Nyikang

Half-divine founder of the Shilluk Kingdom (c. 1490 CE); son of the mortal king Okwa by the crocodile-river-goddess Nyakaya. Twin (or near-twin) of Duwat; defeated by him in succession crisis; migrated north along the Nile to found the Shilluk Kingdom at the Sobat-Nile confluence. The half-crocodile form inherited from his maternal line; the rain-mastery and Sun-defeat the divine-attributes that mark his demigod-status. Disappeared in a whirlwind rather than dying; his spirit continues to inhabit a wooden effigy and is invoked into each new Reth at coronation. Every Shilluk Reth from Dak (his son and immediate successor) through Reth Kwongo Dak Padiet (1993-present) is institutionally Nyikang for the duration of his reign — the longest continuous demigod-spirit-kingship in any human institutional tradition. Subject of James George Frazer's Golden Bough and David Graeber's 2011 HAU paper as the classical anthropological case-study of divine kingship.

Parentage

• paternal: Okwa
• maternal: Nyakaya

Children

• Anongo
• Bwor
• Cal
• Dak

Domains

• founder of the shilluk kingdom
• rain mastery and royal possession

Powers

• Control the rain
• Possess each reigning king
• Resurrect the slain
• Drive the sun back to the sky

Epithets

• the first reth latin · Nyikang · cultThe semi-divine founder-king and culture-hero, incarnate in every reigning Shilluk kingE. E. Evans-Pritchard, The Divine Kingship of the Shilluk (secondary)

Relations

• sibling: DuwatHofmayr (primary)
• sibling: GiloHalf-brother through shared father Okwa; founded the Anuak people through the canonical Shilluk-Anuak fission-narrative.pachodo.org Collo-history compilation; Encyclopedia.com Shilluk entry citing Evans-Pritchard 1948 (primary)
• lover: AkecMortal Thuro woman; mother of Dak.Hofmayr 1925 (primary)
• father of: DakHofmayr 1925 (primary)
• father of: Bworrootsofsouthsudan.org Balanda-Boor tradition; Hofmayr 1925 (primary)
• father of: CalHofmayr 1925; pachodo.org (primary)
• father of: AnongoHofmayr 1925; Howell 1944 (primary)
• foundational precursor to: every Shilluk Reth from Dak through Reth Kwongo Dak Padiet (1993-present) · ShillukShilluk royal genealogical tradition; Hofmayr; Seligman (primary)
• sibling: MiloReciprocal of shilluk_milo.sibling (alphabetical family sweep). (auto reciprocal)

Sources

• existence: Wilhelm Hofmayr Die Schilluk (1925, the seminal monograph); D. S. Oyler 1918; Diedrich 1912; Charles Seligman 1911 ethnographic study; James George Frazer The Golden Bough (1916, made the Shilluk installation-ritual famous); David Graeber "The divine kingship of the Shilluk" HAU Journal 2011 (primary)
• parentage: Hofmayr; Diedrich 1912 (primary)