to visit this region, described to me a shrine which he saw about
twelve years ago, near Ingaw in Owerri District, where certain points
were even more naïvely depicted than by those erected in the present
day. Among the more noticeable groups were men in the act of copulating
with a sheep and antelope respectively. As regards the latter animal,
it is not without interest to recall that, according to several
accounts from well-informed sources, ancient Yoruba custom ordained
that, after the kill of his first antelope, a young hunter must have
connection with the still warm form. Possibly some such rule obtained,
or maybe even yet exists, in these regions.
The group of men and sheep seems to point to the existence of a like
custom among Ibo as one learns, on good authority, prevails among the
neighbouring Ijaw, with whom the chief feature of male initiatory rites
consists in each boy proving his manhood, before a circle of elders,
upon a specially selected sheep. Should he be unsuccessful, he must
wait until the following year and is prevented from marriage until
after having passed the test. From certain information it would appear
that one of the principal centres, where this rite is carried out, may
be found on a southern creek in the neighbourhood of Kula.[7] It was
naïvely added that the sheep ‘never go ’gree to this and always vex
too much’ when the rite was carried out. Later, a similar custom was
reported from among the Ekkpahians of Ahoada District.
It is true that every Ibo or Kalabari who mentioned the subject was
eager to state that Ekkpahians perform this rite ‘merely out of
badness; for no proper reason at all.’ Yet, though it is unfortunately
not permitted me to give a single name as authority, it would appear,
after very careful weighing of evidence, that the practice has been
exacted from time immemorial as a test of manhood. Both Ibo and
Kalabari also asserted that unnatural vice is extensively practised
among this people, though rare with other races of the Division; but it
is only just to state that the practice appears to be carried on not
for the purpose of sensual indulgence, but, in some cases at least,
from the idea, held among certain Australian tribes, that such customs
increase the race by magical means.
That the practice is not held in as great detestation throughout
Ekkpahian and neighbouring territory as among other tribes is proved
by the more or less casual manner in which the matter was mentioned as
well as from one or two Court cases. It will be enough to quote that
heard at Omokku on January 20th, 1913, in which Atoma of Erema charged
Okereke of Idu with indecent assault. In the course of her evidence
plaintiff stated on oath:
About three months ago accused came to my father’s house to
have connection with him. At that time I went to bed....
_Question by Court._ When he came to your house, where did he
stay with your father to have connection?
_Answer._ Outside the house.
_Question by Accused._ What date did I come to your house?
_Answer._ Orie day.
_Question by Court_ (_to father_). Was accused your friend?
_Answer._ No.
_Question by Court._ Did accused ever come to your house and
have connection with you at night?
_Answer._ Yes. He always come to my house and prosecutor saw
him.
Among Ekkpahians and the Abuan, as well as with the Western Ikwerri,
elaborate, two-storied buildings may be seen, upon which the wealth and
utmost resources of the town have been lavished, even to stained- and
patterned-glass for all the windows. My attention was drawn to these
buildings by a man high in the medical service of the Protectorate,
with the information that they were erected for the practice of
unnatural vices. This was later confirmed from native sources with
the addition that they were the homes of the Obukere Club and that
the customs were of religious significance. The fact that such habits
exist is, unfortunately, too well known to be worth mentioning, were
it not for a few words dropped by one of the chiefs and intended in
extenuation of the practice. ‘It is true,’ he said, ‘that the custom is
a very bad one; yet aged men tell us that it was taught in olden days
as a very great magic _whereby our flocks and herds might be multiplied
and made strong. Even, it is said, the crops in the farms are increased
thereby._’
The idea was confirmed by another chief who however insisted that it
was only a tradition from the olden time--held by dead men, very far
away--and he did not think that any such belief was prevalent nowadays.
He also added, cautiously, that this form of vice was far less indulged
in at present than was formerly the case.
The information fitted in with that already gleaned concerning the
supposed efficacy of phallic shrines set up amid the fields in order to
secure plentiful crops.
As a result, further information was sought concerning the cult of
Obukere, one of the most interesting of whose lodges was discovered at
Obelle Oduaha. An avenue, half a mile in length, every trunk of which
bore a sinister-looking smear of cam-wood dye, led to the house. At
the entrance to this grove it opens out into a cleared space, from the
centre of which springs a clump of trees smeared with deep bands of
red and hung round with white cloth. Behind these rises a giant ant
hill, while round their roots a mound of earth about five feet high
was piled. Amid the rich mould and fallen leaves stood votive pots and
bowls, among which bundles of young tombo palms just bursting from the
parent kernels, were to be seen, mostly enclosed in wrappings of broad
green leaves bound round with tie-tie. This clump of trees is regarded
as the abode of Obukere himself. Here members of his cult assemble to
carry out the rites. Before his dwelling-place the worshippers cover
their faces and, thus veiled or masked, go in procession through the
sacred grove--the tree trunks of which, down to the smallest sapling,
have been fresh smeared with the symbolic blood-red cam-wood. In these
regions Obukere is regarded as the great giver of fertility to all in
air, water or upon earth--fish, animals, plants or men.
[Illustration: FIG. 14. Obukere Club head-dresses]
[Illustration: FIG. 15. Sacred drum used to call together the Obukere
Club, Oduaha]
All lodges of this club as yet visited show a peculiar development in
the highly conventionalised animal head-dresses which are worn for
plays. In the Otu Obukele (house of Obukele or Obukere) a big shed made
of solid wooden posts, at the Abuan town of Okobaw, some head-dresses
of unusual type were found; among them representations of antelopes,
porcupines and the ‘increase of the Sky people,’ typifying the sky
world above that of men.
Round the lodge at Obelle Oduaha were seven phallic shrines six of
which were of the usual pillar type, while the seventh showed a
featureless head, arms and legs indicated in the roughest manner,
and only the distinctly feminine organs modelled with any care. The
position of these shrines in close proximity to the house of Obukere
worshipped with the avowed purpose of increasing fertility in man,
animals and crops, can hardly be regarded as without significance.
Within the house were two objects of interest--a xylophone in the shape
of a canoe manned by eight figures, stated by the chief to have been
specially designed to express ‘joy’ and raise feelings of pleasure
in those who behold them; and an object which strongly resembled the
Ajokko-Ji or king yam shown to us at Oppe, separated by the sacred
crocodile swamp from Alessa, and which will be more fully described
later on page 99.
The drum used at Oduaha to call together the members of the Obukere
Club was said to have been brought from Abua and to have been made
for the Sekapu Club, connected with the spirits of fish, crocodiles
and--in this part of the world--land beasts. It may be only a whim of
the carver that the figure of the woman, depicted with rounded body as
a sign of pregnancy, should be joined to that of the sacred crocodile.
Drums of similar type were later found among Abaw Ibo.
[Illustration: FIG. 16. Figure in Mbari House, Umoyo]
[Illustration: FIG. 18. Clay figure of Amade Onhia in an Ibo Mbari
house]
[Illustration: FIG. 17. Wrestling scene (’Mba) in shrine of Amade Onhia
and Ale. Shrine drummers on the right]
IV
MBARI HOUSES (_continued_)
In nearly all towns of importance in the Etche country, elaborate Mbari
shrines are to be found, built in honour of the Thunder God. In most,
just within the principal entrance, may be seen the seated figure of
the deity, white from head to foot, and bearing in the right hand a
sword, spear or bayonet, and in the left an imitation of one of the
old stone axe-heads, thought by natives to be thunder bolts, or one of
the long iron sceptre-rattles, or possibly another sword or dagger. By
his side sits his consort, to whom various names are given, most of
them apparently synonyms for the Earth Goddess Ale, Ala, Ana or Aja.
At Ibodo we were told by one informant that the figure represented
Ala--Bride of the Bladed Thunder. The more general Ibo idea as to her
identity was confided by the head priest, Achongwa by name, to chief G.
A. Yellow: ‘That,’ said he, ‘is Omu Ngwaw, wife of Amad’ongha.’
Omu Ngwaw is literally ‘the children (or young leaves) of the tombo
palm tree,’ _raphia vinifera_. Now, when a woman has given birth to a
first or second babe, the days which she spends in seclusion are often
called by the same name, while the word for fruitfulness itself, or
giving birth, is Omumu. The connection thought to exist in primitive
minds is the probable reason why young palm-leaves are in such evidence
before the shrines of all beneficent Jujus; the half-unfolded frond
stands as type and symbol of fruitful motherhood.
On floor and walls, serpents twine and twist; hippopotami hold men
half devoured in their mouths, leopards stand over new-slain goats,
elephants wave long trunks or fall to the guns of hunters, apes climb
or swing, and fabulous creatures disport themselves on every hand. A
clerk counts his money on a little table. Two wrestlers may be seen
locked in one another’s arms[8] and a native doctor anoints the womb
of a woman patient with a feather dipped in oil. In short, so far as
in them lies, the whole life-history of the people is here reproduced
with infinite pains and care. As in the Owerri Mbari houses, the
head-dresses of the women are most elaborately rendered, while the
modelling of a ram’s head and of one small monkey which sat devouring
a corn-cob were extraordinary samples of artistic skill. Again, a
peculiar feature of several of these were figures obviously modelled
with the intention of expressing the feeling of joy. It is probably
only a coincidence that so many of the figures of Ale show much
enlarged navels--the ὀμφάλος of the Earth Goddess.
In all these shrines the mural decoration is not painted, but applied
to the walls like a gigantic piece of Cloisonné--clay, tinted with
various dyes, being filled in between strips of raphia palm which serve
to outline the design exactly as does the brass edging the enamelled
leaves and flowers of the above-mentioned ware.
One of the most interesting of the temples visited lay some two and a
half miles off the main road near Ibodo and was approached first by a
narrow bush-path and later by a broad way over-arched by great trees,
the branches of which interlaced overhead to form a clear translucent
twilight even at noonday. As we passed beneath the fern-fringed,
orchid-decked boles, the sky was overcast and the sun already low in
the west, while the voice of the Thunder God might be heard in the
distance--a low, threatening note in the twilight.
When the village of Omako was reached and we approached the shrine, the
sun was just setting. Blue smoke rose from amid the strange figures,
over which flames flickered and danced from a little fire tended by an
old, old woman, who among such uncanny surroundings was quietly cooking
her evening meal. She was the ‘slave of the Juju’ who had sought his
protection as a refuge from oppression untold moons ago. Her whole life
is spent amid the weird figures which she guards and serves, lighting
fires during the rains that the soft clay may not be melted nor the
roof and wood-work rotted by damp and mould--though, strangely enough,
it is strictly forbidden to make the slightest attempt at repairing
when cracks appear in figure or wall, however much care was expended on
the building of the shrine.
So near to one another are the figures that the little sleeping mat
of the attendant could hardly find space to be stretched out in
between. Their eyes were set with fragments of looking-glass, which
twinkled and gleamed in the most life-like way, as the flames rose and
fell. How many years the gentle old slave, with her soft voice and
deprecatory gestures, had served the Juju, none could tell. She herself
seemed to have lost all memory of any other life; but the dim eyes
brightened at the gift of tobacco leaves and the gentle voice followed
us, still calling Ndeawo--the common word both for ‘thanks’ and for
‘greeting’--as we went away.
In every case which we have seen as yet, the Thunder God wears a
sharply pointed black beard. In many instances little rattles hang from
his neck or are attached to a spear or staff held in his hand, while a
cluster of bells is slung from a rope usually passing over the right
shoulder and resting on the left hip. In one place his feet were set
upon a curved bar of iron which had once been gaily painted and was
said to represent the rainbow. It is with the rattles that he produces
the roll of his thunder, while the bells strike together to form the
clash and bang of each separate peal. The type of figure was identical
with that of the so-called deified ancestor Njokko, seated at the top
of his sky ladder upon each rung of which ‘air people,’ _i.e._ birds,
were perched.
It is perhaps not without significance that, upon either hand of his
throne, two slender pillars the shape of an elongated torch and each
bearing a bird, are set.[9] These are small and vaguely modelled, but
it is possible that they once represented the eagles of Zeus--which,
among Ibibio, are still sacred to Obumo, the Thunderer.[10]
At Ibodo, on either side of the door of the central shrine--the ‘holy
of holies’ which only the priest can enter unscathed--we first noticed
the two strangely-shaped figures which are also to be seen guarding the
inner sanctuary of the Owerri Mbari houses. They were thus explained to
us:
‘These are the servants of Amad’ongha. Their names are Omogwa and
Otamelli. The first’--with spread tresses--‘is calling up the tempest
by striking on her mouth.’ (This action was later described, at another
shrine, as ‘cleaning her teeth with a bush stick!’) ‘The second is
about to loosen her hair which floats around her in the storm-wind
darkening all the earth’--a possible picturing of the rain-bearing
clouds.
Omogwa’s left hand is stretched out to warn intruders from
entering the chamber which she and her sister Alose are set to
guard, lest thereby the wrath of Amade Onhia should be drawn
down upon the trespasser.
In former days, when men had offended against the law of the
Juju, they were brought by the priests and shut up within the
shrine. Then, in the night time, came some fearful thing to
torture them to death, perhaps by beating, perhaps in other
ways. At any rate the body of the offender was always borne
forth at dawn and shown to the trembling people as a sign of
the fate which would overtake any who dared disobey the law of
the Thunder God or the commands of his priests.
[Illustration: FIG. 19. The Guardians of the Shrine, Omogwa and
Otamelli]
As already mentioned on page 20, this custom also prevailed among
the people of Owerri. Near the two Alose, on each side of the inner
entrance, are small holes in which offerings of kola are placed when
people come to ‘bless the shrine’ or ask for special favours.
In the neighbourhood of Ibodo and indeed all over the Etche country,
according to the testimony of chief Achongwa, it is customary before
cutting palm-nuts to offer sacrifice to some specially tall trees, one
of which will be found in every compound. These are named Amad’ongha’s
palms, because the people say that those, which reach very high,
are nearer to the deity. Men who neglect this rite find that their
palm-nuts do not produce much oil. Later, we found that the custom was
also practised by Aro and a row of the trees--here known as the palms
of Kamalo, the name given by this people to Amad’ongha--was shown us
in the compound of chief Ogunda at Azu-Miri near Nkarahia. In an Aro
compound at Ozoaba each tree had a tall palm-leaf tied against its
base, the top leaflets cut off straight and surmounted by a scarlet
parrot’s feather, an egg, etc.
At Ibodo, from the Thunderer’s shrine to the corner of the rest-house,
stretches a sacred grove beneath the shade of which native pots and
other offerings may be found. Here, during the dry season, a number
of small mats of plaited palm were seen, each bearing an offering
of goat’s flesh. It is perhaps worth mentioning that, among Ibibio,
curtains of plaited palm-leaf are hung before holy pools and groves
or round the trunks of sacred trees. The plaited part is said to
represent the rainbow, while the long fringe from the lower edge
typifies the rain itself.
In the grove at Ibodo beneath one of the trees, peeled, short-branched
wands--the symbol of lightning--were still standing, and we were told
that formerly many such had been set up in other spots. When these rods
decay, the power of the Thunder God is said to pass from them into the
nearest tree. Once drawn within the many-forked branches, the ‘mana’ of
Amad’ongha fades not with the fading of its first frail tenement, but
is drawn into the vegetation around, growing and spreading with each
new season’s boughs.
At the far end of the sacred grove stands a tree such as we had never
seen elsewhere, of which the crowded panicles of single petaled
flowers, deepest crimson in colour, swayed to and fro in the breeze
amid dark quivering leaves, or fell earthward in showers, like drops of
new drawn blood.
One night, at the beginning of the tornado season, we were sleeping
in the neighbouring rest-house, when a storm arose with the appalling
suddenness usual at this time of year. The wind tore at the frail
palm-leaf roofs, while rain lashed in through open window- and
door-frames, flash after flash was followed, with scarce an interval,
by crash and roar so deafening that for a long time all other sounds
were drowned in the awful tumult. As the storm began to pass away,
another sound made itself heard in the lengthening intervals. Each
lightning gleam was followed by a burst of trumpeting, as though the
followers of the storm god had come together undaunted by the force
of the tempest to hold a play in honour of their great deity. It
is impossible to give any idea of the impressiveness of this act of
worship. From out the impenetrable darkness, between long lines of
rain, like a sword from its scabbard leapt the dazzling flash. The
branches of the sacred grove moaned and swayed, bitumen dark against
this more than daylight brilliance; while, from beneath their shade or
from the neighbourhood of the shrine, each burst of flame was answered
by a blare of savage trumpets, the sound of which merged into the roll
of the sequent thunder.
So long as the storm lasted the strange music continued, broken now and
again by the cries of the terrified cattle, which rose in chorus from
countless byres and were hardly distinguishable at times from the rude
horns blown by their owners.
Save for the fact that the outer colonnade, which gives accommodation
to further groups of figures in Owerri Mbari houses, is absent,
wholly or in part, from many of the Etche shrines, the buildings are
practically identical in type. Many groups are to be found, save for
the smallest of details, exactly reproduced in each, and it is owned
that freedom of intercourse between the sexes is allowed in the cults
of both Ale and Amade Onhia at certain seasons, with the idea that this
will have the effect of increasing fruitfulness not only among the
human inhabitants of the town but also in farm and byre.
The connection between the two cults was indicated by a practice which
still obtains at Omo Chuku, a quarter of the town of Ibo near Okomoko
inhabited by Etche Ibo. The principal chief of the place, Ababua by
name, is also head priest of the Thunder God and, by the local law of
the cult, is only permitted to eat in a hut which stands by itself in
the middle of his compound. In this, all the dried yams and seed corn
are stored and there too is his Ajokko-Ji or king yam, here represented
by a basket filled with yams and skulls.
Each wife cooks in turn, and the one who has prepared the meal serves
it and is permitted to partake. Should the priest so will, son or
daughter may be invited to join in the repast; but none may do so
without special permission. The chief himself sits upon an elaborately
carved stool, but the others place themselves humbly upon the ground
or on small logs. The doorway is curtained by a fringe of young
palm-leaves which are never allowed to wither.
The son of chief Ababua, who accompanied us for some distance, stated
that his father might never eat of the new season’s yams for at least
two months after this was permitted to ordinary men. As chief priest of
Amad’ongha, Ababua was also obliged by ancient law to perform certain
ceremonies to his personal god as well as to the special protectors
among his ancestors--the shrines of which are placed just within the
threshold of his Obiri (reception room)--before allowing any portion of
the new season’s yams or corn to pass his lips. It was explained that,
by taking his food amid the seed set apart for planting, the priest
was thought to endow these with special fertility by the power of the
Thunderer whom he served.
Not far from the little dining hut, a small, highly decorated mud house
was to be seen, consisting of a dark inner chamber opening from an
outer porch-like one. The chief explained that this was the local Mbari
house and that they built it each year--making the mud walls gay with
shells and brightly coloured plates because their fathers had bidden
them do this in order to draw down prosperity upon their people. He
added, somewhat hastily, that no special rites were carried out and
that the structure got its name only because the word means ‘fine’
or ‘decorated’--probably from its decorations or, perhaps, from the
gay robes, beads and brass ornaments worn by the women when gathered
together there.
All round the compound the much-branched, peeled wands sacred to
Amad’ongha are to be seen. Beneath one of these, two pottery drums were
placed, one half embedded in the ground and one above. By the principal
shrine before the main entrance a curious adjunct was noticed. From a
sapling, cut so as to form a fork, hangs a large oval calabash. Between
the prongs a farm hoe is held, while beneath it two tortoises are
impaled. The explanation of this given by the chief was that one night
his god ordered them to be placed beside the shrine. The combination
of objects, taken in conjunction with the fact that this priest of the
Thunderer may only eat amid the seed corn and yams, suggests that this
is another of the many Jujus for augmenting the fertility of the farm.
It is not without significance that, beside that of Amade Onhia, the
only other shrine of importance in Omo Chuku is dedicated to Ale.
At Okehin, the Thunderer, instead of occupying a whole building, is
only given the front verandah of a house. At one end was to be seen the
figure of a mother with a new-born babe in her arms; at the other, a
group representing a corpse laid in the grave with a pot of offerings
beside it and a pet monkey watching at the foot by the seated figure of
a woman. The pot of offerings usually contains a small plate, knife,
pipe, tobacco, snuff and bottle of gin, rum or palm-wine. Between these
two groups representing birth and death stands the figure of a medicine
man, a magic horn in his right hand and a Juju knife in his left.
In niches cunningly contrived in the rear wall, or upon the low clay
ridge which separates the verandah from the road, carefully modelled
birds sit upon nests of interwoven twigs, containing eggs, tinted or
speckled in close imitation of nature. Small monkeys climb the pillars,
dogs mount guard, while the phallic serpent twines and twists between
all.
[Illustration: FIG. 20. Burial scene in Amade Onhia shrine, Okehin]
V
SKY GOD AND EARTH GODDESS