Wiu

Wiu is a spirit of war known throughout Nuerland and one of the named spirits of the air documented by Evans-Pritchard. It is associated with thunder, so that the Nuer say 'ce wiu mar' as an equivalent of 'ce nhial mar', 'it thundered', and it is particularly bound to the sacred spear of the Gaatgankir, the dominant clan of the Jikany tribes, being invoked with clan spear-names in war. The prophet Ngundeng Bong, who was born and grew up among the eastern Jikany, carried a baton (dang) that was sometimes called the dang of Wiu, the clan-divinity of the Jikany. Like the other divinities of the air, Wiu is understood as one of the children of God, a partial manifestation of Kwoth.

Parentage

• parent: Kwoth

Domains

• war
• thunder
• sky

Powers

• to manifest in thunder and lightning
• to give success in war to those who invoke it

Relations

• subordinate to: KwothWiu is one of the spirits of the air, the gaat kwoth or 'children of God', and is therefore a lesser refraction of Kwoth, the one Spirit of the sky.E. E. Evans-Pritchard, 'The Nuer Conception of Spirit in Its Relation to the Social Order', American Anthropologist 55(2), 1953, pp. 201-214. (secondary)

Sources

• Wiu is a Nuer spirit of war associated with thunder and with the sacred spear of the Gaatgankir, the dominant clan of the Jikany tribes.: E. E. Evans-Pritchard, Nuer Religion, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1956, ch. II, 'The Spirits of the Above'. (secondary); Douglas H. Johnson, Nuer Prophets: A History of Prophecy from the Upper Nile in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994. (secondary)