Kalala Ilunga

The civilizing founder hero-king of the Luba empire — Kalala Ilunga, 'Ilunga the warrior' — son of Mbidi Kiluwe and Bulanda, who, warned by the diviner Mijibu wa Kalenga, escapes Nkongolo's spear-pit, defeats and beheads his tyrant uncle, and inaugurates sacred kingship (bulopwe), founding the dynasty (popular chronology ~1585; Reefe, later 16th c.). Authored as a demigod (the half-divine prince-hero who founds the kingship); bulopwe is carried by descent (inheritability 'full'). era dynastic; lifecycle runs mythic (birth in the epic generation) → dynastic (foundation and death).

Parentage

• Mbidi Kiluwe
• Bulanda

Domains

• kingship
• war
• civilization and statecraft

Powers

• Inherits and inaugurates sacred kingship by descent
• Defeats and beheads the tyrant Nkongolo
• Founds the Luba empire

Epithets

• Ilunga the Warrior

Relations

• enemy: Nkongolo Mwamba
• ally: Mijibu wa Kalenga
• father: Mbidi Kiluwe
• mother: Bulanda

Sources

• Luc de Heusch, The Drunken King, or The Origin of the State (Indiana Univ. Press, 1982; Fr. Le roi ivre, 1972)
• Thomas Q. Reefe, The Rainbow and the Kings: A History of the Luba Empire to 1891 (Univ. of California Press, 1981)
• Harold Womersley, Legends and History of the Luba (1984)