Watramama

Watramama (‘water mother’) is a river spirit of Suriname, also known in Guyana as Water Mama. Surinamese accounts picture a beautiful woman with long dark hair sitting on a riverbank combing it with a golden comb. In folk stories whoever takes the comb is haunted by dreams until she comes to reclaim it, and a person who outwits her may grow rich.

She is part of the Afro-Surinamese religion Winti, brought by enslaved West Africans, mainly Akan, Fon and Kongo, and she is a regional form of the West African water spirit Mami Wata. Scholars including Alex van Stipriaan have traced her creolisation over about three centuries in West Africa, Suriname and Europe.

This is a living faith, not only folklore. Winti was banned in Suriname from 1874 to 1971, and its priests have been formally recognised only recently, so this page describes the stories as cultural tradition with respect.

Folk tales also tell of girls lured into rivers who became Watramama, separated for ever from their families.

A woman or mermaid with long, straight black hair, often combing it on the riverbank; her golden comb is her signature.

Rivers, creeks and pools in the forest and coast of Suriname and Guyana.

Watramama features in Surinamese theatre, such as Edgar Cairo’s Het koninkrijk IJmond (1985), and in Winti ritual, which should be respected as a living religion.