* * * * *
_Superstitions._
The Negro tradition of the book and the calabash, cited by St. Pierre,
is familiar to every native of these parts, and seems the source of
their religious opinions. Impressed that the blind avarice of their
forefathers inclined all the favour of the supreme God to white men,
they believe themselves to have been committed to the mediating care of
subordinate deities, necessarily as inferior to the primary, as they are
to Europeans.
As the Ashantee manner of relating this tradition differs a little from
that of the Fantee, I will repeat it, on the authority of Odumata and
other principal men. In the beginning of the world, God created three
white and three black men, with the same number of women; he resolved,
that they might not afterwards complain, to give them their choice of
good and evil. A large box or calabash was set on the ground, with a
piece of paper, sealed up, on one side of it. God gave the black men the
first choice, who took the box, expecting it contained every thing, but,
on opening it, there appeared only a piece of gold, a piece of iron, and
several other metals, of which they did not know the use. The white men
opening the paper, it told them every thing. God left the blacks in the
bush, but conducted the whites to the water side, (for this happened in
Africa) communicated with them every night, and taught them to build a
small ship which carried them to another country, whence they returned
after a long period, with various merchandise to barter with the blacks,
who might have been the superior people.
With this imaginary alienation from the God of the universe, not a shade
of despondency is associated; they consider that it diminishes their
comforts and their endowments on earth, but that futurity is a dull and
torpid state to the majority of mankind.
Their fetishes or subordinate deities, are supposed to inhabit
particular rivers, woods, and mountains, as the imaginary deities of the
Celts. They are venerated in proportion as their predictions (always
equivocal) chance to be realized. The present favourite fetish of
Ashantee is that of the river Tando. Cobee, a river in Dankara, and
Odentee on the Adirree, are two of the others.
The kings, caboceers, and the higher class, are believed to dwell with
the superior Deity after death, enjoying an eternal renewal of the state
and luxury they possessed on earth. It is with this impression, that
they kill a certain number of both sexes at the funeral customs, to
accompany the deceased, to announce his distinction, and to administer
to his pleasures.
The spirits of the inferior classes are believed to inhabit the houses
of the fetish, in a state of torpid indolence, which recompenses them
for the drudgery of their lives, and which is truly congenial to the
feelings of the Negro. Those of superior wisdom and experience, are said
to be endued with foresight after death, and to be appointed to observe
the lives, and advise the good of those mortals who acknowledge the
fetish; their state corresponding, in short, with that of the first race
of men after death, as described by Hesiod. Those whose enormities
nullify the mediation of the funeral custom, or, whom neglect or
circumstances might have deprived of it, are doomed, in the imagination
of others, to haunt the gloom of the forest, stealing occasionally to
their former abodes in rare but lingering visits. Those who have
neglected the custom, or funeral rites of their family, are thought to
be accursed and troubled by their spirits.
There are two orders of fetishmen. The first class dwell with the
fetish,[77] who has a small round house, built generally at a distance
from the town. They question the oracle respecting the future fortune of
a state or an individual, convey its advice, and enjoin the attention of
the _audible_ spirits of those, any member of their family would
question respecting property or domestic circumstances:
“Auditur tumulo et vox reddita fertur ad aures.” Æn. vi.
The inferior class pursue their various occupations in society, assist
in customs and superstitious ceremonies, and are applied to as fortune
tellers or conjurors are in Europe; especially in cases of theft; when,
from a secret system of espionage, and a reluctance, frequently
amounting to a refusal to discover the culprit, or to do more than
replace the property whence it was taken, they are generally successful.
The magical ceremony consists in knotting, confusing, and dividing
behind the back, several strings and shreds of leather. They are also
frequently applied to by slippery wives, to work charms to keep their
husbands in ignorance of a projected intrigue, which they affect to do.
The primary dignity is hereditary in families, as the priesthood was in
Egypt, celibacy not being enjoined; their property is also hereditary,
and they possess other immunities. The latter order is frequently
augmented by those, who declare that the fetish has suddenly seized, or
come upon them, and who, after inflicting great severities on
themselves, in the manner of the convulsionists, are ultimately
acknowledged. The fetish women, generally preferred for medical aid, as
they possess a thorough knowledge of barks and herbs, deleterious and
sanative, closely resemble the second class of Druidesses as described,
I think by Mela: they seem licensed prostitutes, before and after
marriage.
The present state of these people referring them to a comparison with
the nations of ancient Europe,[78] the close resemblance of many points
of their superstition to relative particulars recorded of Greece and
Gaul, recalls the following reflection of an eminent writer. “The truth
is, there is hardly any thing more surprising in the history of mankind,
than the similitude, or rather identity, of the opinions, institutions,
and manners of all these orders of ancient priests, though they lived
under such different climates, and at so great a distance from one
another, without intercourse or communication. This amounts to a
demonstration, that all these opinions and institutions flowed
originally from one fountain.”
Half the offerings to the fetish, are pretended to be thrown into the
river, the other half belongs to the priests. The King’s offering is
generally ten ounces, and three or four slaves: that of a poor subject
about four ackies. Children are frequently vowed to the service of the
fetish before their birth. A slave flying to the temple, may dash or
devote himself to the fetish; but, by paying a fee of two ounces of gold
and four sheep, any person shuts the door of the fetish house against
all his run away slaves.[79]
Every family has a variety of domestic fetishes, furnished by the
priests, and answering to the Penates of the Romans; some are wooden
figures, others of arbitrary shapes and materials; they receive
offerings and libations at the yam custom, but are not brought out of
the house.[80]
In Ashantee there is not a common fetish day, as on the coast.[81]
Different families solemnize different days of the week, by wearing
white cloths, abstaining from palm wine and labour, as they do the day
of the week on which they were born, which is in fact their second
fetish day. The King’s family keep Tuesday as their fetish day.
Odumata’s, Friday. Saturday was the King’s birth day, when, as well as
on his fetish day, he always sat on a stool placed before his chair as a
foot stool would be. Some families never eat beef, others abstain from
pork. Fowls and beef are the fetish of the King’s family, and
consequently never eaten by it.
The Ashantees have their Fasti and Nefasti, or lucky and unlucky days,
as the Romans had.[82] The former consecrated by some good fortune, the
latter condemned from some national calamity, as Saturday, for instance,
from the defeat and death of Saï Tootoo. They are also otherwise marked
than by the week; for I was told, that our month of September contained
fewer bad days than any other, and was besides deemed auspicious to
travelling:
Ipsa dies alios alio dedit ordine Luna
Felices operum · · · ·
· · · · nona fugæ melior. Geor. I.
I have known Ashantees thirty days coming with dispatches from Cape
Coast Castle to Coomassie, in August; and in September, to have arrived
in twelve.
If the successor to a stool, or any rich inheritance is a child, they
grind aggry beads into a powder, and rub him with it daily, after
washing, believing that it hastens his growth and maturity. When any one
denies a theft, an aggry bead is placed in a small vessel, with some
water, the person holding it puts his right foot against the right foot
of the accused, who invokes the power of the bead to kill him if he is
guilty, and then takes it into his mouth with a little of the water, the
rest being thrown on the ground, and crossed as he repeats the
invocation: their superstition is generally superior to their
resolution. I shall be expected to notice these aggry beads.
The natives invariably declare that the aggry beads are found in the
Dankara, Akim, Warsaw, Ahanta, and Fantee countries, the greater number
in the former, being the richer in gold; they say they are directed to
dig for them by a spiral vapour issuing from the ground, and that they
rarely lay near the surface; the finder is said to be sure of a series
of good fortune. The plain aggry beads are blue, yellow, green, or a
dull red, the variegated consist of every colour and shade. The Fantees
prefer the plain yellow bead, the Amanaheäns the blue and yellow, for
which they will give double the weight in gold; those of inferior beauty
frequently fetch a large price, from having been worn by some royal or
eminent character. Dr. Leyden, who writes, “the aigris is a stone of a
greenish blue colour, supposed to be a species of jasper, small
perforated pieces of which, valued at their weight in gold, are used for
money,” (which I never heard of,) rather describes the popo bead; though
that is semi-transparent, (of a bright blue,) resembling carnelian,
(which is frequently found in these countries) and said to be obtained
in the same manner as the aggry bead. Isert writes, “they are a sort of
coral, with inlaid work: the art of making beads is entirely lost, or
was never known in these parts: it is not improbable, that in the golden
age of Egypt, she had communication with the Gold Coast; indeed, it has
been thought, and perhaps not without some reason, that the Gold Coast
is the Ophir of Solomon.”
The variegated strata of the aggry beads are so firmly united, and so
imperceptibly blended, that the perfection seems superior to art: some
resemble mosaic work, the surfaces of others are covered with flowers
and regular patterns, so very minute, and the shades so delicately
softened one into the other, and into the ground of the bead, that
nothing but the finest touch of the pencil could equal them. The
agatized parts disclose flowers and patterns, deep in the body of the
bead, and thin shafts, of opaque colours, running from the centre to the
surface. The natives pretend that imitations are made in the country,
which they call boiled beads, alleging that they are broken aggry beads
ground into powder, and boiled together, and that they know them because
they are heavier; but this I find to be mere conjecture among
themselves, unsupported by any thing like observation or discovery. The
natives believe that by burying the aggry beads in sand they not only
grow but breed.[83]
To return to the superstitions of the Ashantees: when they drink, they
spill a little of the liquor on the ground as an offering to the fetish;
and on rising from their chairs or stools, their attendants instantly
lay them on their sides, to prevent the devil (whom they represent to be
white) from slipping into their master’s places.
But the most surprising superstition of the Ashantees, is their
confidence in the fetishes or saphies they purchase so extravagantly
from the Moors, believing firmly that they make them invulnerable and
invincible in war, paralyse the hand of the enemy, shiver their weapons,
divert the course of balls, render both sexes prolific, and avert all
evils but sickness, (which they can only assuage,) and natural death.
The King gave to the King of Dagwumba, for the fetish or war coat of
Apokoo, the value of thirty slaves; for Odumata’s, twenty; for Adoo
Quamina’s, thirteen; for Akimpon’s, twelve; for Akimponteä’s, nine; and
for those of greater captains in proportion. The generals being always
in the rear of the army are pretty sure to escape, a circumstance much
in favour of the Moors. The drawing of Adoo Quamina will convey the best
idea of this dress, which has been described before, in our entrée; it
is so weighty that old Odumata could scarcely move in his. Jannequin,
who visited Mandingo in 1637, describes exactly the same sort of dress
as worn by the chiefs of that country, and adds, “their bodies are so
encumbered with these defences, that they are often unable to mount on
horseback without assistance.” For a small fetish of about six lines,
sewn in a case of red cloth, which the King presented to our Accra
linguist, Baba charged and received six ackies. The man valued the gift
highly; he had expended two pieces of cloth and a quantity of rum in
fetish, at Accra, before he joined the Mission; but for which, he told
me, he was convinced the Ashantees would have managed to poison him:
yet, he was one of the most sensible natives I ever conversed with. A
sheet of paper would support an inferior Moor in Coomassie for a month.
Several of the Ashantee captains offered seriously to let us fire at
them; in short, their confidence in these fetishes is almost as
incredible, as the despondency and panic imposed on their southern and
western enemies by the recollection of them: they impel the Ashantees,
fearless and headlong, to the most daring enterprises, they dispirit
their adversaries, almost to the neglect of an interposition of fortune
in their favour. The Ashantees believe that the constant prayers of the
Moors, who have persuaded them that they converse with the Deity,
invigorate themselves, and gradually waste the spirit and strength of
their enemies. This faith is not less impulsive than that which achieved
the Arabian conquests.
Neither the Ashantees or their neighbours have any tradition of a
deluge, nor does Catcott, the only writer I recollect to have read on
its universality, report any Negro tradition, though he submits that of
the American tribes, with those of the other nations of the world. The
Moors told me, that the waters of the deluge retired to, and were
absorbed in the lake Caudi or Caughi, which they also called Bahar
Noohoo, or the sea of Noah.
Amongst other observations, I recollect the Moors to have said, that
Moses spoke like God, that Abraham was the friend of God, that Jesus was
a spirit of God, but that Mahomet was the best beloved of God. They
added, that there were four books written by the inspiration of God, at
different times. Moses wrote Tauratoo; David, Zaboura; Jesus, Lingheel;
and Mahomet, Al Koran. Lightning, they said, was occasioned by God
waving his hand to direct the courses of his angels. One Moor was a
great etymologist; he told me, that Mahomet rushing between two armies,
who were fighting, exclaimed to one party, “Toorek! Toorek!” (leave off!
leave off!) and that those people were thenceforward called Turks. I
questioned them concerning the origin of nations; they told me, that
Japhet was the most active in covering the nakedness of his father,
which Ham discovered, and thence the subjection of black men the
descendants of Ham, to Europeans the descendants of Japhet. Shem, from
whom they were themselves descended, they said, was neither so good or
so bad as his brothers, and therefore his children enjoyed a medium of
endowment and favour. They augured from the sacrifice of sheep, with
which the King supplied them abundantly, and, excepting those who had
made a pilgrimage to Mecca, (of which they told us wonderful tales) did
not hesitate mingling the superstitions of the natives with their own,
either for their profit or safety. They were tolerably expert in slight
of hand tricks.
[Footnote 77: At Nanampong (Nanan means a grand-father) near Mankasim,
in the Braffoo country, there is a deep dell, inhabited by a number of
aged fetish men, whom the Fantees believe to be immortal, and to have
lived there beyond all memory, in close converse with the fetish, and
ignorant of the world but by intuition. The spirits of the aged and wise
are believed to dwell amongst them, and their prophecies and advice are
revered as emanations from the fetish. Adookoo, the chief of the
Braffoos, used sometimes to consult them in person, but generally
through his head fetishman, and the Fantees now attribute the successes
of the Ashantees, and their own defeats and misfortunes, to the
disregard of what the oracle enjoined; for, whilst it was obeyed, they
say the country always prospered; and, indeed, from the instances which
have been reported to me, the responses appear to have directed a just
and prudent policy, highly conducive to the welfare of Fantee. This dell
is so impervious, and yet so capacious, that many hundred Fantees were
secreted there, during the Ashantee invasions, which these priests had
predicted. The house or temple of the principal fetish of the Ahanta
country, called Checquoo, is at Apremmadoo, about four miles up the
Takaradee river: upwards of fifty superior priests are resident there.]
[Footnote 78: “And here I cannot but remark, that those accounts, when
compared, shew how little manners and minds improve in Africa, and how
long, and how much society has been there at a stand:—Jobson saw, in
1620, exactly what Park saw in 1798.” Sir W. Young.]
[Footnote 79: A slave dashing or devoting himself to Checquoo, the great
fetish of Ahanta, is never redeemed; the impression of the superior
power of that fetish being so awful, that the proprietor of the slave,
would believe the death of all his family inevitable, were he to redeem
him from the sanctuary.]
[Footnote 80: The different states of the water side revere different
animals as fetish: the hyæna is esteemed so at Accra, the alligator at
Dix Cove and Annamaboe, and vultures universally; and with more apparent
reason, as they consume all the offal of the neighbourhood, and thus
contribute to its health and cleanliness. A black man killing a hyæna at
Accra, would incur a serious penalty. A European is obliged to pay a
case of neat rum and one piece of white baft, in which the head of the
animal is wrapped, and afterwards buried by the natives. Almost every
resident on the coast, can speak to the imitative powers of the hyæna,
which Pliny has been ridiculed for reporting. In a fresh water pond at
Dix Cove, there is an alligator, about twelve feet long, which always
appears on the bank, at the call of the fetish men, who then throw it a
white fowl. In a modern natural history, I read, “in this part of the
world (Africa) also, as well as at Siam, the crocodile makes an object
of savage pomp, near the palaces of their monarchs. Philips informs us,
that at Sabi, on the slave coast, there are two pools of water near the
royal palace, where crocodiles are bred as we breed carp in our ponds in
Europe.” I never heard of any royal palaces, or of Sabi (probably
Assaboo) on the Slave Coast; the alligator of Dix Cove may possibly be
alluded to.]
[Footnote 81: Tuesday is the common fetish day on the coast, when they
neither fish or work in their plantations.]
[Footnote 82:
Ille et nefasto te posuit die. Hor. 12, 13.
Romani pariter quosdam atros et nefastos habuere, eo quod in iis clades
acceperant; · · ·]
[Footnote 83: The coloring matter of the blue beads has been proved, by
experiment, to be iron; that of the yellow, without doubt, is lead and
antimony, with a trifling quantity of copper, though not essential to
the production of the color. The generality of these beads appear to be
produced from clays colored in thin layers, afterwards twisted together
into a spiral form, and then cut across: also from different colored
clays raked together without blending. How the flowers and delicate
patterns, in the body and on the surface of the rarer beads, have been
produced, cannot be so well explained. Besides the suite deposited in
the British Museum, I had the pleasure of presenting one of the most
interesting kind to Baron Humboldt; and I have also sent one to Sir
Richard Hoare, as it seemed to correspond so closely with the bead which
he found in one of the barrows, and describes, as follows, in his
History of Wiltshire. The notion of the rare virtues of the Glain
Neidyr, as well as of the continued good fortune of the finder, accords
exactly with the African superstitions. “A large glass bead, of the same
imperfect petrefaction as the pully beads, and resembling also, in
matter, the little figures that are found with the mummies in Egypt, and
are to be seen in the British Museum. This very curious bead has two
circular lines of opaque sky blue and white, which seem to represent a
serpent entwined round a centre, which is perforated. This was certainly
one of the Glain Neidyr of the Britons, derived from glain, which is
pure and holy, and neidyr a snake. Under the word glain, Mr. Owen, in
his Welsh Dictionary, has given the following article: “The Glain
neidyr, transparent stones, or adder stones, were worn by the different
orders of the bards, each having its appropriate color. There is no
certainty that they were worn from superstition originally; perhaps that
was the circumstance which gave rise to it. Whatever might have been the
cause, the _notion of their rare virtues was universal_ in all places
where the Bardic religion was taught. It may still be questioned whether
they are the production of nature or art.” The beads which are the
present object of my attention, are thus noticed by Bishop Gibson in his
improved edition of Camden’s Britannia. “In most parts of Wales, and
throughout all Scotland, and in Cornwall, we find it a common opinion of
the vulgar, that about Midsummer eve (although in the time they do not
all agree,) it is usual for snakes to meet in companies; and that by
joining heads together, and hissing, a kind of bubble is formed like a
ring, about the head of one of them, which the rest, by continual
hissing blow on till it comes off at the tail; and then it immediately
hardens, and resembles a glass ring, _which whoever finds (as some old
women and children are persuaded) shall prosper in all their
undertakings_. The rings which they suppose to be thus generated are
called Gleinu Nadroedh, i.e. Gemmæ Anguinum, whereof I have seen at
several places about twenty or thirty. They are small glass annulets,
commonly about half as wide as our finger rings, but much thicker; of a
green color, usually, though some of them are blue, and others curiously
waved with blue, red, and white. I have also seen two or three earthen
rings of this kind, but glazed with blue, and adorned with transverse
streaks in furrows on the outside. There seems to be some connection
between the Glein Neidyr of the Britons, and the Ovum Anguinum mentioned
by Pliny,[a] as being held in veneration by the Druids of Gaul, and to
the formation of which he gives nearly the same origin. They were
probably worn as an insigne, or mark of distinction, and suspended
around the neck, as the perforation is not sufficiently large to admit
the finger.”
The bead engraved in Tumulus No. 9, resembles closely a coarse sort of
bead, still manufactured in Syria, brought over by Dr. Meryon. The glass
globes dug up in Lincolnshire, and presented by Sir Joseph Banks to the
British Museum, are very like a distinct sort of aggry bead, dug by the
natives even more rarely than the others, but not larger than a moderate
sized apple: they are more opaque than the other beads, and the ground
or body is generally black, speckled confusedly with red, white, and
yellow.
_Aggry_ is the generic, not the abstract name; ‘_awynnee_’ is _bead_,
but aggry is an exotic word no native can explain. When first I heard of
similar beads having been lately dug in India, I associated for an
instant the expectation that it might have been in the neighbourhood of
Agra, and thus have thrown some light on the name; but it appears they
were found in Malabar. I am indebted for the following account of this
interesting discovery to a gentleman lately returned from India. “The
bead you sent me is more like those I saw in India, than any I have seen
before; but it is thicker and shorter; neither does the material of
which it is formed exactly agree with those in India, which appear to be
of a red glass, very like red carnelian (such, however, are frequent
among the Aggry beads) with white lines of enamel, inlaid, as it were,
in the body of the bead. I gave these to a friend in India, who promised
to send them to the Asiatic Society in Calcutta. The circles of stone in
which these beads have been found, abound most in Malabar, in the
neighbourhood of Calicut; but I have seen them in other parts of India,
and I am of opinion that they might be traced throughout the whole of
the southern peninsula. They are formed of large masses of rough stones,
placed round in irregular circles, some of very large extent, some of
smaller: they appear so much like natural rocks, that most persons would
pass them unobserved. Several of these circles about three years since
were excavated, in the vicinity of Calicut, and in the centre of each of
them we found, at the depth of about five feet, a large earthen jar of
the same shape as those found in Wiltshire, as near as we could judge,
for it was broken to pieces: it was about four or five feet deep, its
mouth in general closed with a square piece of granite: the beads were
found at the bottom of these jars with some pieces of iron, apparently
parts of swords and spears. There was an iron javelin found in one of
these places, tolerably perfect: it was about five feet long, with a
large iron knob at one end of it. In the centre of one of the circles we
came to a flight of seven steps, which led to a cave excavated in the
rock; it measured 11 feet in diameter, and 7 feet in its highest part;
the entrance to it was a square opening of about 18 inches, which was
closed up by an immense block of granite. We found in this place a great
number of earthen pots of very curious shape; in one of these there were
the remains of bones, which appeared to have been but imperfectly
calcined; in several of the larger jars there were the husks of rice,
which dropped into dust immediately they were opened. We found here also
an iron tripod, and a very curious stone, somewhat similar to what the
Indians now use for grinding their curry powder on. The large stones
forming the circles were set upright and capped with still larger ones.
They are not of granite, but of the stone of the country in which they
are situated; they are of different sizes; I have seen some of them 10
or 12 feet high, and the large stone on the top from 10 to 12 feet in
diameter, or perhaps more. Coimbatore is a district situated between the
Coromandel and Malabar coasts; it is bounded on the east by the river
Cavery, on the banks of which the tumuli are in general situated. In
some, a few silver coins have been found, of a square figure, with
characters on them, which none of the most learned Bramins have been as
yet able to make out; it is in these also that remains of very large
swords, &c. have been found. The Roman coins to the number of upwards of
90 were all of gold, and Nero’s; each of them had a cut or slit in it.
They were not found in one of these barrows, but were discovered in a
garden by one of the natives when digging: they were in a small copper
pot. Pandu Kuri literally means Pandu’s caves or holes. Pandu is a very
celebrated personage in the Hindoo Mythology, and a great warrior; it is
common in India to ascribe to him all great works of antiquity; this
term therefore only shews that those places are very ancient, and that
the present inhabitants are quite ignorant of their origin.”]
[Footnote a: Præterea est ovorum genus in magna Galliarum fama, omissum
Græcis. Angues innumeri æstate convoluti, salivis faucium, corporumque
spumis artifici complexu glomerantur, anguinum appellantur. Druidæ
sibilis id dicunt in sublime jactari, sagoque oportere intercipi ne
tellurem attingat. Profugere raptorem equo. Serpentes enim insequi donec
arceant amnis alicujus interventu. Experimentum ejus esse si contra
aquas fluitet vel auro cinctum Insigne Druidis. Ad victorias litium ac
regum aditus maxime laudat. Plinii Hist. Natural. L. 29. c. 3.]