Mahsuri
Malay · mortal · Malay traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
Mahsuri is a maiden of the island of Langkawi, famed for her beauty, who is falsely accused of adultery and condemned to death. At her execution the ordinary weapons will not harm her, and when at last she is stabbed she bleeds white blood, vindicating her innocence before all who watch. With her dying breath she curses Langkawi to seven generations of barrenness and misfortune. The island's subsequent decline and its devastation in the Siamese wars are popularly ascribed to her curse, which local tradition holds to have lifted only in the twentieth century.
Domains
- wronged innocence curse
Powers
- bleed white blood
- curse with a dying breath
Sources
- Mahsuri is the maiden of Langkawi falsely accused of adultery who bleeds white blood at her execution and curses the island for seven generations.: R.O. Winstedt, A History of Malaya, JMBRAS 13(1) (1935); Langkawi oral tradition. (secondary)