Tsui-Goab, a benevolent sky and rain power, Gaunab, his adversary associated with death and misfortune, and Heitsi-Eibib, a trickster hero whose cairns of stones travellers still add to, are the central powers of Khoikhoi religion in southern Africa. The Khoikhoi are pastoralist peoples distinct from the hunter gatherer San, though the two are often conflated under the term Khoisan. Surviving knowledge comes largely from seventeenth century Dutch colonial accounts, since Khoikhoi society was severely disrupted by colonisation from the 1650s onward.
Facts
Structure
Structure of the PantheonTwo divine families or camps held in tension with each other 1 Divine HeadshipNo sovereign; the gods act as peers 1 Succession Between Divine GenerationsOne divine generation; no succession between generations is recorded 1 Organisation
Membership of the PantheonA fixed roster, named and counted 1 How Mortals Enter the PantheonAncestors and founders become objects of cult 1 Attestation
Era of AttestationDocumented in the outside record from the 17th century, when Dutch settlement began at the Cape, and described at length in the 19th; held by its custodians to be far older 1 Veneration TodayHistorically attested; no continuous cult 1 Cult
Principal Cult CentreNo single centre. The cairns held to be the graves of Heitsi-Eibib stand across Namaqualand and the Cape, and passers by still add a stone 1 Sources
Primary SourceAccounts recorded by European travellers and missionaries from the 17th century onward, and the compilation published by Theophilus Hahn in 1881, whose interpretations later scholars have disputed 1 Connections
Associated With
This source names Africa directly: "of Khoikhoi religion in southern Africa."
Source Encyclopedia of ReligionMircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.)
Namibia holds the largest surviving Khoikhoi population, chiefly the Nama, alongside the broader Khoikhoi presence across southern Africa.
Source Encyclopedia of ReligionMircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.)
Originated In
Source Khoikhoi (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. Encyclopedia of Religion
Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), Macmillan Reference, 2005View the Source Khoikhoi (Wikipedia)
Originated In: Southern Africa, LeadQuote, Originated In: Southern Africa, Lead
Khoikhoi or Khoekhoe (/ˈkɔɪkɔɪ/ KOY-koy) are the traditionally nomadic pastoralist indigenous population of Southern Africa.
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