Katxekwyj

The Star-Woman is the culture-heroine of Canela horticulture. In the myth a young man gazes at a bright star and wishes it were his wife; the star takes pity, descends, and comes to him in the form of a woman, at first hidden as a small object before revealing her human shape. As his wife she leads the people to maize and to the yam, sweet potato, peanut, and gourd growing wild in the forest, and teaches them to clear gardens and plant, an art unknown in the age when the Canela ate only game and the pith of rotten wood. Sources agree in making her the source of cultivated food and, through it, of settled village life, though tellings differ on her final fate and on how much of the agricultural calendar descends from her instruction.

Domains

• agriculture
• stars

Powers

• descends from the sky as a woman
• reveals maize and the cultivated plants
• shifts between star and woman

Epithets

• Katxekwyj — Star-WomanCrocker 1990, The Canela (Eastern Timbira) I. (secondary)

Relations

• spouse: Star-Woman's HusbandShe marries the young man whose longing drew her down.Nimuendaju 1946, The Eastern Timbira, 'Mythology' (the Star myth). (primary)

Sources

• The Star-Woman descended from the sky, married a Canela man, and gave humankind maize and the other cultivated plants, founding horticulture.: Nimuendaju 1946, The Eastern Timbira, 'Mythology' (the Star; origin of cultivated plants). (primary); Crocker 1990, The Canela (Eastern Timbira) I. (secondary)