Mountain-Person Bear
Nivkh · demigod · mythic age · Recorded classification
Culture-hero/mediator tier (classed as demigod: a sacred animal-person, not a free deity). Chxyf is the Nivkh word for bear. The bear festival is the keystone of Nivkh religion; the festival bear is treated as honored kin and as the envoy of Pal-yz'.
Parentage
- parent: Master of the Mountain
Domains
- mediation with spirits
- the bear festival
Powers
- carries the people's gifts and message back to the mountain god
- secures continued game and luck in exchange for honor
Relations
- companion: Master of the MountainBears are the mountain people of Pal-yz'; the festival bear is feasted and sent home as envoy to the Mountain Master.Black, 'The Nivkh (Gilyak) of Sakhalin and the Lower Amur', Arctic Anthropology 10:1 (1973) (secondary)
Sources
- In Nivkh cosmology the bear is a mountain-person and messenger of the mountain god Pal-yz'; the bear festival rears and ceremonially sends a bear back to the mountain spirits to renew game and luck.: Lev Shternberg, The Social Organization of the Gilyak, ed. Bruce Grant, 1999 (secondary); Cambridge, Business History Review, 'The Nivkh People's Sustainable Bear Hunting Enterprise, 17th–20th Centuries' (secondary)