The Clover of Tayava

Once upon a time there was a large, rolling promontory projecting itself into the open ocean. This wide landscape was home to a small tribe whose mythology revolved around the concept of Nature, for which there were four gods, representing the four elements of Nature: the god of earth, the god of wind, the god of fire and the god of water.

One day, the inhabitants of the tribe were searching for food and, stepping foot on clovers with three and, in rare circumstances, four leaves, a heavily skilled hunter and fisher, Tayava (ȴʚȷʚ̃ȵʚ, also spelled in Portuguese as Taiava), found a clover with five leaves—she regarded it as a sign of good luck, as nobody had ever found one such rarity.

Because the tribe also depended on leaves to eat—besides the animals they hunted for fish and meat—, the folks who were with her were indifferent to the five-leaf clover she found in the middle of the hill. As Tayava saw the newly-found five-leaf clover as sacred and the others saw it as food, a battle was fought to decide the clover's fate.

Tayava resorted to all four gods of Nature to save the five-leaf clover. The gods were rampageous over the decision to use this particular plant for food and, in what seemed to be a deluge, transformed Tayava's rivals into a giant lake to feed the clover. A whale was sent by the gods to help Tayava feed the clover and convince other creatures to save the sacred plant.

As such, they joined Tayava's effort to save this plant of rare breed and eventually adopted it as a symbol of their own. The gods reestablished the bright blue sky as a reward for having saved the five-leaf clover and the whale swam back to the ocean.

At the end of that day, at sunset, a ritual was accomplished which sacralised Tayava, thanking her for her precious gift to her tribe—the five-clover leaf was now regarded as the fifth god. The night was made of nothing but peace of mind—and so were all days and nights thereafter.

The five-leaf clover, with all its meaning, became a cultural icon so much that it became the symbol of Tamosa, being the sole element of its cultural flag.