Bomai is the innermost sacred name of the great god of Mer, the power worshipped publicly as Malo. In one tradition Bomai arrived at the island first and took the shape of an octopus; caught by a fishing woman and brought to land, he was later joined by his sister's son Malo, and the two were fused into a single divinity who taught the Meriam the drum, the dance and the ritual law. So closely guarded was the name Bomai that its utterance was restricted to fully initiated men of the cult, and in ordinary speech the god was always addressed as Malo. Because of this concealment the records of the Cambridge Expedition preserve the two names in shifting relation, sometimes as one being, sometimes as kinsmen who became indistinguishable.