The Jaguar's Wife
Apinajé · numen · Apinajé traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
The Jaguar's wife is the menacing counterpart to her generous husband in the Apinayé origin-of-fire myth. While the Jaguar treats the stranded boy kindly, his wife resents the human child and growls at him whenever her husband is away. The Jaguar coaches the boy in how to face her, but her hostility keeps the house perilous, and it is in flight from her, carrying off the fire, that the boy finally returns to his people. She belongs to the recurring Jê figure of the dangerous female at the hearth of the fire-owner.
Domains
- hostility
Powers
- threatens the fostered boy
Relations
- spouse: Jaguar (Rop)Wife of the fire-owning Jaguar.Curt Nimuendajú, The Apinayé (1939), origin-of-fire myth. (primary)
- enemy: The Fire-BringerMenaces the fostered boy, whose escape with fire is provoked by her hostility.Curt Nimuendajú, The Apinayé (1939), origin-of-fire myth. (primary)
Sources
- The Jaguar's wife is hostile to the human boy her husband fosters, and her enmity precipitates the theft of fire.: Curt Nimuendajú, The Apinayé (1939), origin-of-fire myth. (primary); Claude Lévi-Strauss, The Raw and the Cooked: Mythologiques I (1969). (secondary)