Northern Japanese Aborigines, the Ainu, believed dreams to be the manifestation of their deceased ancestors or various spirit deities.

In the (Judeo-Christian) Bible, the first dream is described in the Old Testament in the Book of Genesis (20:3)

"God came to Abimelech in a dream by night and said to him to Behold! Thou aret but a dead man, for the woman thou hast taken is another man's wife."