Felines

Ccoa

Variations: Cacya; Chokkechinchay, Choquechinchay

Ccoa

In the Peruvian Andes, certain protective spirits are known to live in the mountains. Apus are guardian deities of regions, while aukis are spirits of cultivation. Their mountain haciendas keep a number of livestock as well as other spirits that serve the apus and aukis. Condors are their chickens, and vicuñas are their llamas. The ccoa is their cat and is the most feared of those spirits. Its primary dwelling is the mountain Ausangate, near the village of Kauri in the Cuzco district. It is associated with (and perhaps identical to) Choquechinchay, the evening star and a constellation of a fierce puma with brilliant eyes.

The ccoa is a catlike creature 40 cm tall and 60 cm long, with a tail 30 cm in length and 3 cm wide. It is gray with black stripes running the length of its body. Its head is proportionally a bit larger than a cat’s, with phosphorescent eyes; often there is hail running out of its eyes and ears. Sometimes the ccoa appears as a catlike bull with eyes of blood.

During the rainy season the ccoa emerges from highland springs in the form of clouds. An active and angry spirit, it seeks to steal the crops before the harvest, destroying them with hail. Its tail sweeps the clouds, bringing storms, hail, and deadly lightning. It is unclear whether the ccoa acts on its own initiative or if it only follows the orders of its spirit masters, but either way it is treated as a malevolent threat that must be placated.

When it comes to interaction with the ccoa, there are two kinds of people: those who serve the ccoa and those who fight it. The rich serve the ccoa, as their fields are never harmed by hailstorms. The poor fight it, as their fields are destroyed by the ccoa and their families stricken with disease. The ccoa is also revered by sorcerers, as it grants them powers by striking them with lightning.

The ccoa can be placated with suitable offerings. These are usually a combination of materials including incense, wine, gold and silver tinsel, llama tallow, and cañihua and huairuro grains, collected and burned on high ground. Sorcerers in particular must be sure to make offerings to the ccoa in thanks for their gifted abilities. The ccoa is angered by unsatisfactory offerings by sorcerers, children dying before being baptized, and attempts to fight off its hail.

The souls of unbaptized children are duendes, and they are irredeemably malevolent. When children die before they are baptized, they must be taken to he hills and burned to ashes. If unbaptized children are buried, the ccoa will strike their burial place with lightning and take the duendes to Ausangate as servants.

Sometimes the ccoa is replaced entirely by Santiago, a more neutral deity who causes hail and lightning but also protects crops.

The ccoa may be a modern-day descendant of the ancient Chavín feline cult.

References

Bankes, G. (1977) Peru Before Pizarro. Phaidon, Oxford.

Cumes, C. and Valencia, R. (1995) Pachamama’s Children. Llewellyn Publications, St. Paul.

Harrison, R. (1989) Signs, Songs, and Memory in the Andes. University of Texas Press, Austin.

Mishkin, B. The Contemporary Quechua. In Steward, J. H. ed. (1946) Handbook of South American Indians v. 2: The Andean Civilizations. United States Government Printing Office, Washington.

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Cactus Cat

Variations: Cactifelinus inebrius (Cox), Felis spinobiblulosus (Tryon)

Cactus Cat

Cactus Cats once lived in the wide-open Southwestern deserts. They were once found in saguaro country between Prescott and Tucson and in the Sonoran Desert as far south as the cholla hills of Yucatan. Nowadays the species is practically extinct following the exploitation and destruction of its desert home.

A cactus cat has thorny hair, with especially long, rigid spines on its ears and tail. The tail is branched like a cactus with scattered thorny hair. There are sharp bony blades on the forearms above the forefeet.

Cactus cats use their forearm-blades to cut deep slanting slashes at the base of giant cacti. One of those cats will travel in a wide circular path, 80 chains long, slashing every cactus it sees. By the time it returns to the first cactus, the sap oozing from the cuts has fermented into mescal. The cactus cat laps this alcoholic brew up hungrily. By the end of the second circuit the cat is thoroughly drunk and waltzes off in a drunken stupor. It yowls and rasps its bone blades together, a sound which carries through the desert night.

It is this fondness for liquor that was the downfall of the species. By following a cactus cat around, one could collect the mescal and deprive the cat of its sustenance. This was not an activity without risk, however. Thieves caught in the act were flogged to death with the cat’s spiny tail, leaving red welts deceptively similar to the effects of heat rash.

References

Cox, W. T. (1910) Fearsome Creatures of the Lumberwoods with a Few Desert and Mountain Beasts. Judd and Detweiler, Washington D. C.

Tryon, H. H. (1939) Fearsome Critters. The Idlewild Press, Cornwall, NY.

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Nunda

Variations: Nundá, Eater of People

Nunda

The cat of Sultan Majnún was unusually fierce. One day it killed a calf, but the Sultan dismissed the event, stating that “the cat is mine, and the calf is also mine”. Then the cat proceeded to kill and eat a goat, then a cow, a donkey, a horse, and a camel, with the good Sultan shrugging each time. “I will not kill it, let it even eat a man”. Sure enough, the cat killed a human child next, and followed up with a man.

By this time the creature had grown large and monstrous on its diet of flesh, and it left the town on its own. It hid in the undergrowth outside city, and feasted on anyone who passed by, human or animal. At night, it would sneak into the dark roads and abduct hapless wanderers. Sultan Majnún still refused to see the danger. “You all want me to kill this cat. It’s my cat and everything it eats is mine”. He refused to address any more complaints, and the population of the town slowly dwindled. Anyone and anything not locked up indoors was at risk.

Eventually, it would come to pass that Sultan Majnún went out to look at the countryside with six of his sons, whereupon the cat pounced on them and killed three of the sons. It was then that Sultan Majnún finally came to his senses. “That is no longer my cat”, he said firmly. “That is a Nunda, and it will eat even me if I give it the chance”. He sent his soldiers to kill the nunda, but it killed some of them and scattered the rest.

Sultan Majnún’s seventh son, having heard of the carnage, swore a solemn oath that he would slay the nunda. “I shall find the nunda who killed my brothers”, he told his mother as he set out alone with a spear and a knife.

The young prince was nothing if not zealous. The first vaguely intimidating creature he ran into was a large dog, which he promptly killed and dragged home. “Mamá, wee, niulága nundá mla wátu“, he sang triumphantly. “O mother, I have killed the nunda, eater of people”. But his mother shook her head sadly and said “My son, this is not he, the nunda, eater of people. The nunda is much larger”.

So the son set out again, and successively killed a civet, a larger civet, a zebra, a giraffe, a rhinoceros, and an elephant, bringing each one back in turn only to be corrected by his mother. In time, he gathered a small group of followers, and managed to piece together a description of the nunda: it was elephant-sized or larger, had small ears, was broad and not long, had two blotches like a civet, and had a thick tail.

Finally, the youth’s efforts paid off, and the nunda was found asleep in the shade of a grove of trees. That was clearly the nunda, as it fit his mother’s description of it perfectly, and did not resemble anything else he had killed so far. He and his slaves fired their guns into the nunda at close range, but did not hang around for fear that it was still alive. Instead they slept through the night, and checked on it in the morning. The huge cat was undeniably dead.

The beast was dragged back to the city in triumph, and the prince sang of his victory, to which his mother chanted back “Mwanangu, ndiyeye nundá mla watu. My son, this is he, the nunda, eater of people”. The nunda’s carcass was buried, a house was built on top of it, and a guard was placed at the house.

This is but one tale of the insatiable nunda. It is another “swallowing monster”, and sometimes it swallows up the entire populace except for one hero. The hero kills the nunda and cuts it open, releasing the victims unharmed.

References

Steere, E. (1870) Swahili Tales. Bell & Daldy, London.