Supreme Being
Selk'nam · deity · mythic primordial · Recorded classification
Male supreme being, deity-class. His name was rarely spoken; he was addressed indirectly. Documented by the missionary-ethnographer Martin Gusinde and later by Anne Chapman, who recorded the last Selk'nam chants from Lola Kiepja.
Domains
- supreme creator being
- moral order
Powers
- uphold the moral order from beyond the sky
- sends the culture-hero Kenos to order the unfinished world
Epithets
- Temáukel The supreme, eternal, uncreated being “up there,” to whom no image is madeMartin Gusinde, Die Feuerland-Indianer (secondary)
Relations
- ally: First AncestorReciprocal of selknam_kenos.ally — Temaukel's deputy: the supreme being sent Kenos to order the primordial world and give the Selk'nam their law.Martin Gusinde, Die Feuerland-Indianer I: Die Selk'nam (1931) (secondary)
Sources
- Temáukel is the Selk'nam (and Haush) supreme being, a sky-dwelling creator who existed before the world, is incorporeal and distant, and is the only figure they regard as a true god.: Gusinde, Martin. Die Feuerland-Indianer, Band I: Die Selk'nam, 1931. (secondary); Chapman, Anne. Drama and Power in a Hunting Society: The Selk'nam of Tierra del Fuego, 1982. (secondary)