Juyá

Wayuu · deity · Wayuu traditional religion; continuing · deity

Juya (Wayuunaiki for 'rain') is, with his wife Pulowi, one of the two governing beings of Wayuu cosmology and a celebrated case in comparative mythology. He is the rain personified as a nomadic, hypermasculine hunter who roams the sky, descends to fertilise the arid Guajira, and is also a 'powerful killer'. Where Pulowi is fixed, subterranean and female and presides over drought, wind and the wild game, Juya is mobile, celestial and male and brings the life-giving wet season; Wayuu narrators set the two in a complementary opposition, and in some myths Juya's slaying of men repays a debt to Pulowi. He visits Pulowi in her many manifestations across the peninsula, making the pair both spouses and antagonists.

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