why Owls eyes are red to this day. After Snake had failed returning filled with smoke, the rest of the animals would not go for fear of what it might do to them. Finally Little Water Spider agreed to go and wove with her web a sack. She bounced across the water to the island and used the sack to scoop up a burning piece of coal and brought it back to the great counsel and the middle world has had fire ever since.

An old Maori legend, however, begs to differ. According to the Maori, it was Mahuika who was the mother of fire and her fingers were here children, fire. It was the trickster Maui who managed to one by one trick Mahuika out of her fingers in order to keep fire from remaining on Earth. In a rage and only one finger remaining, Mahuika took that finger and threw it into the forest and started a great fire while pursuing Maui. Maui, really scared now, prayed to Tawhiri-matea, (I know it seems like I'm making this up, but I'm not. Somebody else made this up.), the god of storms, to bring forth rain, and a great flood flowed down on the Earth. To save her last remaining child from perishing in the rain, Mahuika hid in the kaikomako tree where her only child slept and she perished. To this day fire can be awakened by rubbing two sticks together from the tee.

There are many more ancient myths that tell of the origin of fire from across the world and yet the world still anxiously awaits the "true" origin of who started fire from those wise and wistful sages Gronk and Ogg, who as of yet have not shared this remarkable and captivating tale of the origins of fire. This answer can only humbly offer the pittance of stories as the world awaits with fiery expectation for edification from Gronk and Ogg.