Nyasaye

Nyasaye is the traditional faith of the peoples around the Winam Gulf of Lake Victoria in what is now western Kenya, and the word is the name of God among the Luo and the Gusii. The Luo, who moved into the region from about 1490, saw Nyasaye as the creator and called him Obong'o Nyakalaga, the one of a kind and all powerful. Neighbouring Luhya speakers used a similar word, though their high god was also called Wele.

Beside the high god, people traditionally honoured ancestral spirits and spirits tied to rain, healing and misfortune. Diviners mediated with the spirit world, and among the Luo it was the diviner who crowned a chief.