Tatei Niwetsika
Huichol · deity · mythic · Recorded classification
Tatéi Niwetsika, 'Our Mother Corn,' is the Huichol maize-mother, one of the great 'Our Mothers' and a central figure of the maize-deer-peyote complex around which Wixárika ceremonial life turns. In the classic myth her five daughters, the corn-maidens, are the white, red, yellow, spotted and blue varieties of maize; a poor mother receives them as brides for her son, but when they are set to the hard labour of grinding they weep and depart, teaching that the corn must be treated tenderly and honoured with ritual. She is celebrated above all at the festival of the new maize and squash, and her cultivation binds men and women together in the reproduction of Huichol life and knowledge.
Domains
- maize
- sustenance agriculture
Powers
- to be the living maize that feeds the people
- to wither if her corn-daughters are treated harshly
Sources
- Tatéi Niwetsika, 'Our Mother Corn,' is the Huichol maize goddess and ancestral mother of the five corn-maidens who embody the coloured varieties of maize.: Zingg, Robert M., The Huichols: Primitive Artists (1938) (secondary); Myerhoff, Barbara G., Peyote Hunt: The Sacred Journey of the Huichol Indians (1974) (secondary)