Seyfu Chenger is reckoned the most powerful of the zar spirits in the folk religion of the Gondar highlands, a martial and Christian-aligned being whose name is popularly linked to the sword. As the tutelary spirit of the noted early twentieth-century healer Malkam Ayyahou, he presided over her household pantheon, mounting devotees in the trembling gurri trance and exacting tribute of coffee, perfume, sacrifice and song in return for protection against lesser and hostile spirits. Michel Leiris, who documented the Gondar cult in 1932, records him as chief of the possessing zar.