Orisha
The Orisha are the gods of the Wakandan Native Religion.
Four of the Orisha (Bast, Ptah, Sekhmet, and Thoth) have their origins in Ancient Egypt, suggesting a link between early Wakandans and Egypt. One theory which has been proposed by anthropologists at the University of Birnin Zana is that the ancestors of modern Wakandans were Nubians who left Kush amid the political upheaval of the late Bronze Age collapse, when Egyptian rule of Kush failed during the Third Intermediate Period.
Kokou is believed to be related to an 'undergod' in the Yoruba pantheon, which is also where the term Orisha originates.
Mujaji is believed to have her origins in the Lobedu people, who originated in Zimbabwe but now live in South Africa. Mujaji's common epiphet of Rain-Queen is also the title of the Queen of the Lobedu. It has been proposed that the name Mujaji may be a corruption of the Lobedu name Modjadji.
The final Orisha of the current pantheon is Hanuman. Despite sharing a name with the Hindu monkey god, he shares few of the Indian Hanuman's atributes. The name Hanuman is a relatively recent introduction; before the 1500s, he was known as Ghekre, believed to be a corruption of Gbekre, the God of Judgement in the Baule pantheon of Cote d'Ivore and Ghana. Some scholars have also connected him to the Ekang god Ngi.
Archeological record shows other Orisha have been worshipped in past times, including the Egyptian crocodile god Sobek, and a rain-goddess called Hadari-Yao who is believed to have been folded into the worship of Mujaji. The figure of Anansi appears in many Wakandan myths, but he is not worshipped as a god, and is regarded as a much more sinister figure than he appears most other depictions.
There is also a dead Orisha. Records suggest that the in ancient times, the Wakandans worshipped one primary deity, Nyami, a sky-father god, with minor 'intercessor' gods simiar to the Yoruba concept of Orisha. In what is believed to be a mythologised telling an actual religious conflict and natural disaster, Wakandan myth says that Nyami eventually became a tyrant, and stopped sending rain, so that the Wakandans would spend all their time worshipping him, rather than working their farms. Seeing the terrible famine that followed, the Orisha rose up and killed Nyami, saving the tribes and becoming the true gods of Wakanda.