Ane kalu
Kaluli · numen · Kaluli traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
The ane kalu are the spirits of the Kaluli dead, a class of being who inhabit the invisible world that overlays the forest of Mount Bosavi. Kindly disposed toward their surviving kin, they can be summoned by a spirit medium to find lost pigs, track game, diagnose the causes of sickness, and give counsel, and their voices are heard in the calls of forest birds understood as 'gone reflections'. The path of the newly dead is said to run westward along the Isawa River into their country, and it is with these amiable dead, rather than with any high god, that the living chiefly negotiate.
Domains
- death and the dead
- healing and assistance
Powers
- aids the living through a medium
Sources
- The ane kalu are the spirits of the dead in the unseen world, generally benevolent toward the living, who assist their kin and are consulted through spirit mediums.: Edward L. Schieffelin, The Sorrow of the Lonely and the Burning of the Dancers (1976). (secondary); 'Kaluli - Religion and Expressive Culture', Encyclopedia of World Cultures (everyculture.com). (secondary)