First Ancestor

Male first ancestor and culture-hero; classed as demigod (a howenh, an ancestral being of the first age, ranking below the sole god Temáukel). The howenh later transformed into the sun, moon, winds, animals, and landscape features. Foregrounded as a culture-hero per the brief.

Domains

• creation and civilizing
• ancestry and origins

Powers

• mould the first ancestors from marsh earth
• lift up the sky to make room for the world

Epithets

• Kénos

Relations

• ally: Supreme Being

Sources

• Gusinde, Martin. Die Feuerland-Indianer, Band I: Die Selk'nam, 1931.
• Chapman, Anne. Drama and Power in a Hunting Society, 1982.