Oa-Laea

Oa-Laea is one of the individually named heroes of the Elema clan myths (lou-oharo) of Orokolo Bay on the Papuan Gulf. His story was recorded in the Toaripi language by the missionary-linguist Herbert A. Brown, who published it as a monograph in 1977 and again, translated and annotated, in Three Elema Myths (1988). The name is built on the Eleman word oa, 'man', a formula also seen in other Papuan Gulf hero names. The Legend of Oa-Laea was sufficiently emblematic of Elema tradition to be depicted on a Papua New Guinea postage stamp series devoted to Elema myths in the 1970s.

Domains

• clan origins

Powers

• to perform the ancestral deeds from which his clan's customs and claims derive

Sources

• H.A. Brown, Oa-Laea: A Myth of the Orokolo People (Clan Myths of the Elema, Gulf of Papua, vol. 2), Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies, Port Moresby, 1977
• H.A. Brown, Three Elema Myths: Recorded in Toaripi, Translated and Annotated, Pacific Linguistics D-80, Australian National University, Canberra, 1988