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A Dagara Rebellion against Dagomba Rule? Contested Stories of Origin in North-Western Ghana1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

Carola Lentz
Carola Lentz
Affiliation:
Free University of Berlin
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Extract

The article explores a neglected aspect of West African history, namely the historiography of ‘stateless’ peoples in north-western Ghana. At the same time, it is a contribution to the recent debate on the role of history in the construction of new ‘tribal’ identities in Africa in the colonial and post-colonial periods. After discussing local oral patrician accounts of migration and settlement, and the historical imagination of colonial officers, I analyse histories of tribal origins written recently by Dagara intellectuals, which draw upon hypotheses, evidence, tropes and narrative models from both colonial and indigenous sources. The concern is not with a conventional history of ideas, but with showing how authors with new requirements and interests can fuse disparate elements into new accounts of the past whose underlying intentions differ considerably from those of their sources. More specifically, the article discusses the claims of intellectuals' and villagers' stories with reference to different underlying political agendas, suggesting that they constitute different historiographic genres appealing to different audiences. The former are basically concerned with establishing the Dagara as a political community within a modern state, the latter with providing charters for local boundaries and rights.

Type
The Historiography of Origins in West Africa
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 35 , Issue 3 , November 1994 , pp. 457 - 492
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

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References

2 Ethnic names are often a matter of political controversy, and ‘Dagara’ is no exception. Colonial administrators introduced the terms ‘Dagarti’ and ‘Lobi’, which many Ghanaians continue to use. Most of those so labelled reject these names as pejorative, but there is much discussion on what to use instead. Some believe that the people living around Wa, Nadawli and Jirapa form a distinct group, the Dagaba (the British ‘Dagarti’), who speak ‘Dagaare’, and that the term ‘Dagara’ (or ‘Lobr’) should be reserved for the population of Lawra, Nandom and south-western Burkina Faso (the British ‘Lobi’). Others hold that ‘Dagara’ is the only correct unitary term for both the language and the ethnic group. For details relevant to the controversy see Goody, J., The Social Organisation of the LoWiili (London, 1956), 16–26Google Scholar; Tuurey, G., An Introduction to the Mole Speaking Community (Wa, 1982)Google Scholar; Some, P. -A., Systématique du signifiant en Dagara: variété Wúlé (Paris, 1982)Google Scholar; Der, B., ‘The origins of the Dagara-Dagaba’, Papers in Dagara Studies, 1 (1989)Google Scholar; and Bemile, S., ‘Dagara orthography’, Papers in Dagara Studies, 11 (1990).Google Scholar

3 Interview, 29 Nov. 1990, conducted by Bianka Gartelmann. For further details, see Gartelmann, B., ‘Die Erdpriester bei den Dagara’ (Free University of Berlin, Institute of Ethnology, unpublished field report, 1992), 21–25.Google Scholar

4 Interview, 17 Nov. 1990.

5 Tuurey, Introduction.

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19 Law, R., ‘How truly traditional is our traditional history? The case of Samuel Johnson and the recording of Yoruba oral tradition’, History in Africa, xi (1984), 195–221CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Peel, ‘Making history’.

20 Goody, J., The Interface between the Written and the Oral (Cambridge, 1987), 279–83.Google Scholar

21 Popular dirge singers and some elderly men may be famous for their sound knowledge of local history, but they have no official status. For other examples of oral traditions in northern Ghanaian societies without unitary ‘tribal’ or chiefly histories, see Fortes, M., The Dynamics of Clanship among the Tallensi (London, 1945)Google Scholar; Tait, D., The Konkomba of Northern Ghana (London, 1961)Google Scholar; Schott, R., ‘Sources for a history of the Bulsa in northern Ghana’, Paideuma, xxIII (1977), 141–68.Google Scholar For a comparison of the production of history among the ‘LoDagaa’ and in the Gonja kingdom, see Goody, J., ‘Oral tradition and the reconstruction of the past in northern Ghana’, in Bernardi, B., Poni, C. and Triulzi, A. (eds. ), Fonti Orali-Oral Sources - Sources Orales (Milan, 1978), 285–95.Google Scholar

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23 Many Dagara intellectuals, however, regard tengkor as the concrete place name of a village that is supposed to have existed formerly; see e. g. Some, B., ‘Quelques sources d'information pour une recherche historique’, Notes et Documents Voltaïques, 11 (1968), 43.Google Scholar My dissenting interpretation follows a suggestion of Beidelman, T., ‘Myth, legend and oral history: a Kaguru traditional text’, Anthropos, lxv (1970), 89–91.Google Scholar

24 Especially around Nandom, many narratives deal with relations between the Dagara and the Sisala, as in Zino Mwier's story, my own interviews with members of the Nandom tengansob clan and the stories documented in Goody, , ‘Fields of social control’, 79–81.Google Scholar

25 For examples of migration stories, see Hébert, P., Esquisse d'une monographie historique du pays Dagara (Diebougou, 1976), 58–196Google Scholar; Goody, , Social Organisation, 14–16Google Scholar; John-Parsons, D. St., More Legends of Northern Ghana (London, 1960), 6–11Google Scholar; Gartelmann, , ‘Erdpriester’; and V. Mörath,‘Yirdem - wir sind eine Familie. Die Familie bei den Dagara: Wandel und Beständigkeit’ (M. A. thesis, Free University of Berlin, Institute of Ethnology, 1992).Google Scholar In connection with my research into chieftaincy and land rights, I collected a number of migration stories myself, but not systematically; hence my observations here are somewhat preliminary.

26 See Kopytoff, I., ‘The internal African frontier: the making of African political culture’, in Kopytoff, I. (ed.), The African Frontier: The Reproduction of Traditional African Societies (Bloomington, 1987), 3–84.Google Scholar

27 According to Horton, R., ‘Stateless societies in the history of West Africa’, in Ajayi, J. F. A. and Crowder, M. (eds. ), History of West Africa (2 vols. ) (London, 1985), i, 102–06Google Scholar, this narrative model is that typical of acephalous, ‘dispersed, territorially defined’ communities which have experienced the ‘disjunctive migration’ of lineage segments. Other types of settlement seem to produce different myths of origin, as, for example, the earth-begotten ancestors of the Tallensi earth priests (Fortes, , Dynamics, 21–7)Google Scholar, the Konkomba collective memory of eviction by the Dagomba (Tait, Konkomba, 4), and the coming of Akan ancestresses from the sky or out of the earth; see Wilks, I., ‘The Mossi and the Akan states’, in Ajayi, and Crowder, (eds. ), History of West Africa, i, 484–7Google Scholar

28 See Gartelmann, , ‘Erdpriester’, 25–30.Google Scholar

29 See, for instance, St., John-Parsons, More legends, 6–11Google Scholar; Hébert, , Esquisse, 113–15Google Scholar; and Der, , ‘Origins’, 7–9Google Scholar; Gartelmann, , ‘Erdpriester’, 36–9Google Scholar; and my own interviews, partly with the same informants as Hébert and Der.

30 See Henige, , Chronology, 5, 26Google Scholar; Vansina, J., Oral Tradition as History (London, 1985), 116–18.Google Scholar

31 See Ibid. 137–46; and Beidelman, ‘Myth’.

32 See Goody, , ‘Oral tradition’, 292–3.Google Scholar

33 See Kopytoff, , ‘Frontier’, 52–62Google Scholar; for examples from northern Ghana, see Tamakloe, E. F., A Brief History of the Dagbamba People (Accra, 1931)Google Scholar; Schott, ‘Sources’; Schott, R., ‘Le caillou et la boue: les traditions orales en tant que légitimation des autorités traditionelles chez les Bulsa (Ghana) et les Lyéla (Burkina Faso)’, Paideuma, xxxix (1993), 145–62Google Scholar; Wilks, I., Wa and the Wala: Islam and Polity in Northwestern Ghana (Cambridge, 1989), 29–63.Google Scholar

34 See Henige, , Chronology, 95–120Google Scholar; Jones, A., Zur Quellenproblematik der Geschichte Westafrikas1450–1900 (Stuttgart, 1990), 152–61Google Scholar; Law, , ‘How truly’, 198.Google Scholar

35 Jack Goody has also noted that some patricians of the District, Lawra ‘trace their origins… to the district round Wa itself and others to Dagomba’. The Ethnography of the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast West of the White Volta (London, 1954), 31.Google Scholar

36 See, for example, the references to a Dagomba origin in Hébert, , Esquisse, 73, 81, 91, 99–100Google Scholar, and to an Accra origin, Ibid. 64–5, 82, 107, 130, 141–5.

37 Fikry, M., ‘Wa: A Case Study of Social Values and Social Tensions as Reflected in the Oral Traditions of the Wala of Northern Ghana’ (Ph. D. thesis, Bloomington, 1969), 115–23Google Scholar; see also Wilks, , Wa, 32–3, 41, 52.Google Scholar

38 Hagaman, B. L., ‘Beer and Matriliny: The Power of Women in a West African Society’ (Ph. D. thesis, Boston, 1977), 47–51.Google Scholar

39 See Ibid, and Evans, P. A., ‘The LoBirifor/Gonja Dispute in Northern Ghana: A Study of Inter-Ethnic Political Conflict in a Post-Colonial State’ (Ph. D. thesis, Cambridge, 1983).Google Scholar

40 Report on tour of inspection, March to May 1905, Ghana National Archives, Accra (GNA), ADM 56/1/50.

41 Public Record Office, London (PRO), CO96/493, enclosure 3 in Gold Coast No. 41 of 19 Jan. 1910.

42 Ibid.

43 Lt. Fabre, ‘Monographic de la Conscription de Diébougou’, Jan. 1904, Archives Outre Mer (Aix-en-Provence), AOF, 16304, 14 Mi 686, 6.

44 Monthly reports, Black Volta District, May 1901, GNA, ADM 56/1/416; see also Northern Territories of the Gold Coast, Reports for 1904 and 1907, Colonial Reports Annual, No. 457, No. 566.

45 On the setting-up of these chiefdoms see Bening, R., ‘Foundations of the modern native states of northern Ghana’, Universitas, v (Accra, 1975), 116–38Google Scholar; Yelpaala, ‘Circular arguments’; Lentz, C., ‘Histories and political conflict: a case study of chieftaincy in Nandom, northwestern Ghana’, Paideuma, xxxix (1993), 177–215.Google Scholar

46 See Kuklick, H., The Imperial Bureaucrat: The Colonial Administrative Service in the Gold Coast, 1920–1939 (Stanford, 1979), 43–52Google Scholar; and The Savage Within: The Social History of British Anthropology, 1885–1945 (Cambridge, 1991), ch. 5 and 6Google Scholar, for a discussion of colonial historiography and the role of anthropology.

47 Report on tour of inspection, Feb. to May 1906, GNA, ADM 56/1/43, 13.

48 In a second copy of the same typescript (enclosure 7 in Gold Coast No. 41 of 19 Jan. 1910, PRO, CO96/493), ‘Kantol’ is spelled ‘Kontol’, the name currently used.

49 ‘Bekye’ is a village west of the Black Volta, about a two days’ march from Lawra (personal communication of S. W. D. K. Gandah). In reply to a questionnaire of 1924 on native land tenure, District Commissioner Michael Dasent also gave a version of the story of Kontol, but had him come from Babile, less than 20 miles south of Lawra (GNA, ADM 56/1/375, 11); John-Parsons, while D. St.(Legends of Northern Ghana [London, 1960], 46–8)Google Scholar has him come from much further north, stop at Babile and then continue to Lawra.

50 ‘Ulliamae’ is rendered as tindana, i. e. earth-priest, in the second copy (cf. n. 48).

51 Lawra District Record Book, GNA, ADM 61/5/11, 251.

52 Personal communication by S. W. D. K. Gandah, who together with J. Goody recorded and translated a number of bagr recitations in Lawra, Birifu and Babile. For a detailed analysis of the rituals and documentation of texts connected with the bagr initiation, see Goody, J., The Myth of the Bagr (Oxford, 1972)Google Scholar; Goody, J. and Gandah, S. W. D. K., Une récitation du Bagré (Paris, 1980).Google Scholar

53 Tengansob, ‘earth-priest’, and naa, ‘rich man, chief’, are clearly distinguishable words, but sometimes the term teng-naa is used, suggesting that the earth-priest was ‘a chief in his own right’; see Lentz, , ‘Histories’, 190, 195.Google Scholar

54 On the competition for the district capital, see GNA, ADM 56/1/43, 13–15; on conflicts between chiefs, see e. g. the North-Western Province annual report for 1908 (ADM 56/1/434), and the Lawra District annual report for 1918 (ADM 56/1/453, 27).

55 For a similar example from the Bulsa, see Schott, ‘Sources’, 154–7.

56 The Kontol story was also used to justify the land rights of the Kusiele, the Lawra earth-priest clan, including those in neighbouring chiefdoms; see District Commissioner Dasent on native land tenure (1924), GNA, ADM 56/1/375, 11–12.

57 The Kontol story itself was never dramatized, but S. W. D. K. Gandah's autobiographical description of the celebration of King George's coronation in Lawra in 1937 and of Empire Day festivities in Tamale suggests that similar histories, such as the Kusiele's resistance against the Zaberima slave-raiders, etc., were indeed performed (‘The Silent Rebel’, unpublished ms., London, 1992, 55–7, 179–83). At any rate, the ‘Kontol of Lawra’ story was included in a widely read collection of legends of northern Ghana for schools (St. John-Parsons, Legends, 46–8)Google Scholar and is repeatedly referred to in newspaper coverage of the Kobine festival, an annual cultural festival at Lawra which was introduced in grand style some fifteen years ago; see Lentz, C., ‘Staatlich verordneter “self-help spirit” versus lokale “self reliance”: Regionale Kulturfestivals in Ghana als politische Arenen’, in Bollig, M. and Klees, F. (eds.), Überlebensstrategien in Afrika (Köln, forthcoming, 1994).Google Scholar

58 The name ‘Dagarti’ was first recorded by G. E. Ferguson who, in order to counter French moves, travelled through the ‘Hinterland of the Gold Coast’ on a mission to conclude treaties of friendship and trade with local rulers. In 1894, he signed a treaty with the ‘king’ of Wa, who claimed to. rule the ‘Country of Dagarti, otherwise known as Dagaba’: quoted in Wilks, Wa, 7; see also Arhin, K. (ed.), The Papers of George Ekem Ferguson, a Fanti Official of the Government of the Gold Coast, 1890–1897 (Leiden, 1974), 109, 117, 137–8.Google Scholar The name ‘Grunshi’ was adopted from ‘Gourounsi’, used by the French explorer and administrator Binger, Louis, Du Niger au Golfe de Guinée, (2 vols. ) (Paris, 1892), ii, 34–5.Google Scholar

59 See Tauxier, L., Lenoir du Soudan: pays Mossi et Gourounsi (Paris, 1912), 360–1Google Scholar; Delafosse, M., Haut-Sénégal-Niger, (2 vols. ) (Paris, 1912), i, 141–2.Google Scholar French officials had a similar controversy among themselves concerning the ‘Birifo’. Delafosse counted them among the ‘groupe Mossi’ on linguistic grounds (ibid. 312–13), Labouret, while H. later insisted that they belonged to the ‘rameau Lobi’ because of their physique and ‘coutumes’ (Les tribus du Rameau Lobi [Paris, 1931], 45–7).Google Scholar For a recent linguistic critique of Labouret's thesis, see Miehe, G., ‘L’abandon de la langue ou de la culture: le signifié et le signifiant dans quelques langues du rameau Lobi’, in Fieloux, M. et al. (eds.), Images d'Afrique et sciences sociales: les pays lobi, birifor et dagara (Paris, 1993), 39–49.Google Scholar

60 Captain Moutray Read, report on a tour of inspection through the ‘Lobi country’in 1905, GNA, ADM 56/1/50.

61 Chief Commissioner Morris to Governor of the Gold Coast, 6 Feb. 1904, PRO, CO 96/417, enclosure 1 in Gold Coast Confidential of II Mar. 1904.

62 Rattray, R. S., The Tribes of Ashanti Hinterland (2 vols. ) (Oxford, 1932), ii, 425.Google Scholar

63 Baumann, H., Thurnwald, R. and Westermann, D., Völkerkunde von Afrika mil besonderer Beriücksichtigung der kolonialen Aufgabe (Essen, 1940), 345–46.Google Scholar See Miiller, K. E., ‘Grundzüge des ethnologischen Historismus’, in Schmied-Kowarzik, W. and Stagl, J. (eds.), Grundfragen der Ethnologie (Berlin, 1981), 193–231Google Scholar, for an overview of German and Austrian cultural diffusionism; see Kuklick, , Savage, c h. 4Google Scholar, for variants that were popular in Britain. Incidentally, the Lawra District Commissioner and amateur historian, Duncan-Johnstone, mentioned that he had read Frobenius (Informal Diaries, Oxford, Rhodes House Library, Duncan-Johnstone Papers, Mss. Afr. s. 593).

64 Chief Commissioner Armitage, report on land tenure and taxes, Aug. 1914, PRO, CO 96/548 No. 42088, enclosure 1.

65 Interestingly, it was assumed that the Dagarti immigrants had imposed their language (‘Mole-Dagbane’) on the Lobi indigenes, though this contradicted general trends in language change that had already been established by Westermann. The alleged ‘intermarriage’ of immigrants with autochthonous women would have resulted in the survival of the original language, but the hypothesis of a Lobi-Dagarti mixture must have been politically so attractive that potential objections were set aside. For a discussion of migration and linguistic change, see Goody, J., ‘Marriage policy and incorporation in northern Ghana’, in Cohen, R. and Middleton, J. (eds.), From Tribe to Nation in Africa (Scranton, 1970), 117–23.Google Scholar

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67 Delafosse, , Haul-Sénégal-Niger, i, 312–13.Google Scholar Unlike in his writings on the savanna states, Delafosse quoted no sources in support of these assertions. Labouret later criticized his isolation from the local population, dependence on interpreters and Mande bias (Tribus, 15–17). For a discussion of the theoretical framework of Delafosse and Labouret, see Hoven, E. Van, ‘Representing social hierarchy: administrators-ethnographers in the French Sudan: Delafosse, Monteil and Labouret’, Cah. Ét. Afr., cxvIII (1990), 179–98.Google Scholar

68 Intelligence report of June 1921, GNA, ADM 61/5/11, Lawra District Record Book, 287. For details on slave-raiding in the north-west during the latter part of the 19th century, see Holden, J. J., ‘The Zaberima conquest of North-West Ghana’, Trans. Hist. Soc. Ghana, vIII (1965), 60–86Google Scholar; Wilks, , Wa, ch. 5 and 6.Google Scholar

69 See Kuklick, , Imperial Bureaucrat, 8–11, 45–52, for more details.Google Scholar

70 To distinguish the ‘Lobi’ of Lawra from the ‘Lobi proper’ in French territory, Duncan-Johnstone introduced the term ‘Lobi Burifo’; intelligence report of June 1921, GNA, ADM 61/5/11, Lawra District Record Book, 253–4

71 Ibid 256–58, 285.

72 Eyre-Smith, R. St. J., A Brief Review of the History and Social Organisation of the Peoples of the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast (Accra, 1933), 12.Google Scholar

73 Earlier British documents leave no doubt that some of these ‘minor kingdoms’, as enumerated by Eyre-Smith, did not exist prior to British rule, e. g. Lambussie and Zini.

74 Ibid. 2.

75 See Labouret, , Tribus, 29–30Google Scholar on the ‘Birifor’, and Labouret, H., Nouvelles notes sur les tribus du rameau Lobi, leurs migrations, leur évolution, leurs parlers et ceux delleurs voisins (Dakar, 1958), 31–2Google Scholar, on the ‘Wilé’ and ‘Dagaba’.

76 Rattray, Tribes, i, p. vii.

77 Eyre-Smith, , Brief Review, 11.Google Scholar

78 H. A. Blair, typescript on the Northern Territories, without title or date, Oxford, Rhodes House Library, Mss. Afr. s. 626.

79 ‘Dagati’ peasants in reply to a questionnaire of 1924, in preparation of a new Native Lands Ordinance; GNA, ADM 56/1/375, 10.

80 Cardinall, A. W., The Natives of the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast (London, 1920), 2.Google Scholar

81 For a similar case of insulation against all contrafactual evidence, see Leach, E., ‘Aryan invasions over four millennia’, in Ohnuki-Tierney, E. (ed.), Culture through Time: Anthropological Approaches (Stanford, 1990), 227–45.Google Scholar

82 For a brief summary of major trends in African(ist) history and bibliographic references, see Freund, B., The Making of Contemporary Africa (London, 1984), 1–15, 289–91CrossRefGoogle Scholar; also Jewsiewicki, B. and Newbury, D. (eds.), African Historiographies: Which History for Which Africa? (Beverly Hills, 1986).Google Scholar

83 See, for instance, Ferguson, P. and Wilks, I., ‘Chiefs, constitutions and the British in Northern Ghana’, in Crowder, M. and Ikime, O. (eds.), West African Chiefs: Their Changing Status under Colonial Rule and Independence (Ife-Ife, 1970), 326–69Google Scholar; Goody, J., ‘The over-kingdom of Gonja’, in Forde, D. and Kaberry, P. M. (eds.), West African Kingdoms in the Nineteenth Century (London, 1967), 179–205Google Scholar; Izard, M., Introduction à l'histoire du royaume Mossi (Paris, 1970)Google Scholar; Jones, D. H., ‘Jakpa and the foundation of Gonja’, Trans. Hist. Soc. Ghana, vi (1962), 1–29Google Scholar; Staniland, M., The Lions of Dagbon: Political Change in Northern Ghana (Cambridge, 1975)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Wilks, ‘Mossi’.

84 On the ‘difficulties of writing a history of stateless societies’, see Horton, , ‘Stateless societies’, 87–9.Google Scholar Significantly, archaeological research was not constrained by such considerations; see Davies, O. ‘The invaders of northern Ghana: what archaeologists are teaching the historians’, Universitas, iv (Accra, 1961), 134–6Google Scholar; and on the history of archaeology in northern Ghana, Anquandah, J., Rediscovering Ghana's Past (London, 1982), 212–9, 72–80.Google Scholar

85 For the most influential formulation of this dichotomy, see the introduction to Fortes, M. and Evans-Pritchard, E. E. (eds.), African Political Systems (London, 1940), 1–23Google Scholar; for a pertinent critique, see Sharpe, B., ‘Ethnography and a regional system: mental maps and the myth of States and tribes in north-central Nigeria’, Critique of Anthropology, vi (1986), 33–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

86 For a relevant discussion of the tensions between anthropology and history, see Hart, K., ‘The social anthropology of West Africa’, Annual Review of Anthropology, xIv (1985), 243–72CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ekeh, P., ‘Social anthropology and two contrasting uses of tribalism in Africa’, Comp. Studies Soc. Hist., xxxII (1990), 662–73Google Scholar; and Goody's, J. recent critique of the ahistoricism of early ethnographies, ‘The political systems of the Tallensi and their neighbours 1888–1915, Cambridge Anthropology, xIv (1990), 1–25.Google Scholar

87 See, for instance, Fage, J. D., A History of West Africa (Cambridge, 1969, first edition 1955)Google Scholar; Davidson, B., Buah, F. K. and Ajayi, J. F. A., The Growth of African Civilisation: A History of West Africa 1000–1800, (London, 1965)Google Scholar; Boahen, A. A., Topics in West African History (London, 1966)Google Scholar; Stride, G. T. and Ifeka, C., Peoples and Empires of West Africa: West Africa in History 1000–1800 (Walton-on-Thames, 1971)Google Scholar; and the chapters by Levtzion, N. on North-West Africa in the Cambridge History of Africa, Vols. 3 and 4 (Cambridge, 1975, 1977).Google Scholar For a discussion of the Ibadan school of history, from which most of these authors spring, see Lovejoy, P. E., ‘Nigeria: The Ibadan School and its critics’, in Jewsiewicki, and Newbury, (eds.), African Historiographies, 197–205Google Scholar; C. Neale, ‘The idea of progress in the revision of African history, 1960–1970’, Ibid. 112–22.

88 In addition, diffusionist approaches to the history of the Black Volta region continue to exist in their own right; see Westermann, D., Geschichte Afrikas: Staatenbildung südlich der Sahara (Köln, 1952), 178–201Google Scholar; Dittmer, K., ‘Die Obervolta-Provinz’, in Baumann, H. (ed.), Die Völker Afrikas und ihre traditionellen Kulturen (2 vols. ) (Wiesbaden, 1979), ii, 495–542Google Scholar; McCall, D. F., ‘Probing Lo Bir History’ in Le sol, la parole et l'écrit: 2000 ans d'histoire africaine. Mélange en hommage à Raymond Mauny (2 vols. ) (Paris, 1981), i, 361–73.Google Scholar

89 Buah, F. K., A History of West Africa from AD 1000 (London, 1986), ix.Google Scholar See also Falola, T. and Adebayo, A. G., A History of West Africa (A. D. 1000–1984) (Lagos, 1985);Google ScholarBuah, F. K., West Africa and Europe. A New History for Schools and Colleges (London, 1967)Google Scholar; Onwubiko, K. B. C., School Certificate History of West Africa A. D. 1000–1800 (Onitsha, 1967).Google Scholar For Ghanaian history in school-books for juniors, see Maté, C. M. O., A Visual History of Ghana (London, 1968)Google Scholar, who has the ancestors of Ghanaians immigrating from Arabia and Asia; and Fynn, J. K., A Junior History of Ghana (London, 1975)Google Scholar, who echoes Rattray.

90 Ranger, T. O. (ed.), Emerging Themes in African History (London, 1968), xxi.Google Scholar

91 See, for instance, Rodney, W., How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (London, 1972)Google Scholar; Nkrumah, K., Class Struggle in Africa (London, 1970)Google Scholar; Coquery-Vidrovitch, C., ‘Recherches sur un mode de production africain’, La Pensée, cxlIv (1969), 61–78Google Scholar; Terray, E., Le marxisme devant les sociétées primitives (Paris, 1969).Google Scholar

91 Research in this vein on northern Ghana has focused on the colonial ‘underdevelopment’ of the region. See Bening, R. B., ‘Colonial development policy in northern Ghana, 1898–1950’, Bulletin of the Ghana Geographical Association, xvII (1975), 65–79Google Scholar; and ‘N. K. Plange, ‘The colonial state in northern Ghana: the political economy of pacification’, Review of African Political Economy, xxxi (1984), 29–43.Google Scholar For a discussion of the impact of French colonialism on Dagara society, see the works of N. C. Somda, a student of Coquery-Vidrovitch, ‘La pénétration coloniale en pays Dagara, 1897–1914’ (M. A. thesis, Université de Paris VII, 1975), and ‘Les mutations sociaux-politiques dus à l'implantation colonial française 1896–1933’ (Ph. D. thesis, Université de Paris VII, 1984).

93 Unlike S. Feierman, who defined ‘intellectuals’ as all those engaged in ‘socially recognized organizational, directive, educative, or expressive activities’ (Peasant Intellectuals: Anthropology and History in Tanzania [Madison, 1990], 17–18)Google Scholar, I use the term in a more conventional sense. Dagara historiographers are men with a formal education, priests, school-teachers, university lecturers or students, who derive their livelihood from their ‘intellectual’ activities. Because of their close home ties and leadership role in the Dagara community, they could be described as ‘organic intellectuals’, to use Gramsci's term. But through their work in national or church institutions, they also perform the functions of ‘traditional intellectuals’. For further details, see Lentz, C., ‘Home, death and leadership - discourses of an educated elite from northwestern Ghana’, Social Anthropology, 11 (forthcoming, 1994).Google Scholar

94 See, for instance, Tuurey, , Introduction, 25Google Scholar; Der, , ‘Origins’, 12–14.Google Scholar

95 Somda, N. C., ‘Les origines des Dagara’, Papers in Dagara Studies, 1 (1989), 6.Google Scholar

96 The tensions between written and oral history have been frequently discussed; see, for instance, Goody, Interface; Henige, Chronology; Law, ‘How truly’; Peel, ‘Making history’.

97 Hébert, Esquisse, 260, my translation

98 Ibid. 2.

99 Girault, L., ‘Essai sur la religion des Dagara’, Bulletin de l'I. F. A. N., série B, xx (1959), 329.Google Scholar

100 Girault accordingly derives the name ‘Dagara’ from da-gâare, to buy a saddle. See ‘Le verbe en Dagara et les families de verbes dérivés’, Actes du Second Collogue International de Linguistique Négro-Africaine (Dakar, 1962), 173.Google Scholar

101 Esquisse, 25–6. Prior to Hébert, B. Some, in a short article that is, to my knowledge, the very first publication by a Dagara intellectual on history, had placed oral traditions, which have the Dagara originate in north-western Ghana, side by side with a citation of Girault's Mossi origin, without using the former to criticize the latter (‘Quelques sources’, 41–3).

102 Esquisse, 28–32.

103 Ibid. 33–40.

104 Etymology plays a central role in Dagara intellectuals’ discussions concerning origins. Hébert's informant had suggested that dà meant ‘to buy’, gaara ‘ in revolt’, and Da-gara ‘ a man in revolt against the Dagomba who buys prisoners’, but Hébert disagreed himself and proposed da = deb ‘ man’ instead (ibid. 30). B. Der and others from the Nandom area adopted Hébert's interpretation (‘Origins’, 3). The linguist S. Bemile accepts gaara, in revolt, but takes da for a prefix indicating the past tense (personal communication); while P. A. Somé, also a linguist but from a different dialect area, explains Dagàrà as ‘man who is about to depart, travel, march’ (Systématique, 14). S. W. D. K. Gandah, from Birifu near Lawra, believes that formerly Dagara, or more specifically Dagara zusoola (‘beings with black hair’), simply meant ‘human race’ as opposed to Dagara zuzie (‘beings with red hair’, i. e. fairies) (personal communication).

105 Esquisse, 31–2.

106 See, for instance, Somda, , ‘Origines’, 6–10.Google Scholar

107 Esquisse, 32.

108 Ibid. 39, 100.

109 See Somda, ‘Origines’. Somda is well aware of the commonsense feeling of many Ghanaian colleagues that an Accra origin is implausible. But although not speculating on the motives for emigration, he insists that this is what Dagara villagers in Burkina Faso told him. There is no obvious explanation for this claim except, perhaps, that in view of Mossi dominance in Burkina and the fact that the Mossi and Dagomba claim common origins, non-Mossi might wish to give themselves an origin as distant as possible from these ruling groups. Some other non-Mossi peoples in southern Burkina also seem to trace their origins back to Accra.

110 Bekye, P. K., Divine Revelation and Traditional Religions with Particular Reference to the Dagaaba of West Africa (Rome, 1991), 106.Google Scholar

111 Introduction, 5. Tuurey came from the southern dialect area, hence the use of the term ‘Dagaba’, which he believed to be a corruption of ‘Dagomba’ (ibid. 13–14). ‘Mole'’is synonymous with Mooré, the language spoken by the Mossi, closely related to Dagara; what most linguists now designate as the ‘Oti-Volta group’, comprising Frafra, Mooré, Dagara, Mampruli, Dagbani, etc., was formerly often called ‘Mole-Dagbani’: see Naden, T., ‘The Gur languages’, in Kropp-Dakubu, M. E. (ed.), The Languages of Ghana (London, 1988), 15–20.Google Scholar

112 Cited in Tuurey, , Introduction, 11.Google Scholar

113 Jones, , ‘Jakpa’, 9.Google Scholar Jones himself based himself on Goody's suggestion that ‘in view of the violence of the invasion [of Na Nyagse] it would seem probable that there was a certain degree of dispersal of the original inhabitants towards the west [sic - Goody has “east”], and that these now form the basis of the Mossi speakers in the area with which we are concerned’, i. e. the north-west (Ethnography, 16).

114 Tamakloe, , Brief History, 16–18Google Scholar, does not give the reasons for the killing of the earth-priests by Na Nyagse nor the reactions to it. Rattray held that they were put to death ‘because they declared that the land belonged to them’ (Tribes, ii, 563). However, there appears to exist no Dagomba tradition that would report a secession of part of the population towards the west; see also Benzing, B., Die Geschichte und das Herrschaftssystem der Dagomba (Meisenheim am Glan, 1971), 102–106Google Scholar; Staniland, Lions.

115 Tuurey, , Introduction, 29–31.Google Scholar

116 Ibid. 5.

117 See Fernandez, J., ‘The experience of returning to the whole’, in Persuasions and Performances: The Play of Tropes in Culture (Bloomington, 1986), 188–213.Google Scholar

118 Der, , ‘Origins’, 12.Google Scholar

119 Tuurey, , Introduction, 11.Google Scholar

120 Ibid. 7.

121 Ibid. 47–48.

122 Martin, D. -C., ‘The choices of identity’, paper presented at a conference on ‘Ethnicity, Identity and Nationalism in South Africa: Comparative Perspectives’ (Grahamstown, 1993), 5–11.Google Scholar

123 There is, however, agreement that the Manlarla (or Manharla) chiefs of Kaleo, north of Wa, spring from the Mossi royal family; see, for instance, Hébert, , Esquisse, 164–65Google Scholar; Tuurey, , Introduction, 49Google Scholar; Der, , ‘Origins’, 16.Google Scholar

124 Somda, , ‘Origines’, 4.Google Scholar

125 Tuurey, , Introduction, 47.Google Scholar

126 Ibid.

127 Ibid. 47–8.

128 Ibid. 67.

129 Ibid. 64.

130 Ibid. 22.

131 Ibid. 33.

132 Der, , “Origins’, 4, 14.Google Scholar

134 Ibid. 20.

134 Ibid.

135 Ibid. 21.

136 ‘The Christianisation of the Dagara within the Horizon of the West European Experience’ (Ph. D. thesis, Munster, 1986), 91Google Scholar

137 Ibid. 104.

138 Ibid. 91, 104. See Dabire, C. G., ‘Nisaal: l'homme comme relation’ (Ph. D. thesis, Université Laval, 1983), 104Google Scholar; and Kuukure, E., The Destiny of Man: Dagaare Beliefs in Dialogue with Christian Eschatology (Frankfurt a. M., 1985), 23–8Google Scholar, for a similar line of argument, which seems to prevail among the Catholic clergy.

139 Christianisation, 104–5.

140 Bekye, , Divine Revelation, 95–6.Google Scholar

414 As I could not be present at the conference myself, I rely here on information from some of the participants.

142 An exception is where opponents invoke a group's ‘foreign’ origins. For instance, when in a conflict over land rights between Dagara from Nandom and Sisala from Lambussie, the local Sisala youth association tried to undermine the Dagara farmers’ claims by referring to their Lobi ancestors and the latter's alleged immigration from Burkina Faso, the Nandome youth association drew on Der's Dagomba origin thesis to reject the accusation.

143 Certainly, Dagomba intellectuals do not appear to be aware of the new Dagara histories. However, the recent conflicts with the Konkomba show how historiography can be exploited in current politics.

144 Despite new trends in research, history textbooks still focus strongly on state formation and are guided by the assumption that except for some primitive autochthones, every tribe worth mentioning migrated from somewhere; see the references in footnotes 87 and 89. In this vein, a Dagara friend once told me an interesting story why he thought that many of the Nandom chiefly family give their clan an Accra or Cape Coast origin. When students of the Tamale Government Secondary School in the 1950s were asked about their tribes’ pasts during history classes, the Dagomba and Mamprusi boys mentioned their famous ancestor Tohazie, the Red Hunter, coming from Lake Chad, while the Gonja talked of Jakpa's victories. The children of the Nandom chief's house, not wanting to be left out, claimed an even more impressive origin for their family and tribe in Accra and Cape Coast. On their next visit home, they discussed their narrative with their elders.

145 ‘The past’, 205.

146 Ibid. 203.