Master of the Mountain
Nivkh · deity · primordial · Recorded classification
Spirit-class master-of-the-mountain (classed as deity). 'Yz' (also yzng) is the Nivkh word for a master-spirit/god of a natural domain; pal = mountain. Documentation rests on Lev Shternberg's foundational Gilyak ethnography.
Children
Domains
- mountains and forest
- game animals
Powers
- sends forest game to the hunters who honor him
- keeps the bears as his mountain people and messengers
Epithets
- Pal Yz The Master of the Mountain; lord of the land, the forest, and its gameNivkh (Gilyak) ethnography; Lev Shternberg (secondary)
Relations
- companion: Mountain-Person BearReciprocal of nivkh_bear.companion — Bears 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
- Pal-yz' is the Nivkh master-spirit (yz) of the mountains and taiga, supplier of game, whose people are the bears returned to him through the bear festival.: Lev Shternberg, The Social Organization of the Gilyak, ed. Bruce Grant, 1999 (secondary); Wikipedia/eHRAF summaries of Nivkh religion drawing on Shternberg, on Pal-yz' and Tol-yz' (secondary)