Anansi Question

A quick question for the world -- I don't know if anyone knows the answer (which may be that "tiger" simply means something else) but in many of the African/West Indian "Anansi" stories, Anansi, the spider, fights or tricks the Tiger. (He did in the one I retold in American Gods, for example, which I think I adapted from one in a book of West African stories.)

I just did a search for Tiger Distribution -- http://www.discoverysoftware.co.uk/GalleryTiger.htm and there seems to be no overlap at all between places that Tigers are, and places that Anansi stories are told (Africa, the West Indies, the Southern United States).

Which seems very odd.

Anyone got any information on this that might make it less puzzling?

...

My friend Jon Singer is not actually a mad scientist, but he could certainly pass for one in the dusk with the light behind him. Proof for the doubting can be found at: http://www.livejournal.com/users/jonsinger/28807.html?#cutid1