Faifai
Mekeo · numen · Mekeo traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
The faifai are a named class of wild spirit-beings of the Mekeo cosmos, dwelling in the bush, rivers and other places beyond the ordered village. The same word denotes the spirit-powers a death-dealing sorcerer (ungaunga) commands, and in this sense the faifai are the agents through which lethal sorcery, the gift of A'aisa, takes effect. They are a collective category rather than a single individuated being, and Mekeo ethnography treats them as one of the principal kinds of spirit alongside the ghosts of the dead.
Domains
- bush and wilderness
- sorcery
Powers
- serves the death-dealing sorcerer as a familiar power
- inhabits bush, water and lonely places
Sources
- The faifai are a named class of wild bush and water spirit-beings that also denote the spirit-powers a Mekeo sorcerer commands.: Stephen, Michele. A'aisa's Gifts: A Study of Magic and the Self. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. (secondary); Hau'ofa, Epeli. Mekeo: Inequality and Ambivalence in a Village Society. Canberra: ANU Press, 1981. (secondary)