Ngeti Gunzy
Ngeti Gunzy is the supreme sky deity of the Nuosu, a subgroup of the Yi of the Liangshan mountains in Sichuan and Yunnan. In the Hnewo Teyy (Book of Origins) chanted by hereditary bimo priests, he stands at the apex of the cosmic genealogy: the world begins when sky and earth are parted, the heavenly bodies are set in place, and the celestial palace is established under his rule. He governs the deluge that all but extinguishes humankind, and his youngest daughter, Hnituo, descends to wed the sole flood survivor, an event whose disputed bride-wealth marks the lasting rupture between the prosperous gods of the sky and the poorer dwellers of earth. A celestial emissary of Ngeti Gunzy is remembered in the wrestling contest re-enacted at the Nuosu Torch Festival.
Children
Domains
- sky and heavens
- creation and cosmic order
- flood and deluge
Powers
- to separate the sky from the earth at the beginning of the world
- to send down the great flood upon the earth
Epithets
- Ngeti GunzyBender, Mark. "Co-Creations, Master Texts, and Monuments: Long Narrative Poems of Ethnic Minority Groups in China." CHINOPERL: Journal of Chinese Oral and Performing Literature 38, no. 2 (2019): 65-90. (secondary)
Sources
- Ngeti Gunzy is the sky god and creator of the Nuosu-Yi Book of Origins, who separates sky from earth, orders the genealogy of the heavens, looses the great flood, and fathers the daughter who weds the flood survivor.: Bender, Mark, Aku Wuwu, and Jjivot Zopqu, trans. The Nuosu Book of Origins: A Creation Epic from Southwest China. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2019. (secondary); Bamo Qubumo. "Traditional Nuosu Origin Narratives: A Case Study of Ritualized Epos in Bimo Incantation Scriptures." Oral Tradition 16, no. 2 (2001): 453-479. (secondary)