Emoinu is a deity in South Asian Folk folklore, from Manipur (Ancient Kangleipak). Emoinu (also Imoinu, Emoinu Ahongbi, Ebendhou Emoinu) is a Meitei (Manipuri) household goddess associated with the hearth, kitchen, family welfare, domestic prosperity, and material resources. She is honored in an annual observance (Imoinu Iratpa) and appears in contemporary civic-cultural events such as the Emoinu Fish Fest.
Sources indicate Emoinu is a domestic benefactor deity within the Meitei religious-cultural world and is frequently associated with Leimarel Sidabi, sometimes regarded as an incarnation or representation of that earth/household goddess. Fragmentary secondary material mentions mythic elements (a narrative fragment referencing descent to earth and a drowning in a river), but these accounts are incomplete in the available sources and cannot be treated as a canonical, fully documented origin narrative.
Available sources do not supply a detailed canonical iconography. Popular secondary descriptions commonly portray her as an old woman or 'great-grandmother' figure, a reading that is reflected in many holiday and popular summaries and which corresponds to explanations of her name in English-language popular sources. More precise visual details are not supplied in the cited archival snippets.
Emoinu's functions in the sources are domestic and beneficent: she blesses households with wealth, peace, prosperity, and resources tied to hearth and kitchen. She is named as guardian of family life and household welfare. Some popular accounts also ascribe a witty personality to her, but core descriptions in academic and reference sources emphasize her role as a household guardian and provider rather than as a dangerous or adversarial force.
*Péh₂usōn (reconstructed)
Péh₂usōn is a hypothetical Proto‑Indo‑European pastoral guardian reconstructed by comparative scholars from parallels in Greek and Vedic traditions. Proposed as a Graeco‑Aryan ancestor‑figure, the reconstruction describes a protector of flocks, roads, and travellers rather than an attested historical cultic personality.
Abhimanyu
Abhimanyu is a youthful Kuru/Pandava warrior-hero in the Sanskrit epic Mahābhārata. Son of Arjuna and Subhadra, he is famed for entering the Chakravyuha battle formation on the thirteenth day of the Kurukshetra War and dying at age sixteen; his posthumous son Parikshit continues the Kuru line.
Achyuta
Achyuta (Sanskrit: अच्युत, acyuta) is primarily an epithet/theonym in Vaishnava Hindu tradition applied to Vishnu and Krishna, signifying the divine quality of being 'not fallen' — immutable, infallible, and imperishable. It functions as a devotional name in scripture, liturgy, and Pancharatra lists of divine emanations rather than as an autonomous folkloric spirit.
Acintya
Acintya is an Indonesian Hindu theological-symbolic representation of the ineffable supreme divine principle. In Balinese and Javanese practice it functions as a way to make ultimate reality present in ritual and art—often aniconically as an empty throne (padmasana) or anthropomorphically as a naked, flame-surrounded figure—rather than as a narrative, intervening deity.
Adi (asura)
Adi is attested in modern reference works as the name of an Asura who 'appears in the Matsya Purāṇa.' Beyond this single-line citation in secondary sources, no descriptive material about the figure is provided in the supplied research notes.
Adi Shakti
Adi Shakti (also Adi Parashakti, Mahadevi, Adya Shakti) is the primordial feminine power in Hindu/Shakta theology, regarded as the ultimate reality (Para Brahman) and the source from which all goddesses and gods manifest. She is both an impersonal cosmic principle (Mulaprakriti) and a focus of devotional invocation in temples, mantras, and pilgrimage sites such as Shakti Peethas.
Adi Vinayaka
Adi Vinayaka (Ādi Vināyaka; also called Nara Mukha Vinayaka) is a named iconographic and devotional form of the Hindu god Ganesha portraying the deity with a human head, described in sources as the form before the episode of decapitation by Shiva. It is rarely worshipped and appears in a small number of South Indian shrines and in devotional/musical repertoires.
Aditi
Aditi is a major Vedic goddess in Hindu tradition who personifies the boundless, infinite cosmic principle and functions as the maternal matrix from which many celestial deities (the Ādityas and other groups) are born. In the Vedic hymns she is invoked as a protective liberator who guards petitioners, provides wealth and safety, and frees devotees from hindrances such as sin and sickness.
Agastya
Agastya (also Agathiyar/Agasti) is a revered Vedic and later-period Indian rishi (sage) figure credited in textual traditions as an inspired seer, ascetic, teacher, culture-founder, and attributed author of Vedic, Puranic and Tamil works; in South Indian tradition he is associated with origins of Tamil grammar and Siddha medicine and is identified astronomically with the star Canopus.
Aghasura
Aghasura is an asura from the Vaishnava/Hindu narrative tradition (notably the Srimad‑Bhāgavatam) who, at the command of Kamsa, assumed the form of a vast serpent to ambush Kṛṣṇa and the cowherd boys in Vṛndāvana. The episode demonstrates Kṛṣṇa’s protective, divine power as he enters and destroys the demon from within.
Agiya Baital
The fire-form of the Vetala — a cremation ground spirit of UP and Bihar that manifests as a wandering flame rather than a corpse-inhabitor, leading night travellers off roads and into marshland or flames with a dancing fire that seems always just ahead.
Agneya / Āgneyī
Āgneyī (feminine) or Āgneya (masculine adjective) is a Vedic–Puranic divine figure and ritual principle tied to the fire-god Agni and the southeastern direction. In textual traditions she appears both as a personified daughter/shakti of Agni and as an adjectival/technical term applied to fire-consecrated things (direction, astra, etc.). She also occurs as the name Agneya (or Anala) among items revealed in a Shaiva-Agamic list associated with the Aghora face of Sadashiva.
All South Asian Folk entities →
Community Record
- [1]Imoinu - Wikipedia. Wikipedia entry 'Imoinu' (summary statements on domains and association with Leimarel Sidabi).wiki
- [2]Emoinu Fish Fest - Wikipedia. Wikipedia entry describing the Emoinu Fish Fest (names: Emoinu Nga Kumhei / Imoinu Nga Kummei) and its organization by Government of Manipur.wiki
- [3]Emoinu Ahongbi Tungnapham (catalog/archival entry). Archive.org catalog entry for 'Emoinu Ahongbi Tungnapham' (indicates textual traditions but content not quoted in excerpts).other
- [4]Laiyingthou Lairemmasinggee Waree Seengbul (catalog/archival entry). Archive.org catalog entry listing related Meitei deities alongside Emoinu (catalog metadata).other
- [5]Holy Man (catalog/archival entry). Archive.org catalog entry referenced in source set (catalog metadata indicative of material on Meitei religious figures).other
- [6]Imoinu Iratpa — Office Holidays (Manipur calendar). OfficeHolidays listing of Imoinu Iratpa as an annual observance; includes popular-language note that her name is often explained as meaning 'great-grandmother' in Meiteilon.other
- [7]State Manipur Holidays 2021 (Deskera blog summary). Popular summary noting Emoinu as goddess of wealth/prosperity and listing the regional holiday.other
- [8]How does Religion view Women? The Pre... (IJSR, 2022) — fragmentary. International Journal of Science and Research (IJSR) paper containing a fragmentary reference to a mythic episode involving Emoinu (descent and drowning) that is incomplete in the excerpt and therefore cannot be treated as a full canonical narrative.academic
- [9]Imoinu (hi) - Wikipedia (Hindi). Hindi Wikipedia entry for Imoinu included among the source set.wiki
- [10]Heinrich Böll Stiftung — Neglected history of a dwindling identity. Contextual commentary on Meitei cultural identity that references familial and identity aspects relevant to Emoinu's cultural role.other