The Gur speaking Gurunsi peoples of northern Ghana and southern Burkina Faso constituted a non-centralized cluster of village communities sandwiched between the more powerful centralized states of Mamprusi, Dagomba, Gonja, Lobi and Mossi. Though regularly being the victim of slave raids from their stronger neighbors, the warlike Gurunsi were able to maintain their independence from these neighboring states (and each other), and fiercely maintained their traditional culture and religion.
In 1888, the Frenchman Louis-Gustave Binger was perhaps the first European explorer to pass through the Gurunsi country, and left the following description of a sacral building in Paga, a town of the Kassena subgroup of the Gurunsi peoples:
“The religion of the Gourounga seems to be fetishism. They have round earthen constructions, which are sacred; I also saw them invoke God, who bears the same name as the sun (ouindï). The sacred constructions, of all shapes and sizes, are covered with geometric designs, circles, lozenges, squares, etc., painted in red or black ochre, or even mottled with gray obtained using ashes. dissolved in water. In Pakhé [Paga], one evening, while walking in front of one of these constructions, without thinking about it, I began to whistle. There you have it! The village gathered together and lamented my actions; I had just, it seems, profaned this holy place. I had to explain, for a good hour, that such an act committed by a European did not at all have the same significance as if it were committed by a native.”
- Du Niger au Golfe de Guinée par le pays de Kong et le Mossi
No comments:
Post a Comment