Category: | Our Mythical Childhood Survey

Dapo Adeleke

Adamu and His Horse is a Children’s fiction, didactic and with thematic thrusts yarned from oral tradition. Adamu is a young and ambitious young man. His parents migrated to Garinlafiya long time ago from their ancestral village where they were relatively wealthy but had to leave because of famine. His father had a retinue of slaves but trusted one. On the night of their departure from Garinlafiya, he tied together most of his property and money which were too heavy to carry on the back of(...)

african

YEAR: 2004

COUNTRY: Nigeria

TAGS: African Storytelling African Traditions Archetype Odyssey Slavery in Africa

Cyprian Assam Egbe

Arrah and the Slave Girl

A long time ago, there lived a beautiful young eighteen-year old girl, Arrah, from a royal family. Her grace and charm left no young man indifferent both within and outside the village of Tinto. Her beauty was also complemented by good manners and diligent housekeeping which she learnt from her mother. As a result, a long line of suitors called on her every day to ask for her hand, but she and her parents found none worthy enough of her. Eventually, despite the fact that in those days people did(...)

oral

COUNTRY: Cameroon

TAGS: African Mythologies African Storytelling African Traditions Archetype Slavery in Africa

Diane Dillon, Leo Dillon, Patricia C. McKissack

Never Forgotten

The story opens with a griot’s warning that white folks will invade Africa, capture blacks, and sell them as goods. He recounts the story of Dinga, a well-respected blacksmith who, after losing his beloved wife, decides to raise his newborn baby boy all by himself. Although elderly women in the village advise him to remarry or give out his son as requires their culture and tradition, Dinga rather dedicates his son to the Mother Elements (the goddess of the earth, the goddess of the wind, t(...)

african

YEAR: 2011

COUNTRY: United States of America

TAGS: African Mythologies African Storytelling African Traditions Deities Nature Goddesses Slavery in Africa

Brey Houzibe

The Enormous Monster [Burma-Te-Dge]

In the beginning, among the Ngambays people of Mundu in the South of Chad, there lived a young pregnant woman, who constantly went out to fetch wood in a nearby forest. While in the forest, she wanted to lift a big log of wood, and suddenly her baby came out of her womb together with the placenta. In this village, the placenta was considered as a second baby. She took the placenta home and abandoned the real baby in the forest. After a long time, an old woman who had also been fetching wood in t(...)

oral

COUNTRY: Chad

TAGS: African Mythologies African Storytelling African Traditions Slavery in Africa