Culture
A language lived out loud.
Masquerades that are licensed to speak. Drums that call a town to the square. Canoes racing on the creek. Okrika culture is best understood through its own words, so every term on this page opens in the dictionary.
Festivals & masquerades
The town comes out to see itself.
Rite of passage
Ịrịà
The transitional ceremony from girlhood to womanhood, performed by every young woman of adolescent age. Ịrịà women — ị̀rị̀apụ — are dressed in wrappers of Akwete cloth and beads and presented to the town, with families marking the day with gifts and feasting (àgbànị̀chụ̀á). In Okrika and the neighbouring Ijaw kingdoms the rite is staged in grades, from the first wrapper of girlhood to the most honoured stage of senior womanhood.
The same word names the months of feeding and rest a nursing mother takes after childbirth, and the tradition is counted among the oldest in the Delta.
On the water
kúbǔdọ́kụ́
The regatta, canoes raced against each other, in a town whose great houses are named after war canoes. The dictionary records a second word for it, árụ́dọ́kụ́tí.
Read the entriesÓwú — the masquerades
Each masquerade belongs to a house or family and is played to its own drumming. Some are comic, some chase the crowd, and the Kíríọwū are regarded as sacred and secret: licensed to talk in a special mode, they check immorality, bad behaviour and quarrels. The December holidays bring the masquerades out across Okrika and the neighbouring towns.
- Kíríọwūsacred masquerades that check bad behaviour
- àgị̀jị̀-òwúmasquerade that chases with a sword
- ájụ́kụ́jụ́kụ́raffia masquerade with dangling tassels
- àsàmbị̀amasquerade on long wooden legs
- Éférífédouble-faced masquerade in a flowing gown
- ḍú↓mínéyàmermaid immortalised by a masquerade
- átúmpìhorned raffia masquerade that dances to Ọbọnị
- ètèḅìsunflower-like feather decoration for masks
Music & dance
A drum for every occasion.
The dictionary names more than a dozen drums, each with its own tone and job: to call the town, to honour the dead, to carry a masquerade or to speak.
Drums
Dances & societies
ákụ́afárị́
v. to play or beat drum
Blench’s edition drew on his own notes on Kịrịkẹ musical instruments, which is why the drum vocabulary is unusually complete.
Food & the water
Cassava from the farm, everything else from the creek.
Okrika sits in the mangroves of the Bonny River, and the language shows it: there are separate words for fishing mullet by lamplight, for cast-netting tilapia, for spearing at the weir and for the mangrove tray the catch is cured on.
On the table
Age grades & traditions
Growing up in sets of equals.
Okrika counts its people by age. Children born together form an age grade, and each stage of life has a rite of its own: a young man’s pólóchó, a young woman’s Ịrịà, marriage, the chief’s stool and the honours paid when a chief dies.
- 1ógúawọchildren of the same age
Childhood
Children born around the same time are ógúawọ. As they grow they become an ógú, a set of equals, which the dictionary also calls ógú-ápụ́: an age grade.
- 2pólóchóinitiation of a young man into manhood
Young men
A young man is initiated into the regular customary contributions of his family, such as those made at burials. From then on he is regarded as a full-fledged person, and he has achieved manhood.
- 3ị̀rị̀àfrom girlhood to womanhood
Young women
A young woman’s passage is Ịrịà, described above. The dictionary names its details: the ìmkpálà, bronze anklets worn by the girls, and ógbùdù, their way of tying cloth like a hoop skirt.
- 4yàabọ̀a woman married by the yaa system
Marriage
Courtship begins with wárị́nwẹ́ngị́, asking for a woman’s hand, and a drink offered to her parents. The highest form of marriage is yaa. A yàabọ̀ is a lawfully married woman whose marriage included the customary ókuru (raffia cloth) and íkpo (Kano cloth) with other gifts.
- 5álábọ̌chief; head of a house
Chieftaincy
Each chief heads a war-canoe house, a household of families. Between the people and their rulers stand the sẹ́kẹ́nị́, a group of respected men who speak for the people to the chiefs, and for the chiefs to the king.
- 6pérígóceremony for a dead chief or warrior
Honouring a chief
When a chief or warrior dies, his first daughter and two others perform the pérígó in his honour, and the ékéré drums are played. A man famed in life as a warrior, a wealthy chief or a patriot may be laid in state on the tàndà, an elevated seat.
Other traditions
Strength, song and the season.
Wrestling
ị́mgbáwrestlingThe dictionary names the throws as well as the sport. In kíndā a wrestler hooks his leg round his opponent’s, lifts it with a forceful twist and throws him down.
Singing clubs
áḅákáclub of singers in Adedeme BiriClubs gather singers and drummers. Áḅáká was inaugurated in Adedeme Biri in the first decade of the twentieth century; kóngò is a singing club in Bolo.
The fishing season
kọ̀nị̀mèngífishing season, usually a fortnightFishing has its own calendar: kọ̀nị̀mèngí is the fishing season or period, usually falling within a fortnight.
Definitions are quoted from the Kịrịkẹ dictionary. Practice differs from town to town and has changed over time; if your family or town keeps these customs differently, please add a cultural note.
Dress & ceremony
Cloth that travels.
Okrika ceremonial dress is a Delta trading story: Akwete cloth from the Igbo weaving town, the agbada from Yoruba country, “real India” injiri by way of Kalabari. The dictionary records each borrowing.
- ị́kákị́thick Akwete cloth
Woven in Akwete and worn as wrappers at Ịrịà and on feast days.
- dọ́nàlong flowing shirt for men
Sewn like a big long-sleeved shirt with seams falling to the ankle.
- àgbádáflowing gown
Borrowed from Yoruba and worn by Okrika men for ceremonies.
- ínjìrìreal India cloth; George
The prized cloth also called George, borrowed by name from Kalabari.
Gallery
Seven words to start with.
Open any card to read more, then follow it into the dictionary.