The Egungun Festival in Yorubaland is an important part of the different religious practices of the people of Ede, Nigeria. Most Yoruba religious traditions are based on oral traditions. Practices and beliefs are preserved by customs, passing history, and traditions from generation to generation. Authority for interpreting occasions and also establishing needed conduct of morals and ethics rests with a bureaucratic structure of some rulers that function in both political and religious realms.
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
Yoruba Egungun festival, Nigeria
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
- Date of Observation: it is conducted in June
- Type of Holiday: it is a Religious Yoruba holiday
- Countries it is celebrated in: Nigeria and also Brazil
- Symbols and Customs of this holiday: Yam, Masks
Origin of the festival in Nigeria
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
According to well-known Yoruba faith, all power in the world emanates from the greatest being, Olodumare. Olodumare that is known as the proprietor of eternal abundance, among many other acclaim names, holds all deep power and is the giver of all existence. Olodumare is the mystic distant origin of all things and is not identified by gender. All that exists, including preternatural godlike realities and reasonable world realities, are a piece of Olodumare.
As the highest almighty origin, Olodumare is straight concerned in the affairs of the world through a complex center of sub-divinities called orisa. The orisa is official godlike emissaries and assists as intermediaries between the people of planet and Olodumare. They are the main objects of respect and ceremonial duty. The names and figure of orisa change according to nationwide and nearby practice, but they number in the hundreds. Some of them are more popular while others may be only venerated according to some localized practice.
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
The Egungun is a hidden fellowship among the Yoruba people, who live Nigeria. A heritable chief called the Alagba heads the society, which celebrates its most significant feast in June. Members of the fellowship come to the marketplace and perform dances for the Timi, or chief, wearing MASKS that substitute for the spirits of deceased ancestors.
Which spirits are worshiped each year is marked by the Ifa prophet. A gentleman who is instructed by the prophet to honor his forefather has a particular mask made for the dance. Although he himself doesn't participate in the dance, he is considered the proprietor of the mask. He takes it to the Alagba, along with appropriate gifts, and the Alagba secretly appoints a fellow of the Egungun fellowship to put on it during the feast.
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
READ ALSO: Ethnic groups in Nigeria
About thirty masqueraders in extensive, colorful robes collect in a grove not far from the city and then come as an assembly to execute their dance in the marketplace. Some Egungun dance in one location, others make sudden movements toward the neighboring spectators. When one leaps advance, the adolescent men acting as guards whip out with their whips to anticipate anyone from coming near the masked shape. The serious point of the feast is the arrival of Andu, the most significant and mighty mask. The other masqueraders unclouded a walkway for him, and the drums strike louder and faster as Andu rushes into the marketplace.
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
It is the Egungun who pay attention to the requests of the living and transport their messages back to the ancestral community in paradise. Women who are having trouble conceiving, for example, often ask the masked figures to present them children. The responses of the Egungun can be ferocious as well as bounteous. They anticipate their descendants to uphold the highest ethical standards and are fast to reveal the bad thoughts that neighbors harbor against one another. Even though the annual arrival of the Egungun in the streets of Yoruba towns and villages inspires a certain amount of terror, it also assures the people of their continued leadership.
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
The word "Egungun" is sometimes translated word for word as "bone" or "skeleton." This is probably the outcome of a misconception of the right sound since Yoruba is a tonal speech. When the word is pronounced with the right tone color, it means "masqueraders." Today there is a thriving community of Egungun worshippers in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil, where they put on the colorful costumes of their Nigerian counterparts.
Symbols and customs of Yoruba festival
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
Masks
Some of the Egungun masks consist of colored fabric and leather that protect the complete corpse while the dancer looks out through a closely knitted net. Others are wood masks worn in fore-part of the face, and still, others are carved heads worn on the cap of the dancer's own head. The mask-wearers are often accompanied by some men holding sticks or different whips who keep the crowd away from getting too near. This is because it is considered very risky to advance the spirits of the deceased. According to an old Yoruban saying, "Even a Prince cannot go near an Egungun with impunity." At one moment, anyone who saw an even fragment of the guy who was wearing the false face could be placed to dying as a punishment.
Yoruba cultural dance
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
Each false face represents the anima of a particular forefather. In fact, everyone knows that there is a man being below the mask. But it is believed that the anima of the deceased may be persuaded to come in into the masquerader while he is dancing. At the altitude of the dance, every accurate Egungun enters into some hypnotic-like conditions and speaks with a speech he has never used before.
Yam
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
The Yoruba honor the annual coming back of the ancestors to the earth of the living during the period of the yam yield. Their coming not only brings a prayer upon the crops but stands as a mnemonic that it was the ancestors who first sophisticated Yoruba motherland.
When a Yoruba man dies, the Egungun are especially troubled about the break-up of the deceased from their former existence. So after a certain amount of time has elapsed, the widow is led to a hillock of the world that represents her spouse. From this, she takes a yam, which symbolizes the last present she will get from him. Then, a week or so later, one of the Egungun visits her residence and calls to the deceased man in an elevated-pitched or nasal speech. This is a signal for the deceased man to go away the world and his relatives behind.
Egungun festival in Yorubaland
This feast is often called a masquerade festival. But this event is religious and very important for Yoruba people. However, if you want to see good, historical masquerade, Nigeria is the place you need to visit.
READ ALSO: Nigerian native styles for men
