Mumbi Mukasa

Mumbi Mukasa is the celestial woman of the Bemba origin charter, said to have fallen from the sky with ears as large as an elephant's and to belong to the crocodile clan (Bena Ng'andu). As wife of Mukulumpe and mother of Katongo, Chiti, Nkole and Chilufya Mulenga, she is the ultimate ancestress through whom the matrilineal royal dynasty of the Chitimukulu claims descent and clan identity. Hinfelaar treats her as the female, heavenly pole of Bemba royal ideology.

Children

• Chilufya Mulenga
• Katongo
• Nkole

Domains

• royal matriliny

Powers

• to descend from the sky

Relations

• mother of: the Founding Paramount
• mother of: Nkole
• mother of: Katongo
• mother of: Chilufya Mulenga
• spouse: Mukulumpe
• subordinate to: the High God of Storm

Sources

• Andrew D. Roberts, A History of the Bemba: Political Growth and Change in North-eastern Zambia before 1900, Longman, 1973
• Hugo F. Hinfelaar, Bemba-speaking Women of Zambia in a Century of Religious Change (1892-1992), Brill, 1994