The Cross River Forest and the people's traditions

Muri Cobham, the Clan Head of Efut Ifako, Creek Town, is considered among if not THE most knowledgeable Ékpè leaders alive in the Calabar region today. His cap sports a red parrot feather, a leopard pelt, and a porcupine quill. On the back wall hang leaves from the 'Ékpè tree', called Oboti in the Èfìk language; on the table is a plantain leaf. 2010.

The peoples living in the huge forest-belt of West Africa used its flora and fauna as key ingredients in their cultural ways. Most communities had forest and water reserves that were taboo for all but ritual specialists.

 Oboti leaves (the 'flag' of Ékpè), as well as palm fronds hang from the entrance to the lodge to keep non-initiates out. Èfé Ékpè Efut Ibonda, June 2010

P.A. Talbot, an early British colonial officer, documented some of these sacred spaces in the Ìbìbìò-speaking and Ejagham-speaking regions of the Cross River basin: “Like the Lake of the Dead in the Oban District, many Ìbìbìò sacred pools and groves serve as a place of sanctuary, not for human beings alone, but also for wild things."

The Oboti trees and stone (ítíát in Èfìk) mark the shrine of a lodge. The empty bottles were left after pouring libation to ancestors. The raffia-woven basket with egg and other edibles is a gift to the river goddess (Ndèm in Èfìk, or generically 'Mami Wata'). Èfé Ékpè Efut Ibonda, June 2010

Talbot recognized that in some cases, the 'sacred groves' served to protect the forest from destruction by farming and iron smelting:  “. . . a dense evergreen forest . . . This bush . . . now exists, in its primeval state, only on the borders of streams, in sacred groves or the comparatively small proportion of uninhabited country.”

Idem Ikwo, an Ékpè masquerade known in the historical literature as 'Ékpè runner', is the most public of Ékpè masquerades. The masker holds Oboti leaves in the left hand; the suit is woven from palm raffia. Èfé Ékpè Iboku, Creek Town, 2009

In a region impacted by the trans-Atlantic slave trade for centuries, the 'sacred groves' could protect enslaved peoples, who would then become 'servants' of the grove. Talbot wrote:
“Not far from Idua Oronn is the sacred grove of Abang ‘Ndak, whence no branch might be cut, or leaf plucked, on penalty of death. This was a place of refuge for escaped slaves and of sanctuary for those guilty of manslaughter.”

View from the Ikom-Calabar road of a volcanic cone in the Ekuri community forest, Akamkpa Local Government Area. Ekuri people call the cone Ágàmlògón 'mother of whiteness', because of the morning mists around its peak. Stones used in Ékpè practice derive from this mountainous region.

Surplus wealth entering communal societies became a factor in dealing with humans who broke taboos of the 'sacred groves'. Talbot wrote:
“Should a man be proved guilty of cutting down the trees in this or any other sacred grove, he was put to death, unless his family were rich enough to ransom him by payment of a very heavy fine.”

Èfé Ékpè Asibong Ekondo (Obutong) in Calabar Municipality. The lodge pole at the front door shows mythic movement from water to land with totemic animals, at bottom the python, then crocodile, then leopard, and finally the founding ancestor Asibong Ekondo. January 2010

The relationship between cultural ways and the forest was not lost upon the early colonists and missionaries who struggled to open the region to European commerce.

The 'high-table' where Ékpè title-holders sit, is covered with plantain leaves, the 'table-cloth' of Ékpè. The red and white 'chalk' is used to initiate members. White for peace (ancestors/ lunar energy) and red for activation (solar energy). The white is kaolin clay from the earth; the red is derived from the center of the camwood tree. Èfé Ékpè Efut Ibonda, June 2010

Talbot rounded up his book-length study of the cultural habits of the Ìbìbìò people with thoroughly European-centric views of what progress should look like in Nigeria: “. . . with the coming of railways, and consequent opening up of the country, we may hope that progress will be still more rapid in the future."

Ékpè ceremonies occur in the night, the time leopards move through the forest. This young man is being initiated at Èfé Ékpè Efut Ifako in Creek Town. See the similarity of his body markings with those on the iron 'gong'. These marking show the deep relationship between Ékpè and its music. 2010.

Talbot continued: "Possibly, too, the darker aspects of many rites and beliefs may be attributed, in great part at least, to the shadow cast over the minds of the people by that dense tropical forest which covers such vast stretches of the West Coast, or by the mangrove swamps which surround the low-lying lands."

Ukara cloth, the hand-dyed cloth used only by Ékpè title-holders, covers the entrance to the 'butame', the inner sanctum where  the Voice of the Leopard resounds. Its symbols include pythons, crocodiles, leopards, tortoises, and chameleons. Èfé Ékpè Efut Ibonda, June 2010.

"In the open sun-lit country, like the wide plains of Northern Nigeria and the Sudan, the more revolting customs seem to be dying out, as was the case in Egypt with the cutting of the bush, and in Europe with the thinning of the great forests.”
        P.A. Talbot. Life in Southern Nigeria: the Magic, Beliefs, and Customs of the Ibibio Tribe. (London, 1923)

Wooden gong on the front patio of an Ékpè lodge in Ikom-urban with crocodile and tortoise symbols. 2010. In Éjághám speaking-regions like Ikom, Ékpè is known as Mgbe.

Talbot perceived ecological destruction as part of the ‘civilizing’ process, and he was not alone.
        A recent book by Ìbìbìò-speaking author Okon Antia describes the attempts of his grandfather, a nineteenth century local leader, Obong Udo Antia II of Ikot Aba, to protect his community's inherited life-ways and sacred forests from destruction, in this case by the celebrated Scottish missionary, Mary Slessor:

Elder (Dr.) Okon R.U. Antia, Village Head of Ikot Aba. November 2010

“He resisted the white missionary efforts to destroy his people’s shrines and forests. No wonder why he strongly and successfully opposed the felling of the great ‘Mkpa Tree’ — a symbol of his family shrine by Mary Slessor’s workers while opening the old Itu-Ikot Ekpene road which passed though his village— Ikot Aba."

Sacred grove at the Ékpè lodge (Osam Mgbe) of Ikot Ansa (Nkonib), Calabar Municipality, 2009.

"According to Efiong Udo Antia ‘When Mary Slessor failed to heed Ete Nyin’s warming not to fell the tree, but divert the road and to save the trees he used a contingent of his soldiers and policemen to drive away Mary Slessor’s workers. This incident led to a serious and open confrontation and quarrel . . . He seriously opposed the stripping of himself and other traditional rulers of their economic, political, social and judicial powers by the westerners.”
        Okon R.U. Antia. Akwa Ibom Cultural Heritage: Its Invasion by Western Culture and its Renaissance. (Uyo, Nigeria, 2005).

Ékpè chiefs sit at the high table wearing leopard teeth and skin, porcupine quills, and red parrot feathers; A sting-ray tail lies upon the table, a symbol of Ékpè discipline. The two at center are the Ntoe of Ikot Ansa and the Ntoe of Akim Qua. Ikot Ansa (Nkonib) Osam Mgbe, 2009

Issues related to the ecology and to the royal traditions of communal societies, to the impact of slavery and surplus wealth, and to forest conservation and Christianity, rage on into the present.