Tilafaiga
Tilafaiga is the mother of the warrior goddess Nafanua and is portrayed as a divine figure in Samoan mythology. She is one of the atua, the non‑human origin gods, and is associated with nurturing and protection. Tilafaiga is also noted as one of two sisters who brought the art of tattooing to Samoa.
↻ synthesized from 5 sources
When
Relationships
- co occurs with
- Saveasi'uleo, Tui Fiti, Nifoloa, Fetu, Ele'ele, Saveasi'uleo, Taema, Tagaloa, Mafui'e
- consort of
- Saveasi'uleo
- parent of
- Nafanua
- sibling of
- Taema
Mentioned by
Sources
Source passages
“Tilafaiga is the mother of Nafanua.”
#948 · extracted by claude-haiku-4-5-20251001
“Taema and her sister Tilafaiga are the Matriarchs of Samoan tatau. The sisters brought the art of tattooing to Samoa from Fiji. In a similar legend, Taema's sister Tilafaiga was the mother of the Samoan goddess of war, Nafanua”
#31444 · extracted by anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5
“In one tradition, Nafanua's mother was Tilafaiga the sister of Taema, the legendary conjoined twins, whom brought the malu tattoo to Samoa.”
#31450 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001
“According to a legend in Samoan mythology Tilafaiga was one of the twin sisters who brought the art of tatau (Samoan tattoo) to Samoa from Fiji.”
#31489 · extracted by deepseek/deepseek-chat
“Nafanua's mother is Tilafaiga, the sister of Taema another figure of Samoan mythology. One day Saveasiʻuleo met his twin nieces Tilafaiga and Taema swimming back to Samoa from Fiti where they had learned the art of tattooing. Saveasiʻuleo abducted Tilafaiga and she later gave birth to Nafanua”
#32236 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001