Nkongolo Mwamba
Luba · deity · mythic · Recorded classification
The autochthonous 'red' tyrant-king of the Luba genesis epic and the first kingship — Nkongolo, 'the rainbow' (the red-skinned rainbow-python, master of the dry season), 'Muntu wa Malwa.' Brother of Bulanda and Mabela; maternal uncle and enemy of Kalala Ilunga, by whom he is defeated, beheaded and castrated. Authored as a deity in the cosmic register the charter gives him (a chthonic rainbow-serpent genius), not as a mere mortal. era mythic.
Domains
- kingship
- the rainbow
- drought and the dry season
- violence and bloodshed
Powers
- Embodies the red rainbow-serpent and rules the dry season
- Rules as a drunken, incestuous tyrant
- Diverts rivers to raise fortified islands
Epithets
- Muntu wa Malwa'Man of misfortune / woe' — the moral and physical monstrosity of the red tyrant.Luc de Heusch, The Drunken King (1982); Reefe, The Rainbow and the Kings (1981) (secondary)
- Nkongolo (the Rainbow)His very name is 'the rainbow' / the rainbow-python, master of the dry season.Luc de Heusch, The Drunken King, or The Origin of the State (1982) (secondary)
Relations
- sibling: BulandaBrother of Bulanda, one of the two sisters he gives (and lives incestuously with) — mother of Kalala Ilunga.Luc de Heusch, The Drunken King, or The Origin of the State (1982) (secondary)
- sibling: MabelaBrother of Mabela, the second sister married to Mbidi Kiluwe.Luc de Heusch, The Drunken King, or The Origin of the State (1982) (secondary)
- enemy: Kalala IlungaHis nephew and nemesis: Nkongolo plots to kill Kalala, is foiled by the diviner Mijibu wa Kalenga, and is finally defeated and beheaded by him.Luc de Heusch, The Drunken King (1982); Reefe, The Rainbow and the Kings (1981) (secondary)
Sources
- existence: Luc de Heusch, The Drunken King, or The Origin of the State (Indiana Univ. Press, 1982; Fr. Le roi ivre, 1972) (secondary); Thomas Q. Reefe, The Rainbow and the Kings: A History of the Luba Empire to 1891 (Univ. of California Press, 1981) (secondary); Harold Womersley, Legends and History of the Luba (UCLA African Studies Center, 1984) (secondary)