Hánuxa

Female lunar deity of the kína myth-cycle; impersonated by a mask in the ceremony alongside Lëm and Akáinix. SPOUSE VARIANT: sources conflict on her husband — the English Ser-Indígena passage makes her the wife of Lëm the Sun (wired here), while the Spanish Ser-Indígena / El Rompehielos tradition makes her (as 'Janusha') the wife of Akáinix the rainbow. The flood association follows Bridges, Uttermost Part of the Earth (1948). She is DISTINCT from the giant Hánnush, who is a separate being and is not authored here. Classed as a deity with no attested divine parent.

Domains

• moon
• tides
• the great flood

Powers

• flees into the sky and becomes the Moon
• governs / is associated with the rise and fall of the tides
• causes the great flood that drowned the land

Relations

• spouse: LëmReciprocal of yamana_lem.spouse. Wired per the English Ser-Indígena passage (Hánuxa wife of Lëm the Sun). VARIANT (sources conflict): the Spanish Ser-Indígena / El Rompehielos tradition makes Hánuxa (Janusha) the wife of Akáinix the rainbow rather than of Lëm — see this figure's notes.Ser Indígena, 'Mundo Espiritual — Yagán' (serindigena.org), English rendering: Hánuxa the Moon-woman as wife of Lëm the Sun. (secondary)

Sources

• Hánuxa is the Yámana Moon-woman: in the kína myth a leader of the women who, when the men killed the women, fled into the sky and became the Moon; she is associated with the tides and, per Bridges (1948), with the great flood.: Wilbert, Johannes (ed.). Folk Literature of the Yamana Indians (Gusinde's collection), 1977. (secondary); Bridges, E. Lucas. Uttermost Part of the Earth, 1948. (secondary); Gusinde, Martin. Die Feuerland-Indianer, Band II: Die Yamana, 1937; Hakai Magazine, 'The Man Who Became the Rainbow' (hakaimagazine.com); Ser Indígena, 'Mundo Espiritual — Yagán' (serindigena.org). (secondary)