Matavilya
Matavilya, also spelled Matavilye, is the first-born creator of Mohave cosmogony, son of the primordial Sky and Earth. Born where sky met earth, he led the first people to the origin place in the Mohave Valley and raised the Great Dark House at Avikwame, Spirit Mountain, where he began to order the world and institute custom. Having given offense, in most tellings an improper gesture toward his daughter Frog, he was bewitched by her: she seized his bodily leavings and worked sickness upon him, and he weakened and died, the first being to do so. His death established mortality and the cremation rite, and the ordering of the world then passed to his younger brother Mastamho. Sources differ on the exact offense and on whether Frog acted alone.
Parentage
Children
Domains
- creation
- death
- mortuary rites
Powers
- institutes the first customs
- dies the first death
Epithets
- the first-born — eldest creator, first to come into beingJohn G. Bourke, Journal of American Folklore 2, no. 6 (1889): 169-189. (primary)
Relations
- sibling: MastamhoA. L. Kroeber, Handbook of the Indians of California, BAE Bulletin 78 (1925), pp. 770-771. (secondary)
- enemy: FrogHis daughter Frog bewitches and kills him.A. L. Kroeber, Handbook of the Indians of California, BAE Bulletin 78 (1925), pp. 770-771. (secondary)
Sources
- Matavilya is the first-born creator of Mohave cosmogony, son of Sky and Earth, who leads the first people and raises the Great Dark House at Avikwame.: John G. Bourke, 'Notes on the Cosmogony and Theogony of the Mojave Indians of the Rio Colorado, Arizona,' Journal of American Folklore 2, no. 6 (1889): 169-189. (primary); A. L. Kroeber, Handbook of the Indians of California, BAE Bulletin 78 (1925), 'The Mohave,' pp. 770-771. (secondary)
- Matavilya is bewitched by his daughter Frog and dies the first death, and his cremation founds the Mohave mortuary rite.: A. L. Kroeber, Handbook of the Indians of California, BAE Bulletin 78 (1925), pp. 749-751, 770-771. (secondary)