Self-Begetting Creator God
Fang · deity · primordial · Recorded classification
In Bwiti and some Fang accounts the creator is Mebege; in others the creator/trinity is named Nzame. The names overlap and the divine principle is often spoken of as a triad (see Nzame, Mebere, Nkwa). Typed deity (creator).
Domains
- creation
- sky
Powers
- forms the cosmic egg from parts of his own body
Epithets
- Zame ye Mebege Zame, son of Mebege (firstborn of the creator)Fernandez, Bwiti (1982) (secondary)
Relations
- ancestor of: Supreme Creator of the Threefold GodheadIn Bwiti and some Fang accounts the self-begetting creator Mebege is the source from whom Nzame proceeds; Nzame already registers descent from Mebege, mirrored here as ancestor-of to preserve the deity tier. The two names overlap across recensions.Fernandez, J. W., 'Bwiti: An Ethnography of the Religious Imagination in Africa' (1982); Trilles, H., 'Les Pygmées de la forêt équatoriale' (1932) (secondary)
Sources
- Mebege is the Fang creator god who, alone over the primal waters with the spider Dibobia, made a cosmic egg from parts of his own body and from it produced the first beings.: Fernandez, James W. Bwiti: An Ethnography of the Religious Imagination in Africa. Princeton, 1982, pp. 321-330. (secondary); Tessmann, Günter. Die Pangwe. Berlin, 1913, vol. 2. (primary)