Boiuna (translated as "Black Snake") is a mythological creature in

Brazilian mythology Brazilian mythology is a rich and diverse part of Brazilian folklore with cultural elements, comprising folk tales, traditions, characters, and beliefs. The category is representative of Brazil’s greater culture, being a melting pot of Iberic ...

. It is also known as the Cobra-Grande (translated as "Large Serpent") and the Mboiaçu.

Mythology

The Boiuna is a nocturnal black

snake Snakes are elongated limbless reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (). Cladistically squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales much like other members of the group. Many species of snakes have s ...

creature which is the most powerful creature of the rivers within the

Amazon rainforest The Amazon rainforest, also called the Amazon jungle or Amazonia, is a Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests, moist broadleaf tropical rainforest in the Amazon biome that covers most of the Amazon basin of South America. This basin ...

. It can take on various shapes in order to frighten away any

fishermen A fisherman or fisher is someone who captures fish and other animals from a body of water, or gathers shellfish. Worldwide, there are about 38 million commercial and subsistence fishers and fish farmers. Fishermen may be professional or recr ...

that enter its territory. Some of the forms the Boiuna can take on are a canoe, a sailboat and a woman.

In popular culture

* The Boiuna appears in '' The River''. Initially, it was portrayed as an uncharted stretch of the Amazon river that curves through the jungle like a snake's coils, and it's home to all manners of paranormal occurrences: "The further we go up the Boiuna, the further the laws of physics breaks down" as one character states. Later, it is revealed that the Boiuna is actually the evil life force of the river itself, and the series ends with the very river changing shape to prevent the characters from leaving, trapping them in the jungle for all eternity. * The Boiuna also appears in ''

AdventureQuest Worlds ''AdventureQuest Worlds'' is a browser-based massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) released by Artix Entertainment in 2008. Synopsis The player character, referred to as 'the Hero', arrives in the midst of a war pitting the fo ...

''. This version of the Boiuna is a recolored version of Snake. It is among the creatures that attack Terra da Festa before the Carnaval Party.

References

External links

Boiuna
at Itanheim Virtual Brazilian legendary creatures Fictional snakes Legendary serpents Indigenous Amazonian legendary creatures Water spirits {{Brazil-myth-stub