Elephant
Kaguru · numen · Kaguru traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
Elephant belongs to the recurring cast of Kaguru animal tales as the figure of vast size and strength paired with a lumbering slowness of mind. Where the Lion embodies dangerous, kingly force, the Elephant embodies mere massive power, and both are prone to being led by the nose by the quick-witted. In the moral world these stories build, the Elephant illustrates the Kaguru conviction that greatness of body is no guarantee of understanding, and that the small may master the large through insight rather than force.
Domains
- size and strength
Powers
- overbears others by sheer bulk
Sources
- Elephant figures in Kaguru folktales as the immense, strong but slow-witted animal whose bulk is offset by its gullibility.: T. O. Beidelman, Moral Imagination in Kaguru Modes of Thought (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986). (secondary); Alice Werner, Myths and Legends of the Bantu (London: George G. Harrap, 1933). (secondary)