The Beginning of Troubles

This is part of a series: Njeddo Dewal, Mother of Calamity

At that time, Njeddo Dewal, the maleficent instrument of Guéno's anger, lived in an abode made of tiaïki branches, that magical tree which wilts in the rain and turns green in the heat (24). She was there, with her seven ears and three eyes wide open. When she coughed, sparks sprang from her lungs. When she scratched, bees burst out of her body. If she breathed in front of a tree, the tree would wither. If she screamed at a mountain, the mountain would cave and crumble and turn to sand. So there she was, lurking in her abode, performing her spells, which spread their harmful effects throughout the land of Heli and Yoyo.

One day, Fulani women who had gone to the market to sell their milk found strange things there: containers filled with sheep dung, large bowls containing human excrement, cow dung or lizard droppings, gourds filled with urine and spit, human shin-bones spread on the ground like cassava roots.

“Yoo! Yoo!” cried the Fulani women. “That which is disgusting and stinking has entered the market!”

“What has happened?” they asked each other. They did not know that Guéno had begun to impose their punishment and that Njeddo Dewal, Mother of Calamity, was the agent of its execution.

When the women looked into their calabashes, they saw that the milk had turned to blood and the unskimmed curdled milk (pen’ngal) had turned to pus. They fled and returned home, some to Heli, some to Yoyo, wailing their misfortune everywhere.

These extraordinary events came to the ears of Heli’s king.1 In turn, he informed his people. They all went to Yoyo, the capital where the High king resided. 

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1 Lit. laamdo: “he who commands”. Above the local kings or chiefs, there was a single High king of the Land of Heli and Yoyo. Immediately under him came the king of Heli (25).

He summoned the 22 silatigis and the 56 great shepherds (26) of the land. He asked them to draw up geomantic signs and to interpret them in order to know the meaning of these strange phenomena. Having performed their art, the silatigis concluded that a great misfortune was going to fall upon the country of Heli and Yoyo because the elders had prophesised:

“Woe to the country when milk turns to blood and pus, when excrement and urine are sold at the market! When that time comes, the world will change. Heli and Yoyo will be crushed and ground to dust like flour. The high banks of the rivers will subside like walls of adobe clay torn asunder by a tornado. The riverwater levels will sink to the lowest ebb, the forests will become deserts, the great cities will be nothing but heaps of ruins. Where rivers used to run, only sandbanks will be seen. The great multi-storied mansions will be piled high like dunes, or else like caves where lizards, bats or cockroaches nest. In the fields, the edible calabashes will yield only bitter squash. Women and cows will become sterile, fulsome but unproductive. And if by chance they should give birth, they will not be able to breastfeed their young.

“No one will have pity for what is pitiful! No one will have shame for what is shameful. Each man will work only for himself.2 He will think he is always right and blame his fellow man for his own shortcomings. Everyone will build themselves up by denigrating others, praising their own work, while criticising the work of others.

“You will see people talk and smile with hypocrisy at each other, then mock and call each other names behind their backs.

“Men will resemble dabbling teals.3 When one of these little ducks dives, the others pray, ‘O Guéno! Drown him, prevent him from getting out of the water!’ But as soon as the diver surfaces, they kindly tell him: ‘We were praying for you. Did you catch anything?’

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2 In African tradition, selfish ego is considered the greatest evil. In its extreme form, the one who “does not share” or who lives apart from the community is considered unnatural. Note that in the myth of the creation of the world, it is after Habana-koel (“Every man for himself”) that duality appears, therefore good and evil.

3 A species of small dabbling duck that symbolises hypocrisy.

“In this calamitous time, which will be governed over by the Great Hag, a dark foreboding star will rise in the north (27).

“Then the stranger who comes to stay with you will say, ‘I will not leave!’ He will seal his purse, keep his property and live on yours. Moreover, on the day he does agree to leave, he will expect to receive a gift!

“Indeed, in this cursed time, the Master Initiators will even sleep with their female students.4

“Close friends will sleep with each other’s wives.

“When that time comes, women need say nothing more than: ‘I want to divorce, I will divorce!’ And too bad for the children of the marriage.

“When that time comes, leaders — who can take advantage without risk because they are leaders — will tell brazen lies,5 and the richest will not shy away from stealing from the poorest.

“When that time comes, earth will be believed to be heaven and heaven will be believed to be earth.”6

Such were the predictions. The leaders of Heli and Yoyo asked the silatigis and shepherds:

“Is there a sacrifice that can rid us of this evil or lessen the torment that will erupt like a volcano? What can be done to ensure this calamity is stopped in its tracks, so that this tornado of misfortune will not fall upon the land of Heli and Yoyo and our country will not be destroyed?”

The shepherds turned their eyes to the silatigis,7 because the latter surpassed them in knowledge. 

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4 Symbol of the reversal of values, because the master initiators (silatigis, masters of the earth, masters of the knife etc.) are considered the very model of probity and morality. Their functions are valid and effective only if they respect major prohibitions: to never lie, to not be prejudiced, to not commit adultery, etc..

5 It is said that a chief, or a king, does not have to stoop to lying because, in any case, whatever he does, he runs no risk. In Africa, it is understood that a leader can abuse his power, but never lie. In The Radiance, when Bâgoumâwel gives the royal sceptre to Djendo Diêri, the young king whom he initiated, he tells him (p. 91): “In your speech, let no lie enter, for the end result of one who lies is to be corrupted. He who has power to abuse must never lie.”

6 Symbol of the most extreme confusion, the total upheaval of values.

7 The silatigis, it has been said, represent the supreme degree of Fulani initiation. Every shepherd or initiated pastor dreams one day of becoming silatigi (see Koumen).

It is said that the most difficult thing for a subject to do is to look his king in the eye and tell him the truth without concealing, downplaying or sugar-coating.8 But this is what the silatigis of Heli and Yoyo did without hesitation. Their answer was straight to the point and did not equivocate:

“Nothing can stop this prophecy from coming to pass.

Those who have sinned will pay.9

Heli and Yoyo will be destroyed and the bricks of its dwellings turned to dust.

The tree branches will wither on their trunks.

The rivers will dry up and the grasslands will become bush.

Things will not return to normal until after the death of Njeddo Dewal, mother of calamity.

But alas! The dark night will last long, because she is strong as metal and will not easily melt. (28).” 

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8 In ancient Greek, this was known as parrhesia meaning “speaking truth to power” or “fearless speech”, the latter being the title and subject of French philosopher Michel Foucault’s final book before his death in 1984..
9 Sub-text: those who have not sinned will be saved and will escape calamities.

Endnotes:

24. Wilts in the rain and turns green in the heat: this inversion of phenomena is frequent in the tales. It indicates that we are in another world, to which material laws do not apply. It often occurs in connection with great initiates (e.g. Bâgoumâwel in The Radiance) or great magicians.

25. King: In traditional society, the functions of the king (or chief) were not totalitarian and did not give absolute rights. Kings had to rely on the power of traditional spiritual chiefs, true masters of decisions in their own domain (“Master of the land”, "Master of the blade" or sacrificial priest, Fulɓe silatigi etc.). In addition, they were bound by very strict prohibitions.

26. 22, 56: Among the Fulɓe (as in Islam), the numbers 11. 22 and 56 are powerful numbers, with a very strong symbolic function.

27. Dark Foreboding Star: The appearance of a star is always either a negative sign (as here) or a positive one, as later in the tale when a star announces and precedes the conception of Bàgoumâwel. Whether the star remains visible for a long time or disappears quickly, it is always highly charged with meaning.

28. End of the Prophecy: this description of a society in decline is comparable with descriptions of the same kind in other traditions, especially in Islam. In each case, history is cyclical and there comes an end to each cycle when values become inverted and society experiences a great calamity before starting afresh on new foundations.

Translation from Amadou Hampâté Bâ, Contes initiatiques peuls 

Painting: “The Scream” by Edvard Munch.

The Birth of Njeddo Dewal

This is part of a series: Njeddo Dewal, Mother of Calamity

For such a long time, so long we cannot count the days, the Fulɓe lived happy in the land of Heli and Yoyo. But after a long while, they were so engorged in happiness that they became proud and lost themselves. They began to behave very badly. Some of them were so disrespectful that they wiped themselves with ears of grain.

Some of the women cavorted with male animals. Others, forsaking water, bathed in milk.1 They even used it to wash their clothes and their children, or to groom their pet sheep2 and their husbands’ white stallions!

Did they not go so far as to use diluted rice flour to paint their houses? Sometimes, overcome by desire, they would go out into the street naked, swinging their hips to better show off their assets.

The men began to imitate them and went naked also. They met the women in the bushes and made out like animals.3 Little by little, men and women refused to marry and gloried in their infamy. Being single became a normal state of affairs.4

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1 To wash with milk indicates an abrogation of norms, and a state of pride and excess, especially among the Fulɓe for whom milk is a sacred substance.

2 A pet sheep is a kind of family mascot which comes and goes freely from the hut of the family to which it belongs. They are much loved and pampered.

3 In traditional society of the African savannah, the sexual act is considered sacred because “the woman’s belly is Guéno’s workshop”; in a society which emphasises mastery of oneself, the sexual act performed outside its norms and contrary to its customs is said to reduce humans to the level of animals.

4 Even into the 20th century, being unmarried was rare in Africa and judged poorly. It was considered that a bachelor was not a man conscious of his responsibilities, and therefore unreliable.

This is how most of the Fulɓe lived, without a prophet to warn them.

Once this state of affairs had gone on too long, Guéno became angry. He decided that misfortune would cure the Fulɓe of their perversity, so he set out to create the being who would be the agent of this misfortune.

Guéno took a black cat, so black that it would blacken black coal and darken the darkest night! He took a stinking goat with jet-black fur (17), then a bird whose plumage was also a deep black. He burned them all with a green ray, put their ashes in a yellow goatskin, and mixed them in colourless water. He placed the mixture in a turtle shell, made from a gigantic sea turtle from the depths (18), then transformed the whole into an egg (19). He gave the egg to be brooded by a hard-skinned, old caiman who had aged through countless years (20).

The caiman brooded the egg. Guéno made the egg hatch. A being came out of it. This being, while vaguely human in shape, had seven ears and three eyes (21). It was a girl.

All that is venomous and wicked, all that live in forests or in the high bush, that dwell in the valleys, wallow in rivers or burrow within the earth, all that climb the hilltops or take refuge in caves, the evil that lives in fire and hides in plants, in short all that we ask Guéno to keep us far away from, all these beings took turns to breastfeed the girl who had just been born. The baby grew and became a chubby little girl, unpleasant to look at, with deformed ears. No creature on this earth had ever seen such ears!

The monstrous little girl was given the name Njeddo Dewal Inna Baasi, the Great Septenary Hag, Mother of Calamity.5

She learnt the seven sounds of magic words.

She got to know all the spells to command the evil spirits of the four elements and the six points of space.

Able to take all forms, she metamorphosed at will, throwing spirits into turmoil.

Thus, enveloped in darkness, surrounded by all the evil spirits and demons, Njeddo Dewal reached adulthood.

A man named Dandi (lit. Chilli) son of Sitti (lit. Saltpeter)6 saw her and proposed his hand in marriage. His proposal was accepted. After their marriage, the couple moved to Toggal-Balewal, the lugubrious black forest.

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5 Njeddo comes from jeddi, which means seven. She is therefore “Septenary”. Dewal is composed of dew (woman) and the affix al which can be pejorative or admiring depending on the context. Dewal could mean “Extraordinary Woman”, but here it means “Great Hag”. Inna Baasi literally means “Mother of Calamity”.

6 Chilli causes burning; as for saltpeter, it is used in the making of explosive powders, hence destructive, and also in various evil spells. This goes to show what evil elements, both maternal and paternal, will unite to give birth to the seven daughters of Njeddo Dewal.

Dandi and Njeddo Dewal had seven daughters, each more beautiful than a female genie.

One day, Dandi met Tooké (Venom).

“O my Dandi, where are you going?” Tooké asked Dandi.

Without further provocation, Dandi threw himself at him. Tooké then swelled himself with venom and rose up like a high riverbank. Then he grabbed Dandi and squeezed his neck until his body became completely cold.

Nearby, toads with sagging hindquarters and pregnant bellies had witnessed the scene. They, in turn, threw themselves on Tooké, killed him and swallowed him without leaving anything behind.

Snakes came out of nowhere and rushed at the toads and ate them, then rushed to hide in holes.

Then black scorpions, as big as small turtles, attacked the snakes. They triumphed and swallowed them just as the snakes had swallowed the toads.7

Where did these scorpions come from? (22)

Silence! ... I will say it so that mouths can relate it back to ears.

These scorpions are older than Kîkala himself, the ancestor of mankind.

They are older than elephants, older than the oldest vultures, older than baobabs, older even than some mountains (23).

On that distant day when the first raindrops fell on earth, the scorpions were already there and washed themselves. Afterwards, they dug up excavations and waited so that whatever should come should come, waiting for what they might encounter there.8

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7 The succession of animals which swallow each other show that for every evil, there exists a still greater evil.

8 This whole scene serves no other purpose than to present the death of Dandi, whose only function was to procreate the seven daughters of Njeddo Dewal who will play a major role in the tale.

Endnotes:

17. Black cat, black goat: Since these are involved in a creation that brings about misfortune and disaster, it is the colour black that dominates, reflecting the shadows in which sorcery is ideally practiced. The cat and the goat appear in many traditions because they are considered as particularly “charged” as receptive vessels of magical power. The most active fetishes are kept in black catskins or goatskins. The goat is more often sacrificed than even the bull. Once upon a time, every village in the Niger Delta had its own goat which roamed where it pleased. The goat was thought to receive all the misfortune that might strike the village and so was considered its guardian and protector. The symbolism of the goat is also related to reproductive health (see Kaïdara).

18. Turtle: The turtle is considered to be one of the first animals of creation. Symbolising long life and duration, it is also a symbol of protection because of its shell under which it can withdraw completely. Moreover, the fact it lives in the depths further symbolises vitality, as water is considered to be the source of life.

19. Egg: The egg is a symbol of life because, as well as water, all life comes from eggs. Even the seeds of plants are considered to be eggs.

20. An old caiman: The caiman is likewise a symbol of antiquity and longevity. Lest we forget, everything in Africa which is old or ancient is charged with nyama (occult power), as a receptacle of a force emanating from the creator God, who is the pre-eminent “Ancient One”. It is therefore a little of the divine force itself (in its aspect of duration and perpetuity) which is found in all that is old, because of the law of correspondence through analogy that prevails in African thought. Although we describe the caiman as a “symbol” for lack of a better term, this is not an abstract or purely intellectual symbolism; it is a concrete correspondence or a manifestation as it were of one of the aspects of the original divine force (duration, vitality, power, etc.) through a receptacle, the degrees of intensity of this manifestation varying according to the nature of the receptacle.

21. 7 ears & 3 eyes: The seven ears are one of the manifestations of the septenary principle which marks the entire existence of Njeddo Dewal. The third eye is on the forehead and designed for inner sight. It is called the “eye of knowing” or “eye of the sorcerer”, because this knowing, while neutral in itself, can lead to good or evil depending on the use one makes of it.

22. Scorpion: In diurnal (positive) symbolism, the scorpion embodies selflessness and maternal sacrifice (not “paternal” as printed in error in the first edition of Kaydara published by the now-disbanded Nouvelles Éditions Africaines, Abidjan). Indeed, it is believed that the female scorpion’s young plough its flanks and suck out her insides before being born.

In nocturnal symbolism (negative), the scorpion embodies warrior spirit and bad temper, always lurking and only showing itself to sting and sometimes to kill. Generally, one avoids to speak its name because it is maleficent.

Its eight legs, two claws and tail symbolise the eleven forces about which there is a whole field of esoteric study.

Black scorpions are often seen in Mandinka or Bambara huts, and even among the Fulɓe, hanging inside the front entrance or at the entrance to the room reserved for funeral ceremonies. The animal symbolises magical protection against the evils of the night and against vampires.

23. Elephants, vultures, baobabs and mountains: These three are the quintessential symbols of antiquity. In L'Eclat (p. 43), we refer to the “baobab council”, a secret assembly held each year by the vulture, the elephant and the baobab to examine past and future events together. Only the silatigi Bâgoumâwel was able to attend this council, forbidden to humans, and to receive initiation from these three ancestors of living beings.

Translation from Amadou Hampâté Bâ, Contes initiatiques peuls

Painting: “Scorpio” by Hiroko Sakai.