Abokurayan

Abokurayan is the male progenitor of the Amis in a widely reported strand of the origin tradition, in which a divine couple descend from the sky (in some tellings by way of an overseas island, Sanasai) and become the first ancestors. With his consort Taribrayan he produces so numerous a progeny that they must disperse and settle along the eastern coast of Taiwan, whence the Amis are descended. The northern Amis in particular trace themselves to such heavenly forebears, whereas some southern communities held instead that their ancestor was born from a stone; sources thus preserve more than one account of Amis beginnings.

Domains

• ancestry

Powers

• fathers the ancestral line of the Amis

Relations

• spouse: TaribrayanDivine consort with whom he peoples the world.Ami origin tradition of the descending progenitors; Joshua Project, 'Ami in Taiwan' people profile (secondary)

Sources

• In one Amis origin tradition the people descend from the god Abokurayan and the goddess Taribrayan, who bore so many children that they migrated to the east coast of Taiwan.: Ami origin tradition; Joshua Project, 'Ami in Taiwan' people profile (secondary); Mabuchi Toichi, 'The Aboriginal Peoples of Formosa' (1960), on Ami origin and migration traditions (secondary)