Tyanaba, also Caanaba, is the great primordial serpent of the pastoral Fulɓe, at once guardian and ancestor of cattle. Born from an egg, the serpent is said to carry ninety-six scales answering to the sacred colour-combinations of cattle hide, binding it intimately to the herding life. In the cosmology it is the instrument of the unseen creator Geno, who acts upon the world through it. The myth, collected especially from the Massina of Mali, tells how the multiplying herds were entrusted to the herder Ilo son of Yaladi, whom the serpent led down the Niger, so founding pastoral society; in the initiation recorded by Hampâté Bâ and Dieterlen the bush-spirit Koumen serves as the serpent's auxiliary. A localized cult of Tyanaba persists in Mali into the present day.