Maxa'xâk (the Great Horned Serpent)
Lenape · deity · Lenape traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
Maxa'xâk, the Great Horned Serpent, is a powerful and dangerous water being in Lenape tradition, an underwater serpent bearing horns who lurks in deep lakes and devours the unwary. He personifies the chaotic and hostile powers of the waters, and the Thunder Beings are charged by the Creator with protecting people against him and his kind. In the recorded creation narrative he contends with the Great Toad, the appointed keeper of the waters, for mastery over them; their battle ends in mutual destruction and unleashes a great flood upon the young earth. Parts of his body, such as his horns or scales, were regarded as sources of extraordinary medicine power.
Domains
- lakes and deep water
- storms and chaos
Powers
- to lurk beneath the water and devour those who venture near
- to stir the waters into destructive floods and storms
Relations
- enemy: Kichichaxkal (the Great Toad, Keeper of the Waters)The horned serpent and the Great Toad fought bitterly over which of them would rule the waters of the earth, a struggle that in the creation narrative loosed a world-flood.Robert Red Hawk Ruth (Chief), The Lenape Creation Story, Delaware Tribe of Indians (recorded oral narrative) (primary)
Sources
- Maxa'xâk is the Lenape Great Horned Serpent, a malevolent underwater manitou of the lakes and rivers, opposed by the Thunder Beings and, in the creation account, by the Great Toad.: M. R. Harrington, Religion and Ceremonies of the Lenape, Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, 1921 (secondary); John Bierhorst, Mythology of the Lenape: Guide and Texts, University of Arizona Press, 1995 (secondary); Herbert C. Kraft, The Lenape-Delaware Indian Heritage: 10,000 B.C. to A.D. 2000, Lenape Books, 2001 (secondary)