Formed From White Corn

First Man, Altse Hastiin, is described in Navajo emergence narratives as having been formed from an ear of white corn by the Holy People at the beginning of the tradition's cosmology, appearing together with First Woman, formed from yellow corn, at the close of the underworlds and the beginning of the ascent through the sequence of worlds that leads eventually to this, the current Glittering World where the Dine now live.

Navajo cosmology describes this emergence as passing through several prior worlds, most commonly counted as four, each ended by conflict or disorder that forces the people upward into the next, and First Man plays a central organising role throughout this journey, frequently credited with establishing key elements of the created order once the people reach the present world, including aspects of ceremonial practice, the placement of the sacred mountains that bound Navajo traditional territory, and the naming of the days and seasons. His role as an organiser and namer of the created world's structure gives First Man a function closer to a culture hero and cosmic architect than to a distant, purely originating creator figure.