The supreme being in the pantheon of the Ashanti is Nyame (also Nyankopon), the omniscient, omnipotent sky god. He and Asase Ya, his wife, have two children: Bia and Tano. Asase Yaa is an earth goddess of fertility.
The creator of the universe in Ashanti mythology is Odomankoma.
The Ashanti believe lower gods, more akin to spirits, assist humans on earth. Onyame was traditionally supposed to be aloof and away from the Earth. As the Ashanti adopted Christianity, they used the word Onyame for God.
Anansi the Spider is a folk hero who plays no role in Ashanti mythology. He is, however, prominent in Ashanti folktales where he is depicted as a trickster.
Famous quotes containing the word mythology:
“Love, love, love—all the wretched cant of it, masking egotism, lust, masochism, fantasy under a mythology of sentimental postures, a welter of self-induced miseries and joys, blinding and masking the essential personalities in the frozen gestures of courtship, in the kissing and the dating and the desire, the compliments and the quarrels which vivify its barrenness.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)