Chiuta
Tumbuka · deity · primordial · Recorded classification
The self-existent creator and sky/rain god of the Tumbuka, an 'absentee' high god of the heavens whose name is glossed 'the great bow' and who is symbolised by the rainbow; also called Leza and Mulungu. Authored in the 'primordial' era as the cosmic, timeless creator. SOLITARY: Tumbuka theology gives him no parents, consort or divine offspring (he is self-existent), so no kin edge is asserted. In the highlands he was approached, and rain solicited from him, through the serpent-divinity Chikang'ombe (tumbuka_chikangombe); that is a cult relationship of medium-to-high-god, not a kinship, and is recorded in the domains/faculties rather than as a relation.
Domains
- creation
- sky
- rain
- thunder and lightning
- the rainbow
Powers
- Exists of himself and creates the world
- Sends and withholds the rain
Epithets
- Mulengi'The creator'.Molefi Kete Asante & Ama Mazama (eds.), Encyclopedia of African Religion (Sage, 2009), s.v. Chiuta (secondary)
- Mwenco'Owner of all things'.Molefi Kete Asante & Ama Mazama (eds.), Encyclopedia of African Religion (Sage, 2009), s.v. Chiuta (secondary)
- Wamtatakuya'The eternal'.Molefi Kete Asante & Ama Mazama (eds.), Encyclopedia of African Religion (Sage, 2009), s.v. Chiuta (secondary)
- Chiuta wa makoraUsed here for the gloss behind the name itself — 'the great bow', the rainbow-bow of the heavens. (Recorded as the meaning of the name in the reference literature; included as an epithet-gloss rather than over-claimed as a separate cult title.)Chiuta, Oxford Reference (Dictionary of African Mythology) (tertiary)
Sources
- existence: T. Cullen Young, Notes on the Customs and Folk-lore of the Tumbuka-Kamanga Peoples; and Notes on the History of the Tumbuka-Kamanga Peoples of the Northern Province of Nyasaland (1932) (secondary); Molefi Kete Asante & Ama Mazama (eds.), Encyclopedia of African Religion (Sage, 2009), s.v. Chiuta (secondary); Chiuta, Oxford Reference (Dictionary of African Mythology) (tertiary); Steven M. Friedson, Dancing Prophets: Musical Experience in Tumbuka Healing (Univ. of Chicago Press, 1996) (secondary)