The Kusasis-A Short Histroy (2)

,t.1 1370
.r .1 .__ r
'rIlE I(USASIS
.....
,A SHORrr HISTORY
by
J. K. G. SYME

" , ...

,
1\ .....
'
~,.'
I
'\ '.
,· <m ,
,. em •
(' .
\", I'~ "
( ,
,. :\. . ~
Ib
n , IT IS BmTER .. "
':5" 1) -
1Tf/.EJ! A J,;AN SHOULD \ ".
, ~ . \~'
I bVI A SPEAR AT HI~ ~ ....
"' (~ .
I
Q • t
•
•
.-: ~ TIIAli JilAKE ' FALSE ,. ".
, :"..... ACUUSATIOl-lS AGAINSr lilli
,
/
" BllilND HIe
"~,~: , ,
/,
c '
-'i)
"* :'
............... ...
. .
'. .
{~ng attributed '-: "
~ to ~" Ataoia, the 11 , '.
Na O:L Mampruaa1.} ..,'
~ ~ .............. .. .... . . " .......... " .... .

Us. Kulba fi
CON T B N T S.
Forew~rd.
Introduotion.
Chapter 1.
Historioal -Bungvla - The olans - Origin - Comparison with
people of Southern Nubs. - Kusa.si Legend.
Chapter 11.
Culture and Social Or~a.niza.tion
Kalensinaba - BUn[,'Vla - The 1amprussiChiefs.
Chapter 111.
- Gumbonaba, Kusanaba. and
Consit1tution, Past and Present - Only Chiets were the
Tindana.s - Evolution of the Chiefs - Ocoupation ot TOGO by
the Germans - Eleotion of Trmbal Chief-- Present Organization
- Looal ~prussis often now Kusasis in all but name.
Chapter IV.
Religion - Kusasis have no .h1ehomecian traits - Death -
Burial - ~ourning
- Importanoe attaohed to Religion.
Chapter V.
The .lloronaba and Sanganaba.
Bungwa.
Chapter Vl.
Chapter V1l.
Foundation of the various Chieftainships and brief his-tory
histories of their people. eV/'A no NA nA AN'D 1(~s.tNtl"''Al
NOTABLE BATT~.
Page.

(Jontents .•
Seteem, Uhief of dawku k111ed by d\lsangas.
b h.ulba overruns Kusasi; but is repUlsed at
!g011e hill.
'
Arazubi, Uhief or tiinduri, and U8I'Unaba lead
the daZaberimies into a trap.
Bazaber1m1ea and Uhakosis overrun Togole.nd.
58.
, 66.
Bazaber1mies drive the inhabitants from W1rinyanga.61.
Chief of 'ranga-Dambungu-fignts hia brother, Obie! ..
ot L\.UI'UgU lover the !~ash1 P • JJ.
Uhlef of Bimsni .. Beriga,fights Yinga.dama over the
Naship. 14.
Na Beriga brings an army against the people of
Kugri. 90.
APPBND1X A.
List of Chiefs and Sub-Ghiefs(Kpamberi).
APPENDIX
.. .. . .... ~.' .. .. , ",'
Genealogiaa.l tree of the Na.s of Mampruss1.
B
APPENDIX
a
JdAMPRUSSI LAWS OF SUCCESSION.
APPENDIX
., .
D
h9.p ot Kusas! •
{

~ 0 R E ~ A R D •
.. --:000:---......
It is with some trepidation that I let this.
small work leave my hands at all, for I mow that it is
very incomplete, and no doubt full of inaccuracies.
However, if it sarves a useful purpose, by providing a
foundation upon which more oapable people than I can
gradually build up the true facts I shall feel that the
hours spent upon ~t were not altogether wa.sted.
With the 6Aoeption of one or two faots taken from.
the Distriot Record Book, nearly everything from start
to finish has been told me by the old men and the Chiefs.
Owing to the amount of Hausa that 1s spoken in the Distric.t
I was able to gather a great deal of my information ?1ithout
the aid of an interpreter.
My thanks are due to many of the Chiefs for the
assista:.la.e \vtioh they have given me, but espeoially to
Yakubu Mampruss1, brother of the Chief of Bawku.
The wordrtSeation 't has been used throughout instead
of ,tV1l1age" ~s
'7I\.M.1..
being"appropriate in a oountry where a
small village usaally covers many square miles of oountry.
With about three exceptions there is no part maere one can
see houses olustered together in the form of a townShip.
T.ney are scattered all aver the oountryside at irre~ular
interva.ls. , ./

Actuall,;l, ho.rever, the lr.nd slopes steadily
~
upli:ards
'rh2..t part of the Kusasi Tribe which
lives in mglish Territory occupies the fertile
lands which lie North of the Gambaga Scarp and
£astof tho Red Volta.
Unlike some of their
neighbours furtnl)r ,{est they are blessed with an
ample food supply, while their oattle are
considered among the best in U18 country.
The area these people inhabit is Imown as the
Kusasi District, though aotually now-a-days,
owing mostly to immigration from French Country,
the Kusasis only fonn about two thirds of the
total population and even many of theseare only
Kusasis in name.
In some densely populated
sections there are no Kusasis at all.
The principal town and Administrative Headquarters
is Bawku, but it is conunon to refer to the whole
District by that name.
A corruption of the
kamprussi vrord "BOKU" it means a "HOLE" or
ltU.lil'R.i!i6.5ION tI ,
and this is what the country looks
like I/hen vi8wed from the top of the GElJubaga
Scarp in kar ;prussi •

11.
upwards from the foot of the Scarp, until at
Bawku itself one is 1)00 ft. above sea-level. or
praotioally as high as the Soarp.
TheDistriot 1s bisected by the White. Volta.
and, as already mentioned, the Red Volta forms
the west boundary.
':Che land between the two rivers is knmm
locally as TOEND1'1iA, while that to the East of
the White Volta is termed AGOLLE, after a looal
fetish hill near Bawku.
Toendema is the part where we. find the real
Kusasis in greatest nem.bers.
Before migrating
southwards they had been concentrated for many
years round Yuiga, Zaw§a and Biery;u, which
v
places are just north of the present Anglo-Frenoh
boundary.
Kusasis.
!hey are still thiokly populated by
It is mostly the Zawga and Biengu
people whom we know in Toendema, the few real
Kusasis of long stamding in Agolle having oome
from Yuiga" ~ z ~ '\ "
~ Apart from the more recent influenoe of
Moshi, Busanga, B'moba and others Agolle was
originally largely inhabited by Nabnambas, who
trace

ill.
tra.oe tneil' origin to the Frafra oountry ~ 'r'
The 1ia.m.prussi Chiefs Clame in from Gamba.ga,
bringing many people with them, among whom the
~a.ramba.s were perhaps the most numero~. They are
of ~ussi origin, but are supposed to belong to
the Da.gbondurisi group, who are rather more primitive
than other hla.mprussis, and great eaters of dogs-meat.
They are now very numerous indeed, but both the
--- _ .... -
Nabnambas
and Uaramba~ regard themselves as Kusasis,
as also do the Ba.mshis, who Oame with the first
Chief of Binduri from Ma.mprussi. the Goashis who
say they fell down from the sky in a tornado, and
, .,,,.'" eM I the Pusiga people who are alleged to have desoended
). "'1"' ~ ... , !:. t ~ .. \' I
" , 1" .... l . I,
. 'tt:': tl:,. ,1 :,).o.I')rom above by a rope ladder • .
SUch being the oonditions it is no wonder that
the oha.raoteristias of the people in the two halves
of the Distriot vary oonsiderably.
The people of Yuiga, Zawga, Biengu and Toendema.
are all very similar, but the AgoUe people are
notioeably different in many small w~s;
In the old ~s every village was a.t enmity
with its aeighbours, and the idea of a.nybo~ orossing
nl

1. .....
orossing from Toendama to Agol18~
or vice versa,
was almost unheard of.
~~sangaa
to the north and Bazaber1m1ea. to
the east oonsidered allot them tair 8por~ tor
periodioal raids. and the Kusasie generally seem
to have oome oft worst in the enooun.ters.
'l:he oountry WD.S
never ravaged, however, by
the sle,var-raidar Barbatu, who appears to have
oonfine!d his attention to the people further West.
The last f1ghting on any saale whiah took
place was in about 1895 when the people of Kugri
1naul ted the Na of Ma.mprussi and refused to make
amends.
The Na (oer1gaj sent an army against them,
but it was de'feated and driven bo.ok to Gambe.ga by
~he
KUgris, ~o reoeived help from many Kusasi
olans against the oommon foe.
The Na was
preparing to send a larger foroe when the opportune
arrival of the Yrhi teman in Gambe.ga made further
hostilities impossible.
It was not until t909 that Bawku station was
first established by ~
Lieut. F.N.F.Jaokson.
~
(NoW Major F.U.F_JaOkSOn; C.l1.G.,D.s..O.,C.C.N.T.J
t

v.
On the outbree,k of the war J
the District
Commissioner. the Detaohment, and all officials
withdrew to Gambaga Oth August, 191-4)-.
But it
was found neoessary to reopen the atation again
in December: and at a great gathering on 5th
December in Bawku the Chiefs and Headmen expressed
th~ir
grat1f:ioation. at the Gov~rnment' s. action.
Later the sta.t1on was closed again. but. it was
reopened on 3td .. October. t9~.
In the years of peace. that have followed our
occupation of Gambaga the popUlation of the
Kusas! District. haa inoreased eL Jrmously I
and,
with the fear of raids by Bazaberimies and
Busangas no longer ever present, the people have
been able to $pread much further afield, so that
miles of country which was. uninhabited thirty or
forty years. ~o is now dotted allover with
oompounds ..
Toendeme. and !galla are reconciled to each
other, and the Chiefs of both are oolted under
a single leader- the Chief of Bawku.
So tar as. Agolle. is. concerned much of Bawlru
is. now inhabited by Bussngas, Pusiga is. full of
,/ Yangas

vi.
Yangas, andilokambo is composed largely ot Btmobas.
~~t with these newcomers spreading themselvea
every whf?l'8.. in addition to the earlier penetretion
ot Nabnambas, Narambas, and others.. alread1
mentioned,?becomas obvious that there 1s
difficulty in finding a typiaal Kusasi in Agolle
at all, if one disoounts the reoent imm1grante
from Toendema/who in the last tan years have
orossed the Volta in great numbers.

CHAPTER. 1
HISTORICAL.
When writing ot the. Kusasia one has to
rememb8l' tha~ the name Kusasi is really ~ry vague when
referring to the people of !golle, and not alwaya aor~eo.t
even in the case ot Toendema.
For it is aonstantly used
a.1-
to inalude people who aI'evtrue Kusasia at all. ~e . tribe
was originally quite small, and it 1s only in aOInparativeJ.y
recent years that a large population has grown up
consisting of people known as Kusasis.
Actually a very
large proportion of these people are the dasaebdants of
unions between Kusasia and imported slaves, male and female·
Others are the descendants of Moshi, Grunshi and
B'moba ~anta (to mention a few only) who have aome in
:,Q IJA (l
at different timea in sUClh of better lands than their own,
and who tor generatiOns have intemarried with the Kusa.sia ..
Strangely enough ~t
was during the raids of Barbatu and
his predece $sors. ,:wong the Kassana,
Bu11sa and Sissale.
tribea that the Kusasia prospefed ~ost in the matter ot
alavea.
Though they had attacked frQDl the East in earlier
days. the Bazaberimiea never arossed the led Volta from the
! 0
II
~
'v

2...
w.eat so the tew Kusasia dotted about tha place lived in
oomparative p8alle. when they ware not ti&htin& either am.on~
themselves or with their neighbours to the North.
At that time ~at oaravana at Hause. and Moshi traders
used to make theu way down to Sal~a and they were in the
I
habit o! stay~ a month or so at Tenkudugu to break the
journey. From there horses and tina ~CJWIla used to be sent
aver to the Bazaberimiea leader under a strong asoort
provided by the Busanp Chie! at Tenkudugu..
Slaves. would
be ~ven in exoban~e and brought baok to Tenkudugu. The
Caravan owning them used them to prooeed on down to Bawku,
where Kusasis llv~ under the proteotion ot the Mamprussi
crua! ot Ba.wku used to oome in end buy many ot the slsvaa
tor oattle and oowrias.
One good male slave was worth
four o.ovs and a tamale five.
The. people ot Binduri used
to do the S8JIle in a small wa.y as the Caravan passed through,
but the people ot Simebaga. were in those. days too taw in
number,~too poor in cattle, to go 10 for slaves much.
The Caravan I s. next.. stopping plaoe was Gambaga, where m.any
more sla.ves, were dispose.d of, and then the long journey to
Salaga was. commenoed.
.)alaga was the slave market par
exoellenoa. and here the Ashantis used to bring their ko~

3·
and English oloths with which to purchase them.
The ohildren of the slaves bought by the Kusas1s were
invariably absorbed into the tribe and known as Kusas1s,
and by the third generation they would all bear Kusasi
fao1al mar kings.
It is not difficult to obtain oorroboration for the
above statement.
At Zabugu, some four miles south of
Bawku, there was until fairly recently a man oalled
Agbenga Kusasi who bought a Busanga named Akorli.
This
slave had many children by Kusasi women and many of them
are still alive.
They have Busanga markings but oall
themselves Kusasis, while their own children, besides
oalling themselves Kusasi, have aotually got Kusasi
markings.
Even the CJ;lief of Timoni, who has been entered
in the Chiefs t
List for years as a Kusasi, 1s really of
Kasaena origin, for his grandfather Hauya came from
Janogo in the Kassena oountry and settled at Peregu in
Teshi.
Thus the KUBaSi
popula tion, as we !mow it to-day,
has grown out of a heterogenous orowd ot people.
Indeed
though the tribe is still fairly pure in Toendema, it is

4.
hardly an exaggeration to say that among the 54,OOO~
so-called Kusasis in !golle it is the exaeption rather
than the rule to meet a full-blooded one.
*" ~~ore the time ot the BazaberWe. in the Grunahi
\; ,
ao~try, when Mahama (Seteem) was Chief of Bawku (about ~820)
It
the town of Bawku had about five large aompounds.
~ ~
Certainly he had a few followers in the sections of Zorse,
Yara.gungu, Tampiellm, Pwalagu;' Palweyga, Sapelliga, Nyokko,
Bawkuzua, and perhaps one or two others, but the rest of
the present-day sections were bush.
Binduri, whioh in those days extended muoh further
west and south than it does now, was almost worse of', for
the Chakosis had raided the inhabitants and m.eny of them
1,
had fled to Yuiga.
The. 1iamprussi Chief of Binduri stopped
with some of them at Tangsia, but it was only after the
death of Chief Sanida that many of the refugees returned
from. Yuiga and settled at what is now known as Binduri.
where they were later Joined by the new Chief Winyam.
As reoently as )5 years ago Sinnebaga. was a village
olose by the Morago river with five oompounds.
The Chief
had a few people in the bush as well, e.g. a.t potw1a but
•
l',I'Nhen spea~ of Agolle the Mandated port1on of the
.Distriot 18 lUoluded unless otherwise stated.

but his influence did not extend far * and his so-called
sub-chiet of Songo had only three large. compounds. wer
which he oould olaim to rule.
Bawku, Sinnebaga and Binduri are three of :';!ive
hlamprussi Chiefs living among the Kusaais, and more will
be said about them later on.
Similar conditions to those stated above exis.ted in
other parts of Kusasi country forty or fifty years ago.
Kugri and Binaba were praotically uniQhabited.
Wlth the exception of a. few B'mobas. in Wokambo the
vinole of the Mandated Area was a wilderness wi.thin living
memory and even to-day the name for this part is Tempenga, 7
meaning bush.
Even the plaoaters of the great fetish Bungwa at
Pusiga, nine miles east of Bawku in the 1landated Area.l and
burial plaoe of the first known Na of mamprussi and
Dagomba, lived in Sarabogo
close to Bawku.
Originally the people of Dagbon had spent some time
a.t Pusiga, but after the death of Bungwa. (Gbewa in Dagomba)
they appear to have wsaed with the Grumas. and passed on to
-rh~re are s.iX now including Nokambo but in those days
. the Chief of Wokambo lived away to the East in the proper
B'moba country.

o.
1iampW'uga near Sansane-:"'ango
The remains . of little mosq,ues, have been seen a.t
PUI11ga by people still' living, but nO\,i, with the enormoua
growth of population, these have all been swept awe;y.
Perhaps they were built by ~ohamedan
followers of Bungwa.
As just explained the real Kusasis were never very·
numerous.
Yet few as they were they were originally
divided into many small clans, eaoh more or less distinot
from the others,and each possessing its own nama.
Thus
there were the Bimbas, the Gbingbingas, and the Gballis,
to mention some of the more important ones only.
Later
they became lmown oolleotively as Kusasis, and now there
has been a grElat deal of intermarriage between the
different groups.
The Kusasis are only one of many peoples who went
through this process of evolution.
The Zulus, for
instanoe, did just the same, but they advanoed a step
fW'ther than the Kusasis ever did by finding a leader who
united them into a single unit.
Ocoasionally the Kusasis
appear to have formed themselves into a loose sort of
" aonfederation for the pW'pose of resisting the OODlIllon foe,
but beyond that :iltardapendence did not exist.

7·
If one'asks a Kusasi where his~randfathersoame
tram
he will prQbably reply that as he was'nt there to see he
really does'nt know.
If he ~athers what one is dr1viJli
at, however, he may say they oame from Zaw~a,
B1~ or
Y~a.
It he belongs to the Nabnamba-Kuaasi olan he may
s~ that he Baa never heard of any home other than the
present one,
tho~ should he be a bit more intelligent
he will probably admit that his people were ori~inally
Nabdams from i~angocli in the FTafra oountry. Some say
they ca.L1e from Gambaga, e.i. the Naramba-Kusa.s1s, and the
people of Gumbo, ,Kwatiga (under Wokambo), and Potwia
(under Sinnebaga.).
But if one makes careful inquiry
;.lien told this it genera.lly transpires that their forebears
were lAamprussis who settled down in Kusasi and took Kusasi
Wives.
As already described the new-comers adopted the
oustoms
ot the oountry and after a generation or two their
desoendants became Kusasis to all intents and purposes.
It is most unlikely that the real Kusasis were ever in
Uamb~ at all.
The Goashi-Kusasis and the people Jf
pUs~, as mentioned in the introduotion, Will tell fairy
stories about their celestial or1.~.

8.
In the majority of aases. however,
if one presses
them to cast their minds still further be.ok the Kusas1s
will say that they have heard that in the dim past their
ancestors oame from far eYl~
to the East.
~ the lii.osb1 History -aritten by J .Witheraglll. which
consists of a collection of Ra.usa manuscripts, a story is
told oonoerning a oertain h!ialam. Gada J
the origin of the
Kusasis. end the meaning of their nama.
I do not propose
to query the authentioity of this typioal Hausa yarn. but
it will be sufficient to sayl that exhaustive en~leB have
failed to lead to the sllgntest bit of oorroboration.
Regarding the statement to the effect that the Kusasis
bear a kind of Zamfar~
faolal mark this is quite inoorrect,
and is evidently prompted by the faot that evell since . the
advent of luropeans Kusasl ohildren in growing numbers are
being given a Bort of fuamprussi mark. whioh 1s oonsidered
more attraotlve than the verry ela.bora.te Kusas1 markings,
and is muah easier to perform..
NoW that the need for
everybody to bear a mark by whioh he oan be reoognized
. is past the women give their ahildren any mark they fancy.
Some give none at all, and a you~oes himself to the
operator and instructs him as to the partioular,style of
bea.uty with wah he is to be adorned.

the Southern Nubs. men lnot the llubians of the Nile Valley)
and Ule black hillmen of ~ordofan and Darfur may exhibit
a rela.tionshi~with the pa~.;:lns of Northern ld.~eria and the
Northern l'erritories of the liold Coast.
Both physically
and oulturally the Kusasis \{Quld S6em to conform to this
theory, as oan be seen by oomparin~
their oharact.eristics
in the followi~ table wiT,1l those assigned by
Sel~18Jl
to the l'luba. people.
~ ~DA LTJ0.ri.SI
Average stature 68 ft • lwer8.f:,8 stature 67".
11011 go nal(sd, or with a skin Len formerly naked but now
suspended over the shoulders. usually wear lain cloth with
a skin suspended over the
shoulders ..
,lawen of both Vlear a bunch of leaves before
and behind.
I~either
Nuba nor Kusasi oiroumc ise their men nor
do they mutilate their \'wmen .
,lOmen of. beth wear quzrtz ornaments :in the lower lip.
Both Huba and Kusasi have a tree and stone cult,
resulting in rocks and clumps of trees being freq,uenUy
regarded as shrines:! ___________
An attempt was made to obtaj.n the' average Cephalic
index. of typical Kusasis, but owing to the inacouracy of the
home-made instrument used it is impossible to give e
reliable figure.

One interestin~ le~end oonoerning the orl~in
cf the Kusasi Tribe, as related by the people ot Tili, is
80S
follows:-
In the dim pn.st a man Oe.1l1d trom somewl1ere to Lhu
Nort,h with ti13 wife, and settlod at wha~ l~ now ~Cl.\{,;a
(in Prenoh rerr-iLol'Y,.
At this time thure vVa6 not a. s~le
person a.t law~,
but the t,;round was lnteate4 witn small
blaok ants, known in llioshi a.s
Sala.nsansi (Salansabt is
the sin[;ular).
The desoendants of the man and his wife
were very nwuerous and beoome known as Salansans1, but
~adua.lly this ~ ot oorrupted into Kusansi and now XU3.:lXlsi
is nearly invariably r endered as Kusas1.
Many years lat~er
tht;; Kusasis were viai t ed by a l\1osh1.
This man set tied among them and married some ot their
women.
His dwsaendants. were many and they were known a.s
Kusa-Moaga, to indiaata their mi.Xecl Kuaas1. and Moshi
antecedents.
Among these Kusa-Moaga peopla was a great slayer ot
men.
He used to waylay passar-by in t.he bush, engage
them in mortal combat, and bury their dead bodies on the
spot ..
,/&,C. "I
The Kusasi word for ~ave is "~ball1Jt
II
and that

11 •
is the name by which tha K .lsa-Lo~as.
came to bo known on
aao.ount of this man ..
Ap'tJarently the Kusasis(Salansansi)
tllemsalves used to eolleat ,round and wato.h. the Kusa-Moa~a
diggi.n& his viotims t graves, and asa result they in their
turn became dubbed J~ilbibsi
(Agilbib means oollect round)
hy the Kusa-Mo~as.
Before. they stal'ted pay~ eaoh other these
oomplira.en~s at Zawga, however J it is said that. some
descondants of the original Kusasis (Salansansi2 had moved
over to a place known as Kulsablafia (Rologo Sablaga ~
blac!c
strer;J1ll) north of Widinaba (English Territory}.
Here they
were joined later by the , ()ballis J
while the .Agilbibsi
remained behind at Zawga.
Some time later both KUsasis
and .~ballis
are said to have crossed over the hills to
Korobaga, which is part of Widinaba, and here they lived
tor a long time ..
Vtnen at Kulsablaga the Kusasis had become possessad
ot a powerful fetian and as a result the leader beoame
known as Kusanaba (Naba :. Chief).
On arrival at Korobaga. they f ound some people on the
land known as Gbir.u;b11' _,c.3 '1..'1d t.l1er.e they drove out, so
are
that they ran amm to ':""n~o i ri , 'rl:le.re they~to this dc.y ..

They also, however, are. said to be Kusasia, and as such
they are. always known.
Many years we.re spent at Korobaga, and then ow1oi to
the &rowth of popula.tion the people broke up into tootions
and started t~t1ng among themselve.s.
The Kusasis ned
with Kusenaba down to their present hom~inolud1ni Kamea&&
now under Binaba, and the Gball1 faotions. became dispersed
over ~lli,
Widinaba and Lamboya, the last named being part
of what is now known as Zebilla.
Later, quite recently in fact, the Bimbas oame down
and sprea.d themselves over Binaba.
The. Bimbas came from
Biengu, which is 01000 to Zawga, and are Kusas1s. They
should not be oonfused with those other B1mbas, known as
Btmobas, who are quite different M'd suppose.d to be akin. to
the Gr1.lIllahs.
In their general appearanoe, hab1ts, and
mode of l1v~ the Btmobas resemble the Konkombas far more
than they do the. Kuaasis., but whether there really 1s any
kinship betwe.en. them or not is a matter on which the wr1ter
has no information •
It was not till after they reached their present
home that. the. Kuscwaba started going to Naler1gu for the
purpose. of having his fetish recognized by the Na. ot
./

.i..amprussi\.saa page 11) J tie is samar to L.av.t:!.anaoa wilo
gets his fetish Nabaship from Tampelaga, a place somewtH:Jre
to the North of the Nankanni Country in Zuarlll1.o'7U.
So fat' as. Toend.ema is concerned there remain the
Sub-Divisions of Ze billa~iith
the exception of the sec tion
of LambOy~/Teshi,
Tanga, Timoni, and Sapelliga whioh are
not included in the above,
It seems probable ttlt1t Zebilla was the first to be
settled, that the traditional ancestors Abiongo and
Aputoba came from Detokko in the Frafra country J
and that
other sub-Diviai.ons with the exception o·t Sapelliga, were
gradually populated from Zebilla.
aputoba'.s home in
Zebilla was kno?m as Datok, presumably after Detoy~o,
but
now-a-days the place is more often called Angpalaga~
The Sapelliga people are mostly of BU~1anga
descent.
Teshi and Ta.nga have Mamprussi Chiefs J and ciurine; the
lz,st twent~l
yeers Zebilla has reoeived such a large Dumber
the original familias. are 'l.uite out numbered.
In 1·92 t
the population Was given as 2.4~1.. and in i93t as 797) ..
';;hen we come to consider the Agolle llalf of the
District it gradually becomes evident. that it is.. not
really Kusasi a.ountJ.:y at all.
Certainly in the old d3.ys
./

14.
a feYL Gb~bi.nga-Kusa.sis.
spread over to Sinneb~a from.
Zongoiri, and in the north round Bawku there were. some.
J{usa,sia who had coma from Yuiga..
But by far the most.
nUlll6rOus. were the Nabnamb§s, who li vec1 on the lands whioh.
a.re. now divided up into BinduI'i. Kugr1, Tempane. and Vlokambo.
TheBe. Nabnambaa tra.ae their ancestry to the i'rafra. town of
Hangod! where tha fabdama liVe..
in their own language. as. Nabraba J
Thesa Nabdams are known
and Nabnamba. is. evidently
a Kuaasi version of this..
Than there. arw the Narambas.. who are mentioned elsewhere
as of Dagbondurisi origin. ' The Bamshi, who oeme
with the. first Mamprussi Chief of Binduri, spring from the
same stock.
All these. people have gradually come to be knmm as.
Kusasis, and the name seems to have been used to .irulluda
Agolle as well as Toendama before we camc."
though to the
present day an !golle man crossing over to Toendemo. will
often say hers going to Kusasi.
The following figures taken from the i;) t C0n~)1Linteresting
in tLis connection.
Kusasis.
•••••
hoshis,Lamprussis
liG011~
(inClthLL.'
~::1l.(_,al~fjC1 .i~'C:<.J,
54,02 t
Others e.g.BuSang~
_ (,:'
Fulanis Hausas,et. 47,/vv 11, 1"17
-------------------------
j

The figures show what a muCh larger" 'proportio~ . of. .
Kusasis. to strangers there are in ;roendema whe.n comp8l!ed
with £galle.
.And when what has been 6.aJld above. concerning
the a.doption of the nama KUsasi by the. Nabnambas., Narambas J
and others, is taken into conalderatlon it will be under­
I
stood that the discrapancy is real~ far greater than is
shown even by the figures.
And even many of the . real
Kusasis in flgolle. have crossed over from. Toendema within the
last ten years.
----------:000:------___ _
,.

16.
C H 4 PTE R
ii.
CULTURE AJ.W SOCIAL ORGANIZATION.
• ~ .' I , I 4 , _ I ~ • _ # • # ,I ••' , , , " , , ••' , I , .' , ,
The
Kusaais are essentially an agricultural
people with early and late millet and guinea - corn as
their staple toods.
They possess individual herds ot
cattle , sheep and goats, but they neither drink milk nor
do they eat much meat. The animals have a grea.t .
. ~trlns1c value, however, as a medium of exohange in the
marriage market, and they are regarded as. a desirable
investment by everybody who has the means with which to
purchase them.
In the Agolle halt ot the oountry, the Kusasis. do not
usually rear the cattle themselves.
They give them out
to Fulani herde,men who tend then with intinite oare and
kraal then at night near their oompounds, reoeiving as
their reward all milk produoed by the oows under their
charge.
Aoross the ,/hi te Volta in Toendema, however, the
Kusasis e.s -a rule preter to look after their own beasts,
and Fulanis are tew in number.
Here the oattle arl) kept
inside the oompounds at night and during the day they are
left to forage nearby for food by themselves.

The Manis, on the other hand, take the herds to the
bush to gI7aze., and many of them even store fodder against
the rlgQllre.. of the dry season.
The re.sul t of this.
greater knov.ledge of cattle exhibited by Fulanis are
,
refleated in the superiority. of the Agolle herds over those
in Toendema.. .
Horses have become more numerous during recent years
but they are rarely bred. by the Kusasis., who buy most of
them.. from the Busangas or pa~$ing
travellers.
The members of the tribe. Ida not live in villages.,
but in compounds which are scahtered .over the cOlIDtry
side at irregular intervala.
and may consist of ~y number
These oompounds. are rOlIDd
. I
of ciroular mud huts. with
conioal shaped grass. roofs. and 9pnnected together by mud
walls.
Though conditions are changl.{lg rapidly now, the
compound used to be the local grQ~p.
Friendly relations
would probably exist between near neighbours, but each
house .. hold was an entity in itseH.
When the young men
got married they did not leave the paternal roof, asno~
generally happens, and set u'P for themselves.
The, bride.
was brought home, allotted her h\.;~
and given her shB.re

18.
of the general work to do. I~ other words at the time
we first came upon them the [usasia had only got as tar
as the patriarchal stage of evolution.
Under suah an organization orimes against the
communi ty were rar'o..
Chiefs, as we know them now did not existi., and what
authori ty there waf t
was vested in the head of each
family.
The pr~t.ly class, known as Tindanas (Landmasters)
had authority in so far as the welfare of the land and
the orops were oonoerned, but they_had no judicial
funotions. whatsoever.
Three at least ot these Tindanas
were very important people in the old days.
They were
Gumbonaba, KUS4naba and Kalensinaba.
Zawganaba was
perhaps as important as any of them, but as he lives on
the French side of the Frontier it is difficult to find
out much about him, espeoially as he denies ever having
had anything to do with the Na of 1iamprilllsi.
The word
"-Naba n in 1ioshi means the same. as ItSarld" in Rausa, which
is. Chie!, and is just about as haokneyed.
There are the
Chiefa of the horses, of the young men, of the ootton
treea, of war J
and of the fetishes.. as well as many others.
Thus- to hear a person adressed as IrHaba"' may mean that

19.
he is a Chief in theprope~sen.e
of the word, or merely
tha.t he uses the term as a sort of ourtesy title.
That apparently -is wha.t: Gumbonaba, KusGllaba end Kalensinaba
I
did. ~aoh had powerful ~et~shes, and at some time the
soothsayers had indioated that their fetishes re~uired
recognition by ~Na
of' Mamprussi. · :ui eaBh case. harfsoma
presents were taken to' the 1ia,.and on arrival a sheep
would be killed by the Na in honour of the guest.
He
would be installed as a fetish,::. Naba and sent back with a.
sn:.all horn conta.ining some of the blood of the slaughtered
animal.
This was incorporated ip the fetish at home which
\'la,s thus made doubly powerful, and its fame spread much
further afield than heretofore.
But though a man cou.ld o01I'JIland considerable r espect
on account of his fetish, which gave him povver to call the
rain, to drive away sickness, make barreh women fertile
and do oountless other miraoles J
yet all this gave him not
:.he slightest authority tp impose his will upon the people
I in ordinary every day affairs. '
rather the reverse.
SOil1etLrnes infaot it was
,
Bungwa, for instanoe, is probably one of the best
known fetishes in the co~try.
The man who placates it

~lish Territory, where he lives in Widinaba more or lesa
unnoticed ..
Am~ the followers of the Mamprussi Chiefs in the
District there are at least twenty people known as Ifnaba ll
who vary in importance from people like. So~onaba.
and
Zabagunaba, who rank a.a Sub-chief s,. down to Zeydnaba and
I
I
Deygnaba which mean! respectively ItChief of the SOUpll and
"C-l1ief of the pigs tl . ,
Neither of. them has muoh more. land
than that on which he lives., but the names are titles. of
respect awarded many years ago in recognition of services
performed ...
v The occasional thief 'ltas not unlmown, but if caught
he was dealt with drastically on the spot by the owner of
the stolen property and members. of the latter's family.
Sometimes the culprit lost a hand and some~imes
an eye.
If he repeated the offence he was deprived of the second
hand or eye, as the vase might he.
'til' the case ot murder
or fighting in which blood was spilt. it was customary tor
the people eoncerned, or their rolative~,
to make a peaoa
oftering to the local fetian, and, so obtain aesol ution.
In the Northern part of Toendema. this ofie=ing was. often
made to the fetish of Kalensinaba..

Mention has been made of the five lklamprussi Chiefs
who in those days lived among the Kusas1s.
-.j
They were
~~, Bindur1, 13awku, Teshi and Tania. In more
modern times they have been joined by the Chief or Wckambo
who migrated weatwards with many of his Blmobal subjects,
and settled on bushland which was nominally owned by the
Chiefs of Binduri and Sinnebaga. l~e histories or these
six Chiefs are given in another Chapter.
Simebaga, Binduri ana Bawku were the only three ot
the original five who were of My importanoe .. ~ Their
prinoipal function was to keep the trade route open
between Na.leri~
,
and !enkudugu, in the
.
Upper Volta, where
the Chief of the Busangas lives, and to provide esoorts
-r¥
for traders and slavers passing down from the North.
They were merely islands surrounded by hostile Kus~is,
and
their spheres of influenoe extended a very short distanoe.
Indeed their existanoe was most precarious, and Chiefs
Bala of Sinnebaga and Abdahamani of Tanga ware a.atually
driven back to CIambaga, while Setee:m., Chief of Bawku, was.
';f
killed by the Busangas, assisted by the Kusasis.
IjJ W8r6 it not tor the faot that the )fampruss1 Chiata
had been imposed upon them by the Ns. of Mamprussi, wham

,.: ..).
tn6 Kusasis reearded with a cel'tain amount of a\/e,
it is
improbable that they would have tolerated them at all.
Tbey did not objeot to some of their own Tindanas ~oing
to the Na with a handsome present, and bringing back from
Nalerigu in return a powerful addition to their fetishes,
whioh benefited everybody, but for hlamprussis to be sent
to order th~ about was quite contrary to all their
ideas on the subject.
The five Chiefs had but little
influence except among their own immediate followers and
they themselves are the first to admit this.
The first occasion on which we hear of the Mamprussis
being in Kusasi {not counting the Pusiga. days; is during
the reign of Na Atabia of hlamprussi. ~ e
appears to have
penetrated Agolle more or less peacefully, and later
-
appointed the Chiefs of Sinnebaga, Bindurl and Bawku, the
first two being sons of a. former Na. Tampouri and the last
DBmed his own son.
Y It seems to be established now that no lie. ever invaded
the country known as Toendema, e.g. the area between the
two
)ltas, and the great stronghold of Kusasi proper.
~e main object seems to have been to eatablis~a line of
communication between Na.l.erigu...and -Tenkudugu.
Yet even
this was not accomplished for many years, and long after

24 ...
Atabia's death the travellers w~re
still g0in& to
Ualerigu by Timbu and Sanaane-1ll.allgo.
Na Kulba appears to have had a oert.a1n amount of
oontrol, but it evidently waned Oonsiderably ~ain after
his. death, and nobody seems to have made any effort. to
reg;e.in it until the ooming of N& Beriga.
An aaoount ot
his unsucoessful a.ttempt to enforce his will upon the KUil"i
./ people in 189.5 1s given in Ohapter-VU.
------:000:-·---

v d APT ~ R
iii.
CONsrrTUTION • PAST AND PRESENT.
~ ........ , .' .. " ( . . .. .. . . . .. ,. . . . . . , ..... , .. /'
When one reads of the elaborate forma of
Native Government already in existenoe in Mamprussi and
Dagomba at the time Europeans arrived one realizes how
very very primitive indeed -lleople like the Kusasis were
- :.------- !
by oomparison.
An a.tbempt was made in Cha.pter 11 to
show how foreign to their nature was anything in the way
of rule.
In Chapter vii this is demonstrated more
olearly by the account of
the hostility shown to the
various Mamprussi Chiefs who tried to settle in !golle
and in two small areas in Toendema..
The Kusasis"themselves literally had no oonstitution.
Certainly there was a kind of patriarohal organization,
but this can hardly be termed a constitution.
The only
Chiefs were the TindaI:la.s. and the nMe is hardly applicable
even to them. Some were o.i~ greater standi11g than others,
and very often these would be the fetiSh Nabas referred
to in Cha.pter 11.
But they had no power other than the
spiritual authority with whien their position invested
them.
For people in such a. primitive stage of
development, however, this lack of Chiefs
really made

26 •.
no differenoe.
They were so hidebound by tabus and
moral sanctions that wrongdoers were rare.
.;was far less crime than there is to day.
and there
The oocasional
criminal was dealt with so drastically by the people held
offended that it acted as a deterrent on others.
It
has been suggested tha.t in time to came these Tindanas
would have evolved into Chiefs in the rea.l meaning of the
word.
They never got a ohanoe to do it 10 their own
leisurely V{8;l, however, for the British suddenly arrived
10 Gambaga and then came into Kusasi asking for the Chiefa.
They had found them in Gambaga.
and expeoted to do the
same in Kusasi, where, however, they were not much in
evidence.
Chiefs had to be produced, however, and labourers
to work on the new station buildings.
The five
Mamprussi Chiefs ( the sixth, Wokambo, was under German
rule then) were the first to be found.
They blossomecl
forth at once, and assumed control of a.ll the areas to
which their influence had in any way penetra.ted during
their lang up~hil1 struggles in the pa.st. In Toendama,
where t.Q.ere w:ere no Mamprussis except the two
inSignifioant colonies of Teshi and Tanga., the most

2.7.
illlportant Tindanas were pushed forward as Chiefs, or
sometimes a member of the Tindana I s family took on !:.he
job ~
It is satisfying to know that in Kusasi the right
people oame forward, for this was not alw~s the oase in
other plaoes, the result being that Chiefs were made from
among people who had no olaim to the position whatsoever.
At first nobody, neither British nor German, appear
to have ta.ken any interest in the five settlements in
what is now the lriandated Area..
There were Wokambo,
Tempane , Kagbiri, Buguri and 'Pusiga, but as already
mentioned tiley were still praotically bush, never having
been repopulated after the raids made many years previously
by the Chakosis and Bazaberimies.
Thanks to the depredations of a oertain Mamprussi
named .A3ura, who lived in the village of Kuka near Bawku,
we
finally lost the chanoe of adding the area. on to
KUsasi.
This Aaura had a following of lIoshis and among
them they had about fifty horses.
Their pastime was
raiding Kagbiri, Buguri and Tempane, and taking all their
animals.
The authorities in Gambaga apparently knew
nothi~ of this, and when travelling in Y.usasi it ViaS
oustomary for officials to pitch their tents in Kuka. near

28.
!Sura I shouse.
Finally in disgust one Awindi from Kagbiri, Who is
still alive, went to Sansane-Mango and sought the help .
of the Germans on behalf of Asura's viotims.
The Germans
sent a soldier named Dahamani to foll~ Awindi, supposedly
to see if these settlements really existed and whether or
no the British had placed their Uags there.
Dehamani
went round the whole area, ending up at Pusiga, from where
he returned to Sansa.ne-Ma.n~.
Almost immedia.tely
afterwards a German offioer arrived in Danugu (Wokambo)
and hoisted his oountry' s ~la.g there. He did the same
\
at the other four places and then returned.
The Chief
of Bawku sent at onoe to report to Gambaga, Bawku being
I
•
\ paJ:tioularly interested Sl.Iloe the people of Buguri and
\ Kagbiri belonged by rights to h1lll.
, t I '.
v J W .. I V,·c r ,
... t· l· '." .....
\ l" \,
,( \ ~.
\' t l..l.'
The result was a meeting between British and German
offioers at Kagb1ri whioh the Chief of Bawku attended.
pusiga, Buguri, Tempa.ne and Danugu were also visited, and
the whole area was then apparently oeded to the Germans.
I \:) LI.,l Asura was later oonvioted of killing four Kagbiri
'Cvv.\(,·~·
~ .~ .\1' ~{jr'~j
,:~ ..t.\ru
.. ~ people and oonfined in Elmina. Castle for many years, dying
v w ttl
(~~.• ,; t" \ J~ ( l'.~ '
.. ,. later on his release in KtlIIla.Si.

During the past thirty years all these Chiefs
. '
inoluding those made by the Germans in the ' Mandated Area
(
nave oonsolidated their positions, and, most important of
of all, eaoh one was allowe4 to be absolutely independent
of every bOdy else.
The Chief of Bawlru has perhaps been more in the
'ltaelight than the others, but he never had any authority
over them, with the exoeptionof Buguri and Kagbiri, who
originally removed from Bawlru and eleoted to remain under
the Chief of Bawku when founding settlements of their own
in the bush.
Though. separated from him. by the
international frontier for a time they were restored to
him at the end of the war.
Naturally with the settling of the country, and the
opening up of it, there has been more ooming and going
between the various villages t han was ever droamt of
before.
It was not diffioult t o make the Chiefs and
people realize the advantages to be obtained i f t hey
united under a Tribal Chief, and this oulminabed last
/year in the unanimous eleotion of the Chief of Bawku to
the position. ao he was confirmed in the office by ~0

)0 • .
Na. of Iuamprussi and raised a.t the same time to the status
I their independenoe with their own oonsent, and there, for
of Divisional Chief.
The eighteen other Chiefs lost
\ tho pres~nt. tho matt~r rosts. That a lIIaJnpruaa1 should
have been ohosen for the position is a signifioant
Indiaation of a. ohange in attitude..
But at the same time
it should be remembered that the Chief of Bawku I s family
has been in Kusasi for about t50 years, that the male
members have always married the piok of the Kuaasi women;
in fact that the Chief of Bawku is large~Kusasi
himselt
and Kusasi in sympathy.
Were he otherwise the oonsensus
of opinion might not have been so whole-heartedly in his
favour.
At the moment, the Chiefs seem prepared to
follow ~ impl~oitly.
They realize he is the link
between them and the Ne. of Mamprussi, that he is their
Triba.l Chief, and that the Na has given him. authority
to provide them with certain regalia, which is the
symbol of Mamprussi Chieftainship.
That1s all ~uite
pleasant so far, says the Kusasi, but it is doubtful1f
the time has arrived yet when he would s~ the same if the
Me. began to take a more worldly interest in his aff~rs.
The Ma is. a very big man and must be respected, but

at the sam.e time memories of the days at Kugri in 1895
when the mamprussia were vanq,uished and driven baok with
.\
ignomity to Gambaga persist in the memories of many .
That they should have progressed so far f rom their
former primitive state in such a shor t time is in i tself
rather remarkable.
exista:.-
At the present moment the f ollowi ng organizat ion
1.. 1. Tribal Chief (lIamprussi) ·
2. w. Sub- Divisional Chiefs(5 hlamprussi & tJ I~usasi
3. t2-. SUb - Chiefs (Kpamberi)
. S leT ION
4. 269. ~H"668 Headmen (Kombenabas )
A list of t he first three grades are Given in
appendix "A'·.
Nos. J and 4 require a word of explanation.
The people known as Kpamberi were found in Bawku( 8) ,
I
Binduri (3) , and S-innebaga (1) only~
They had the title
of Naba but were sub ject t o the three bigger Chiefs.
They held theil' a.ppointments frOID the Na of Mamprussi
who was advised in tila ma,tter by the Chiefs under whom
they served. They were in fact the Sub-Chiefs, and
battled on behalf of their Chiefs vlith the inhabitents
of surrounding villages wi th Var:'ti.'1b de[;rees of success.

the faot tha~ in many oases they are
T1ndanas, or else related to them. there 18 nothil1l
hereditary about their otfloea at all.
I
Even the nama
Kombenaba is only a makeshift for want of something
better.
Striotly speaking it is the term appl1ed to the
man who oommands the Chief's e.rmy in time of war. Illd he
is assisted by various people termed ~ambenabiBi
An attempt is being made now to insist on the Chiefs
always keeping th!hse Kombenabaships in the same familIes.
Stnce the Chief of Bawku was made Tribal Chief
nobody exoept himself holds his appointment from the Na
of ruamprus 51. The l~a, in ra.ising him to the status
of Dlvisiol1al Chief aGreed that he must be treated as
other Divisional Chiefs and allowed to appoint his own
Sub-Divisional Chiefs.
Chiefs who heve Kpr~ari
Similarly each of the three
under them are to appo+nt them
themselves.
Some of the Kusasi ~biefs
who had never openly
aaknowledged the Ha. have already ooms to the Chief of
SawiN and been invested wiLh the luamPrusa1 regalia.

It is expected that gradually the remainder will come and
do likewise, but as just mentioned, Bawku himself is
large~ Kusasi and almost one of themselves, so that one
has to a.void plaoing too much signifioanoe on the aotion
of these Chiefs in coming to him.
Temple says in his "Native raoes and their rUlers"
that when foreigners invade a country one of three things
invariably happens -
1. Th~ natives of the cOill1try become absorbed by the
invaders.
2. The invaders beoome absorbed by the natives of the
oounilry.
3_ The natives of the oountry regain their freedom and
expel the invaders.
The first mf the three happened in ~amprussi,
while
in Kusasi the third nearly happened - did happen once or
twlcein faot - but later the second process started.
Some of the 100a1 Mamprussis are Kusasis in , all but
~
name, and this~partioularlY illustrated in the case of
the SUb-Chief of Kuka. and his people ..
It is to be hoped therefore, that in these early
days of Native Administration, with the Na at the head of
affairs, allowanoes will be made for the Kusasis and that
'they vdll not be asked to run before they oan walk.
I

They have achieved a surprising amount already-
--------lOOO:---~-~

C H A ~ T ~ R iv.
RELIGION.
A:3 wit.h other pagan religions that of the
Kusasis is surrounded by an environment of mysticism.
It is remarkable ho~-th ey,
and other tribes in similar
latitudes withstood kahomedanism so completely, especially
when it is remembered that bet\'isen the years 1;00 and
t590, when Timbuktu flourished, there was a series of
great MahomedaIl Empires (.w.allestirle, Songh~ and others)
not so very far to the North and East of them.
I t may be that the pagan MOshi Empire· which lay
between, and whioh had considerable power during the
middle ages., was partly responsible for the non
penetration of Isl~.
The unsuitability of much of the
oountry for horses may possibly have been a contributory
oause , for the Mahomedan oould never oonquer unless he had .
a horse and a sword.
MOshi, like Mamprussi, waS and still is, largely
pagan.
Though certain lIahomedan rituals have crept in,
• Moshi was overrun, however, by Sonni Ali, the So~
nng, in about ~490, and then by his sucoessor IIAslda ll a
few years later.

this seems to be largely due to the presence ot Lahomedan
ftdVisers who are to be found among the Councillors of most
big Chiefs.
and Moshi.
And this does not apply only to hlamprussi
We are told that as far back as the eleventh
century the capital of the Ghanata Empire, Vlest of T1mbuktu /
consistllof two towns six miles a.part.
Court were pagan and lived in one.
The King and his.
The llinisters were
mostly ~ahomedan
and live in the other.
Even in kamprussi the Na and his councillors live in
Naleri~u while the Limam and 1.i.alams are to be found in the
town of Gambaga, some miles away.
The hl.amprussi claim. to have been l~ahomedans
themselves
at one time and perhaps this is partly substantiated by
the finding of ruined primitiva 1:osques at pusig<\, as
mentioned in Chapter 1.
But it seems inoompatible with
the theory that during the 14Ul. Century lIarnprussi vIas
united with the notoriously pagan lIoshL
perhaps, however, their traditions carr'J them back
even further than this', and they are thinldnz of. the
legendary days VI'l.1en it is supposed t.hey li ve(~way to the
East.
But the Kusasis have none of these ~ahomedan
trails
at all, and it is doubtful whether th(3re is a sincle

')].
islamised member of the Tribe.
Even the Mamprussi refer
to them as the heathens..
This of course is a case
rather of the pot calling the kettle blaak, but perhaps
in this instance the kettle is particularly black.
They believe in a Supreme Being - Awindi - who is
everywhere, but who can be worshipped through the fetishes
only.
All oalamities that occur are ascribed to the
ghosts of their Wlcestors who are displeased about something.
Recourse is then had to the Sorcerers - Sagari -
WllO indicate the appropriate remedy.
The death of a young person is a cause for sorrow.
The death of an old person is considered the logical
conclusion of a long life.
kuch jollification takes
place in celebration of the fact that de(leased was allowed
to reach the age he did, and leave a number of descendants
behind him.
A corpse is ordinarily buried the day of death.
A
round grave is dug, and at the bottom of ~Ls a tunnel is
excavated at right angles, into which the body is
\ \ pushed.
A man is placed on his left side facing t~e
rising
sun, and e woman on her right side faoing the setting sun.
In eaoh case a hand is plaoed und('1r the cheek.

;8.
It is said that the ilian rests more peaoefully when he aan
see the rising sun callin" him to his laI'm, and similarly
the woman is more content. \:llen she can see the same sun
calling her to prepare the eV0ning meal.
An unwitnessed deatll from slclmeas, dOD.t11 from sleeping-siakn
ess , whether witnessod or umvi tncssed, and death
causedto a. woman by tro.vail in child-birth are all very
much taboo.
In any of the above cases the body must be
removed from the compound by a. special hole in t.he wallj
tl1e hut in which death tooi<: place must be knocked down /
and no sexual intercourse may take place amo~ members of
the household until the whoie place has been purified.
No funeral custom is celobrated in any of the above 0.:;,30S.
A poor man is buried in a. sheep skin only.
A rich
or importElllt mail is provided vrHl1 a aow skin, u cloth and
A woman is buried with. a fibre cloth only
a vlhi te cap.
which is wrapped round her waist and drm'ID up between the
The top of a ,srave is covered with an ilwerted
earthern pot a.fter the hole h[;.8 b':3CIl filled in.
;) OL ll3 t irflfHJ
I
if olose relatives h,;,.v0 not been able to Let to the :3pot
in tiJ:le to see the body before bUl'iQi t.he ~,rave
filled in U1lltil they have c>-OTIle and done so.
1.3 not
rne mouth

of the grave is merely covored over with the pot in the
meantime, so that when the relatives come they can enter
the hole and see the body lying in the ttmnel.
On the death of her husband a Kusasi woman removes
her waist beads
\ piece of common
and usual leaves) dOIming instead a
string decked with leaves from a Shea tree.
Before appearing in the market again she must be
walked rotllld the outside of it .. by an old woman, and thu:lee
days after the death she must have her head shaved.
~prussi wamgQ yomen put a black string round their necks
until after the funeral c.ustom.
The Shea leaves are
never worn by Kusasi. women
except as described above.
The Nabnamba-Kusasis never put them on at all,
however.
When a woman's husband dies the custom is for
her to go into the hen house or sheep pen and roll about
,
on the floor until ooverad with dung.
She then appears
in publiC and shor-tly afterwards is washed by other
women.
Lourning, so far as mle is concerned, is then
finished.
His religion is probably the most important
thing in a Kusasi's life~
It pervades everything he
does, and all his aotions outside the ordinary routine of
daily life are governed by the diotates of the fetishes.

40.
On a.ll sides he is surrounded by tabus, the violation of
which would almost certainly L1ean death sooner or later.
When things go wronG he conclud8s that the [;pirits are
l.LIlIlmyed, and matters can only be l'cctifiGd by a visit to
the soothsayer, who indioates what fetish l'equlres to bl:)
')llaoated.
Then there are the vlitohes who also bring
trouble, and that necessitates the callinz in of the witchdoctor.
Altogether, thoueh hiS life may be an idle one
from the point of view of produotive labour, it is any
thing but idle when one considers the laboll' he pcll'fol'ms,
and the worry he experiences, on account of his religion.
__ ------:000:--------

41.
CHAP'rl!.R v.
Since there are no many thousands of M.oshis
Busang sS and yangaa living among the Kusas1s it is perhaps
relevant to digress for a chapter and say some thing about
them. •
A great deal is always heard and written about the
Chief of Vlagadugu whm is commonly knovm as the l'aoro-Naba.
or King 0f kossi.. Yet in reality he is junior to the
Chief of Tenkudugu wrw cor.u:mands most of the Yang as and
. I
fa,
great many of ttJ.6 dusangas and koshis too.
'fhe' Chief of \Vagadugu has got more people under hi.lll,
and nat~ally the fact of his being Chief at the seat of
Government for tile upper 1/olta has considerably enhanoed
his prestige. But acco~ding to Native custom the Chief
of 'fenkudugu is the senior of the two.
FTench officials generally corroborate this, and on
official occasions he is aocorded.precedence.
It is said
that the first Chief. of Tenlrudugu originated from
wamprUSSi, and that many yeers later one of his grandsons
went to wagadugu and founded another state there.
if
thiS is so it would natt~ally be junior to TenkudUo~·

Actually they are both trea.ted as indeI)endant Paramount
Chiefs by the French.
It is interesting to note that. fOPlllerly when the
Chief of Tenkudugu died it was customary for the follovlill,i
presents to be taken to t.he He. of ill.2lnprUSsi by tho relatives
1 hors&
1 woman
1 slave
5,000 cowries ..
They used to be brought first to the Chief of naY/leu
whose duty it was to see them safely escorted to Nalerigu.
the home of the Na..
These presents were supposed to be the ~als
share
of deceased's property, and had nothing to do ~_th
the
fee paid by his suacessor on appolnt.ment.
The payments were also made by the Chiefs of
Wagadugu and Fada-Ngourma., but with the partition of the
c~untry
amongst European powers they all became honoured
in the breach rat.her than the observance.
It is unlikely
that in those dayS either the French or Germans would
have been pleased to see their Cluefs paying tribute to
the Na of ~amprussi
who lives in tn31ish Territory.
rhus the payments beca.rn.E: irregular, and 7l1ien aade \'!e!:'e

43.
dona secretly.
1ven now any tribute paid to the Na ia
banded over with as little publicity as possible.
The story of t.he Chief of Yange. is lnterest1n&.
He
lived a.t Sa.ni;a, the prinCipa.l town in the Yanga country ..
Some time after the British had Occupied Gambage., they
were reconnoitreiDi in Ule Nor~ of the Kusas! Distriot.
The Na ot Mampruas! (Beriga} sent oertain messengers
with the trQ'Pps t.o lead them to Sange. and asked that.
ftf+ it was his. it should not. be aJ.lowed t.o fall to the
French, who were stak::i.ng out at their claims also a.t tlUa
time.-
t
on arrival ~ Bawku, however, the French were
the Nats messsn&era were so territie4 that they left the
British and ran baok t.o Gamba&a.
Apparently the French went on and oooupied the
country to the North ot Sawka which included the town ot
San&a aDd most of the Yanga lands.
At this time there was an old Chief ot ~a named
.. At .. same time just previous to this it seems that
ihe British had been as far North as Tenkudugu itselt.1fl
the same wlJ3 that in those early days of the scramble tw
terri tory ~ the French a.t one time oame as far South. sa
81ne.ba ana actually fought with the inha.bl tants there.

ot »aprU8S1.
Bopn'en"U&U also was ID old JIll; IDd
~ bia Ion Abambo on t.o loOt. for hill. Now th1a AJ)CIIIbo
kneW t.hat neitbel' be nor his tather had arq r1iht to t.be
Qh1eft.ainship really. and that the r1ght.tuJ. Cbief w.. au
ZUbinaba. He was jealous of ZUb1Daba and treated h1Ja 10
be.cUy that the later oame to live in Bawleu.
In dua
oourse Noyankudugu died and the Frenoh made Abambo Chief.
Then the ~reat
war oame and the Germans lett sanaane-
.tJiaIlgO to the Frenah.
In this aerole there was a Chief
of Timbu who was a follower of San&a.
He decided that it was not right for the UPltart
,
Abambo 1;.0 be Chiet, and knowing that he had never been
aolmowledged by the Na,
made Chief himself.
he determined to try and gat.
He sent very lavish present.s to
the Na of Mamprussi searetly, so that the Frenon should
not hear of i t, and the Na sent the regalia and had h1m
dealared Chief of Sa,nga, though he oontinued to live at.
TimbU.
out of gratitude for his generous gifts the HI.
named bill n Salumbul1ga" or the "V{all ot gold ll •
ZUbinaba was still l1ving in Bawku. and he too now

found that he ha4 a grOuse.
He presented himself in
front of Timbu and oomplained of his e.ation in gett1n&
himself ma,de Se.riganaba when he, Zubinaba., was the
rightful heir.
Timbu adm1 t ted that he was a Usurper
but said he had bean led to it by disgust at the .French
aotion in making AbOlllbo Chief. who had no ale.ill1 at all.
He went on t.o say that he was q,uit~
prepared to resign if
he, ZUbinaba, whom. they all knew as the rightful heir,
would ask th'9 He. f or the Chieftainship himself.
Zubinaba agreed to do 80 and returned to Bawku where b&
oonsulted the Distriot Commissioner.
The upshot ot it
all was that the Ohlef of Dawku sent to Nalerigu. on h1a
b~, as he was an old man and unfit for the journey.
Ne. waro was ruling" now and he sent the regalia for
ZUbinaba to Bawku with his messengers.
The latter
robed Zubinaba in the Chief of Bawku's house and told
him thAt he was now Sanganaba.
The rather pathet1e old
man, without. either oountry or people, went to PulmakOll&
near PUsip and built himself a house.
Timbu sent. to
~eet him and oeased to o.all himselt Sa.nganaba and III&DT
Yangaa oame from. Frenoh ooun1:ry and settled near him.
Ife only died about. tom'" years ago.

46.
Abombo (~a.naba to the Frenah) was put in prison
last year at Tenkudugu, and one Adakori was made Ohie!
1n his pla.oe.
Apparent,ly he wa.s the right man at laat.
ae sent aeoretly to greet the Ohie! of Bawku. but waa
evidently too afraid ot inourrini the displeasure ot tba
Franoh Authorities to send to the Na himself.
-----~--:o~o~-~~-----

~. .
a HAP T E R
Yi.
BUNGWA.
B~, alreacq mentioned once or t.wice, plqa
nuab an important. role in the lives of these people ~t it.
is wortbT of spaoial mention.
It 1s the ereat anoeat.or
fetish ot Mamprussi and Dagomba.
Bl.lDiW8 is the first Na 'of whom anyt.hj.n& auoh 18
known and he is supposed to have been awallond up by the
earth at Pus1i;a.
BtmgWa was tollowed by his SOIl %1r111,
ldlose 08Il8. however, 1s rarely mentioned OIl aaoount of h1a
treaohery in k11~ his elder brother I\Ut~.
Attar
Z1rU1 came TusUCU t~ohU&U in D~(IJlba)
and it.t waa he who
drove his brother Shitobu 8.Wl\T to Walewale wh$l"8 the lat;w
founded the Dagomba Klngdolll.
The Kusasis do not kno .. Bll1 of this, nor 10 the
erstwhile Mamprusais 11v:l.ni am~ them.
Tbey mereIf
regaild B1.UlPa as an all-powarful fetish which everybodJ
has placated sinoe the t1lD.ss ot their crandfathera.
In
Gembaca.. however, the legend 1s told by the old man.
Tbe fetish of BlJIliWa is in a small wood at Pus1p.
It oorll1sta of a stone at the mouth ot a ~ole
whioh 1a
supposed to run in tunnel fashion far into the earth.

48 •.
In this hole there is said to live a h~e snake, and untU
.iU or seven years ~o this snake had an equally hUie
~
"aonll whioh used to pe.trol ll territorial boundaries of its
Father.
A stranger, not knowing its alleged identity.
tilled it. The whole place was in an uproar and I am
told that the wretched man was drBgied befo~e
Captain
Shitlds, Distriot aOIDlllissioner.
He handed the case over
to the Chief of' Bawku who ordered the man to N
two con
to Bungwa as a peooa offer~.
This appears to have
plaoated the fetish for the outrage, and rain, whioh waa
very badly needed, fell at onoe in torrents.
Bungwa i s always plaaate~ by a semi-divine person
appointed by the Na of .Mamprussi and known 808 Pus1.ianaba.
He always has to be a. vsI'j' old man, never touoh the ground
with his uncovered feet and never have nnyt taJ.ng to do with
women.
I
A skin drawn over his head and a ol oth wrapped
round his body is the only ~lothinl he is permitted to
wear, exoept for an ornament.al bra,oal et on one arm.
As
said be! ore he has no jud1o:lal power at all, but 1s e.
sanotuary for the wrongdoer.
In the old days, before the f lr at Mamprussi Chiets
oama from Nalerigu to Kusasi. Zawganaba (in Frenah Terri. )
was apparently the best mom man in this part of the

world.
Whenever Pusiganaba died word used to be sent to
the Na at onoe, and he used to oal1 upon Zswganabato
despatcQ a reliable old woman to Nalerigu to ~et
the skins
anq other articles required for the installation ot a neW
Ne.ba.
The woman would take these to Pusiga wij,ere the
following cerem~ took plaoe.
First of all t.o grass huta were ereoted some little
distanoe apart.
The prospeotive Naba was put into one
alone in tile eVElllini and the woman entered the seoond me.
Four times dur~ the night she was seen to emerge
from her but with a cup and enter the other.
The fourth
time she remained there, or at-any-rate' she was never seen
to leave it. At dq break the watohers would creep up to
. the hut, there to behold the new Pus.iganaba sitting on a
mat ot oornstalks and olothed in skins.
The woman bad
'van1sb.ed. never to be seen again.
I'he old man would than
be taken up and carried bome amid great rejoioiIli.
When the Chief of Bawku was established he was made
partlY responsible for the welfare of the tetish.
On the death ot Pusiganaba the Pusiga people oome and
1ntora h1DL at onaa and he is re'l.uirad to proaeed to Pus1ga

50.
immediately and taka char~e.
He and his people sit. outside
the house until all preparations are made for the
burial.
Nothing that was not removed from the house before
the Naba died ~ be taken aw~ by anybody exoept the
Chief of Bawku.
A special opening is made in the oompound
wall for the body to be taken through.
The main door 1s
'oloaked up with wood and nobody is permitted to enter again.
Zawganaha has had nothing to do with the ceremony
for a great m.any years now, and the old woman's plaae 1s
t&keu by an old woman from Pusiga.
The last Fusiganaba died during the German regime in
Togo land. He was named Ajongo. H1s peoulair position
had made 1t essential for the German Administrat10n to put
somebOdy in authori ty at Pusiga who wculd not be fettered
by the various tabus to whioh the Pusiganaba was subjeot.
They therefore appOinted a man named Agure lI.usaga., who was
of the same family as Pusiganaba, and had at one time been
employed at Sansane-Mang~
as a Government Messenger, to be
n Re~entn of Pusiga. He acted as the Chief, and was
responsible for flnd.tng the labourers _reqw.red t.o work in
Sa,asane - Jdango ~d a.t Lome.
When Pusiganaba died the
Germans. proolaimed Agure as Chief of Pllsiga, and so he bas
remained ever since, under both Germans and Sri t.ish.

aa refuses to call himself Pusiganaba, however, for that
ta tha title which belongs really to the placater ot Bungwa.
l{e is known as the "Tengudnaba tl which means, in Knsasi.
"The one who looks after the town. It
Sinoe Ajongo died nobody else has been apttb1nteq
custodiaJl of Bunocrwa.
Apparently it is not a sought - atter
position, owing to the irritating restrictions it imposes
upon the holder.
Tiler, is, however, an anCient man liv1ng
in BawkU who is entitled to the offica, and there saam& to
be. a growing desire on t4a part of many people to persuade
h:1m. to acoept it. If he were to be apPOinted there 18
reason to believe that he might be named BUngwa.tl8b$, in ,
whioh ease the Tengudnaba, AgUre, Would probably agree
, '
to be known in future as PUsigane.ba and take his place
among the other Chiefs 1n the Distrio.t.
-:',1
Germans took a lII6l1
I ..
AgUr6 tor the position of nRegent n •
FortunatelJr the
from the right family when they oh(!~
The Pusiga people say that. their ancestors came tr.
the sIq.
The story is that when the moon waa br~ght the~
used to came down to earth by eo fra..U ladder and dance.'
One night an evil man S8.W tnem dasoend1.ni and when they
were all d~ he cautnt, the ladder and pulled until it
Snapped up aboVe.
The danoerS ,rere navel" able to return

52..
home and have lived in or near PUsiga ever sinoe. .
--------:000:--------

5;.
C ti APT 1 R
vii.
B A W....!J[
The first Chief of Bawku was Ali, Son ot Na Atabia
of Mamprussl who was probably one of the most outstanding
fiiuresWho ever ruled at Nalerigu •
The Chiefs of Sinnebaga. and Binduri had been
established a short time before Ali, but all three were
Q..uite independent of each other.
The story is that Ali came with So
large following at
lrlamprussia and Nara.mbe.s, the latter being members of an
interior branah ot Mamprussi knCm as ~l}Qnd.urisi.
The first night waS' spent at a village near Bawku
aalled Sapelliga ( not to be ~onfused with Sapelliga
near
often known e.a Seboundi). Next day they adv/!f...~oed to/the
present Chief of Bawkufs hous~
via the section of Zorse,
and were opposed by people ~rOm.
the section of Bawkuzua.
The people of TusUDtu sectlon~
however, came to ilie help
of the MamprussiS and the men or Bawrru~ were overthrown.
1'0 this day, a custom wll.loh is an interesting relio
of Ali fS entry into Bawlru is performed soon after the
accesSion of a new Chief of Bawku.
One evening he goes out to Sapelliga With e. big orowd

54.
and much drinking of Peto takes place. The Chief 18
~ondu~ted
to a 1aege stone where Ali is supposed to have
sat on his way through.
The Chief sits on top of this
stone while a nearby fetish is being placated.
After
this he returns to the jollifications.
In due course
eterybody goes to bed, but in the morning wnen they awake
up one man is missing.
It is thQ Chief.
He has left quickly during the night and travelled
alone several miles to Zorse.
There he is met near
some large ba.oba.bs by another cro\id which has oome out
from Bawku for the purpose .
He enters Be.wlru triumphantly
and the people of TUsungu O0lll6 out in war ldt and pretend
to stop him~
but he rides through unmolested.
All is supposed to have ruled about seven years and
was succeeded by his brother Muzabaga, also knovm e.a. Al1-
Bila.
Muzabaga waa succeeded by another brother lampanga.
also known as Yakubu.
Jappanga was suooeeded by Manamudu, son of Ali.
son of M.uzabagu
,
Babu, (lontested th.a Chiefship With him.
but without suoces:s.
BabU. was. aasilt4d by ae'rta.1n Baw.ku lllaIIlPruss1a. in
A

his tr· . t\-1A I-IAMVPU
s uggle. nth ' Oll"':lga., but they were driven away
•
and fled to what is now- byokko in Binduri..
liilahamudu. beoame Chief, bu:J1 s.oon atter th1a his rivals
came. baok from G\.mlyokko with ,8. 10t1 Zazl&palasi - KUsi.aia.
The.y su~Qeaded in killing lvlahamudu before the latt.er's. S6"
Mahama., drove them. off again.
Bawku was left without a. Chief. and it was soon
aftar this that fighting ooourred in Gambagl oval' the
Naship.
It is said to have been' the struggle between
Mba. and Abu. Bakare whioh is knmm to have taken plaoe
about this tiIne.
'Aooording to Mr. Maokay , in his history
of llampI'Ussi. Abu ~e raised an army of Konkombaa, but
was defeated by Kulba with the aid of Chakosis~
Another version of the above is that Kulba was first
driven from Gambaga and Abu Bakere seized the Naship.
Kulba. fled to Ba.wka and was ta.ken in by Mahama.
The
latter oollected as many people IS he could and conducted
Kulba. to Sansane-Mango, nere an army of Chakosis was
raised.
Th1s they led first against the Chief of
Nakpandure t
who was a powerful supporter of Abu Bukare,
and killed him.
Passing on to Nalerigu tJ1ey routed
Abu SakaI'e r s t.roops and than oaught and killed !hI' himself •

KUlba became Na~
and installed 1ahama as Ohief of Hawku
out of gratitude. 1~e ~amprussis who had killed
~udu tried to get Bawku for one of their own people,
but Kulba refused and said none of them
should ever nave
BawkU.
Instead he gave them the Chiefship of Gumyokko
(~ under Binduri).
Ma.h.a.Ina returned ~o
Bawku and was known as Seteem.
He became pretty powerful and the Kusasis feared him.
It
was during his regime that all the people in Agolle ware
mad. to pay a tax to the Na of \00 oowries per compound overy \
year.
Seteem penetrated the Busanga country as tar as Bittou
and seized a hundred of their cattle which he presented
to the L«r.·
The Limam of Gambaga advised that they should be
returned to the Busangas as otherwise they would surel¥
be avenged.
No attention was paid to him, however.
The Buse.ngas waited their opportunity, and many years
later it oame.
In a careless moment seteem had sent
nearly all his available gillls to Gambaga as an escort for
* Compare the story of Kuga. on page t4 in a recent
,ublication entitled "Enqui!A' into the Constitution and
organization of the Dagbon Iungdom.. 11

)7.
a very fine horse the Ha wantec! to buy from him. While
they were away t.he Busangas came down from Bittou a.J]id the
people of Bawku joiQed foroes with them against time muoh
disliked Seteem.
The latter was left almost unpr~eQted
\
and after defending his house valiantly he was tinally
burnt out and killed.
,Those of his family who esoaped
I
ran by way of Sansane-J:uB.ngO to Gambaga. where they settled
at Bulkwere.
One of his daughters got married to Na
Berig& and was the mother of the presen~
Na Wafo(kabama)
The death of Seteem would seem to have taken plaoe
between 1820 and 1830.
It oannot have been earlier. tor
his son Mamboda, who was a young man a.t the time, did not
die until 1894.
Na Kulba was so enraged at the dee .. ~h
of Seteem thi*
this, ooupled with the treatment acoorded his brother
Bala, Chief of Sinnebaga~
about the same time. deoided him
send a large army into Agalla.
He enlisted the aid of the Na or Yendi who sent h~
an army of aagorobas.
These and the Mamprus$is adVanoed
from the South while a thir'd foroe oomposed ot Ohakosis
oame by Buguri on the East flank.
The tlColJlIll8Jlder in
Chief" waS one Awando, a Chakos:u
The whole ot !golle was over run and a great many

58.
people were killed.
The fleeing inhabit ant a were 'finally
overtaken at Zorse and Yeragungu outside Bawku, and here
they made a stand at the hill of !galle.
This hill is
the sita of an important fetish, and it is said that the
fetish oame to their aid by releaSing swarms of bees,
wlioh so hClrried the enemy that he retired in haste.
l~e
leader AVlando got out off, but he oovered himself With
a red burnous much to the alarm of the people.
They
had never seen suoh a garment, and thought Awando had
turned himself into a ball of fire.
'l'hay ran from him
and he got away unmolested.
The Bawku people oontinued
defiant for some time, but the Sinnebaga people had had
enough, and shortly afterwards they willingly aooepted
a new Mamprussl Chief.
The eldest son of the dead Seteem, Bako, had taken
to travelling about With Hausa traders, and one day many
years later, his journeyings I brought him baok to Beiuku
where he was reoognized in tqe market by same Kusasis.
At first Bako refused to ac1nUit his identity J
'I
I
I
i
I
I
I
but when
\1
they perSisted, saying how t~ay were oppressed by the
i
Busangas, and how glad they should be if he would return
and be their Chief, he gave in and said he would return
to NaleriltU and see the Na. about it. lie did so and was

5~.
made Chief.
On his return to '3awku the Busangas at tacked
again, but a. good cro~d
rallied round. Bako and he drove them
oft with heavy losses, since whioh they have never again
attaoked /)golle.
, After ruling a few years rlako beoame blind, and on
his death, M1ich took place soon afterwards, his brother
MaIIlboda came baok from Bulkwere, where 118 was still living /
and suoceeded him.
He wa.s installed as Chief of Bawlo.1
by Na Yongu 1n about l858.
.1. t. is said that Yongu had
then been Na five years and that he died twelve years later
i.e. about ~870.
It was in mamboda.' s day that Bawku started to grow
into a town.
The 'BIilzaberimies wore ra.iding the Grunsbis
to the West and the profitable trade in slaves oaught by
them. was being oondunted by the Hausas and koshis, as
desori'bed in Chapt.er - 1. Large Caravans were pa.ssing
down to Salaga. via BaVlhu and Gambaga., though at tha.t time
the route passed t .• hrough YGragtu1c;1.1 and Tangsia.. a. little
to thEI West of Bawku i tsel!.
Yeragung-u was under the
Chief of Bawku, and quite an 1Jr.poI'tant c8.¥lP for the
travellers..
There Ylere many ... oshi and Hause. people a.otua.l1~
11 ving there. But the Kusasls rose e,gai.n3 t. ·t.hem and burnt
the wholo place.
Tho Ha.llS s fh:d iout.hW'ards, but. the

60. .
ltlOshia oame into Bawku. and settled down under their leader
Apetera, whose son Sandogo is the present Chief of the
MOshi Zongo.
It was not till some years later that the
Hausas oame and settled in Bawku.
~oda was responsible for establishing the
present Market, and even 1n those. days it oame to be
yJeJl
fairly,. known.
on his death in ~94 at a great age
L1amboda was suooeeded by h1s,sol1l 1v]a.ha.ma.
I ,
h!a.ha.ma. iUid' his young brother Zongbweogo had
aooompanied Mamboda from Bulkwere a.s ohildteo.
MBhama
waS
only ruled a f.ew years andy then suooeeded by his brother
Zongbweogo.
I t Vias in .irlahama "s time, however, that the
the British first settled at Gambaga., and it waa at
~s house that the Union Jack was first hoisted.
Zongbweogo died in ~92 ."
and was suooeeded by the
present man, Abuguri.
Last year the latter was
unanimOus13 elected Tribal Chief. by Kusan and fuampruss1
Chiefs alike through out the Ilistriot. He went to the
Na in June. 19J ~
ami was confirmed in this new offioe,
being raised a.t the same time to the stauu.a of a
Divisional Chief.

61..
Ha Atabia.
.. 1
I···· ..... ·1· .. , " , " ·1
1~. 2.Muza~aga..) .1Ia.mpanga.
4.Ma.hamudu !
1 '
5. hlabama(Setaeml I
1 ~ ;
I··· ····,····,,·1
6.J3ako
7 ..Mamboda
1
l' ., .... , ... , .. ·1~ , ....... " ' . , .... ,1
8 .Mahama 9.Zongbweogo 10.Abugur1.
____:000:-.-.,_._., ._._._. ,_,
.. ~ " ", " ~ , • .. #

S 1 N N H BAG A ..
'" , , I, '" '" '" ,. ,. ,. ,. • , ,. ,. ,.
The Chief of Sinnebaga was the firat at the
tlV$ mamprussi Chiafa to be appointed in the Kuse.sl
Country.
1.Ven so, Sinna baga has apparently never been
at muah. oonse~enoe,
and its history is very Stlallty.
The Mamprussis were the first arrivals, so they beoame the
T1nde.oaa.. and still are in some areas. Later on
Gbingbinp-Kusa.sls sprea.d over from Zongoiri, but the'
population of Sinnebaga was never very large, although
they at one time. oommanded part of the present Wokambo.
land in addition to what they ow now.
Tampourt is. said to have been the first Chief and
he was a son of Ne. Tampouri.
lie and many other Chiefa
a.fter him lived down by the Morago river near the ford
where the old trade route used to oross..
The fourth Chief is said to have been one Bela,
brother of Ha Kulba.
It was he. whom the Kusa.sis drove
away, so that he ran to Patia in Gamba.ga. where later he
died..
It was this aot on the part ot the Kusa.s1s,
oombined with the reoent slaying of Seteem, Chief at
BaWku,.
that decided Na Kulba. to invade Agolle and lay
waste. the country.
At tllls time too the inhabitants.

63.
at !galle had. practically ceased to pay the annual tribute
at ~O cowries per compound, which had been imposed a . few
years previously.
This made :80 third excuse for lia Kulba
to attack them.
The war which followed is desc~ibed under BaWku, as
it was in BaYiku that the. final suca.essful stand of the
!golle people took plaoe.
Atter the. war the Sinnebaga people accepted Dahamani
(7)
Ne. Kulba r s grandson,' as their Chie.f, and since then
Sinnebaga has not been disturbed by hostilities.
__._,_, _,,_,_,:000 :_, _, '- ,-.-' _. ,_._,

64.
Bli~DURl.
"(''''''''''''''~
/
Th~st Chief of Binduri was. Yesya., son of Na
Tampouri, and he. lived at Malaga, a village whioh is now
part. of 'Nokambo.
Yesya brought some people with him
named Bam;:;shis, who. like the Nabambas who followed the
first Chief at Bawku, are of Dagbondurisi desoent.
a-daya they too have all the Kusas1 oharacte~ist1os.
No\¥.-
In
those days Nabnambas (see page 1 J oo~upied the lands. whioh
a.r& now divided up into Binduri, YUlgri, Wokambo and
Tempane. The greatest num.ber were to be found in part~ at
Tempane, and in the seotions of Malaga and Agiseri in the
North of Wokambo.
The bigges.t Tlnda.ne. in Yesya r s day was one Ahipoura
and .('up. to the present time most of the Tindanas in these
parts are ot Nabnamba desoent.
It is supposed that Yesya was put in malaga by Na
Ababia soon after he'd put the first Chief at Sinnebaga
and a little before be put Ali in Bawlru..
On Yesya l s death it is said that his son Arazubi
suCloeeded him, but it is. probable that one or two Chiefs
oame firs.t and have been forgot ten by the Binduri people. I
and that Ar8.Zubi was Yesya l s grandson rather than his son.
It was in Arazubi r s day that the Bazaberimies started raidir

raid1.ng, tram the East.
Tempane was then known as Garu
and there was a Nabnamba Kpa.ruberi in charge who was. under
Bindul'i.
The Bazaberimies atta.cked Garunaba on many
occassions but finally Arazubi and Garunaba. between them
appear to hava got a bit at their O\VU back.
The
Bazaberimies always attacked with horses, and the idea was
, conceived of digging an enormous moat right round Oa.runa.ba l s
house and adjoining land.
When done it was covered wel'
with light branches, grass and ea.r.th.
The. Bazaberimies
'm'Ire.
purposely provoked and enticed to tollow the.
retreating Nabnambas in the direotion of Garunaba's house..
on rea.ching the moat they were unable. to pull up until
many of their horses had orashed through th~
thin surface,
and chaos appears to have ensued.
The moat is still pla~ visible and nearly enoircles
a piece of land wl1ich must be ~uite
a quarter of a mile
in diameter.
It is said that until oomparatively
reoently one could see the remains of spurs and other
bits of metal, but nO'll, with the oontinual silting up ot
the trenoh, no suoh things are visible. ~ whole place
is tabu and nobody would think of/excavating.
After the affair at Garu Arazubi decided that the
sooner he moved out ot talaga the saier held feel, for

66.
the Bazaberimies. were. sure to return.
He therefore
moved right a.<ll'OSS to Gumshe, a section to the V/est of his
~nf; present home. Those of the Na.bnam.bas who did not follow
(SC8t1r.r
were soon driven out by the Bazaberimies who overran all his;
former country, including Kugri.
The Pusiga people were
also driven out. and ned to Sarabogo and other parts of
Bawku.
It is said that the Bazaberimies were helped by
I
oertain Chakosis (also knotm locally as Kambonsi) who
I
qppear to have waged war frequently on their own aacount,
and not just wen the Ha of .h:.amprussi ordered them to do so.;
The story is that after ha'\Zing been driven away by
the Kusasis. at the battle of Agolle (sea page 58) ~a
Kulba gave the Chakosis permission to harrass. the Kusasia
whenever they pleased.
Some of the Nabnambas set tled down at Gumshe with the
Chief Arazub1, but many of them went on to YUiga in what
is now: French Country, staylng for a short time at
Ye.ragungtl in Bawku on the ~va.y.
Arazub1 died in Gumshe.
and was suoceeded by Agani who moved to Tangsia, a short.
distance away.
After Agani came Sanlda, and then Ninyam..
1 t was
during Sanid?- r s day that the Nabnambas started to come.
baok (see under Kugr1). ~ey set~led at the present

67.
Binduri, after spending a short time at Tampielim first,
and 'When Winyam. came from Gambaga., where he I d been living,
to succeed Sanida. he too decided to, make Binduri his
hame,
and there the Chiefs of Binduri have lived ever
since.
All the present M.andated Area was by now uninhabited,
except for a tew Brmobas who had settled at Natenga in
Wokambo and refused to be driven out.
Blmobas who had
settled at Wirinyanga in Buguri were expelled by the
Bazaberimies some illty or sixty years;, ~o ,
t.hey,
. together with the other Buguri inhabitants who mostly
lived near Zambala, fled westwards.
The B'mobes \'lent
on and joined the Nabnambas at Yuiga, but soon came back
and settled at Bianguri in Binduri.
The other BUo~i
people settled at Zabagu in BawkQ which had been their
home once before.
Gagbiri at this time formed p~ of Bawku and had
nev.er been inhabited at all.
The BazaberiIDies attack on W~inyanga was their last
effort, for Europeans started to arrive soon after\~ds.
No International Frontier had been demarcated when
descendants of the old NabnambaS who had been driven from
their hames in Wokambo .,
and Tempane began to trickle back.

J..a.ny of them were followers of ~ure,
the pOVlerlul Glui:lf.
of Kugri (see under Kugri i and refused to have ~
to do with Binduri.
In fact Agure was mbmi Dally thair
overlord. until tha (}amana occupied the whole area, when
",,u.
neither Kugri nor Binduri had anything,\to say in the
matter.
The duacendant. of the old Ga.runaba came into his
own and booama a Chief in the place where, nearly a
hundred years before, his anoestor had been a sub-ohief
(Kpamberi) under Chief Arazubi of Binduri. before the
latter fled Westwards to new oountry.
The name of Garunaba's country was changed to
Tempane (Tempalaga· new ground). but the market which he
established at Barabokko was knmvn as Garu.
Vlhen the
Frontier left the market just insida German Territory the
a hief of Kugri Is aoos did their best to entice it a~
from Tem.pane. and in this they were eventually Buoaessful.
The market beaame defunct , in Barabokko and was
established at what is now known as Garu in the Kugri
aountry.
It waa for a very long time a sore point betweec
the two Chiefs.
The set~ up of Feragonaba. at Kugri and his
ultimate saverance from Binduri has been described under

Kugri.
The Rugur! people returned to Zembala about tbirtythree
years.. ~o and from then on have never lcwked
baok.
G~biri became inhabited too, for some Zaba&u
people who had aoma from Nyoklo, and before th-at fram
Zorse ) moved out into this o.ompletely bush part.
The
people of zorse, which is close to Bawku, are said to
be Na.nkQUll1s!ram Bongo, North of Zuarungu.
There is alsotN. oase of Sapelliga whioh ahould be.
mentioned when on the subject of Bindilri.
Everything is
very vague now, but at some tJ.me in the past it is said
that Binduri owned Sapelliga, although the la.tter is.
across. the Volta in Toendema..
This was even mentioned
( .
in the Distriot Record Book many years ago, but s~nce
Europeans have been up here Sapelliga haS never followed
Binduri..
Certainly in t916 when the late Chief of
~pell.iga Vias appointed at Ba.wku Binduri appears to have
been present, bu~ it does not seem to have been of much
significanoe.
The Chief of Binduri says that Sapelliga
used to be a Kpamberi of Binduri, but it appears as if
this. may refer to the po.tion of Sapelliga in Binduri

]0.
proper wah 1a where the family ot the Chief. ot
Sapel.11ga or1~ oaUf came fram. They ware Goashi-Kusasi s.
and moved to Guz.ongo in Sape1l.1ga sub-divisiOll JIIaDl
years ago.
Here the people were mostly Busangaa.
Later the GoasM.-Ku.sas1s moved a little to where the
Chiefs house 1a to-day. Whether they eva~ followed
the Chief of B1nduri muoh again after they Ql'ossed the
river, and how the Goaahi-Kusasis. became the rulers
instead ot the indigenous. Busa.nga.~
are points· that
have yet to be oleared up.
Na. TampQuri
1 '
t.Yesya .
1 ,.,
i
2 .. Arazubi
1
1 "" " ,,"'" " . ,1
). Agani 4. Sanida.
1 __________________ ~
1 ·' ............. ' ..... , ,1
I..... .. 1 ... .. 5~ .~,... 6.As1g1ri
1.Clambila. 8. Yirimiya ll..Abi~dogo
I· .. " .. · .. ",1 1
.salitu to .. Nykema. t2..A.wind:l.

T E. S H 1.
" # ,. .... I , .. /
~t is said that the first Chiafo! Teshi
waa one ASala.g1, a son of Na Jia who only reigned seven
daYs at Nalerigu before being replaoed by Kulba.
ASalagi was unpopular in Gambaga and was told to olear
out and make himself a house somewhere in Kusasi.
The inhabitants of Teshi, not oounting the
hlamprussi element, ~e supposed to be of the same stoak
as the Zebilla people.
When an old man Asalagi returned to Gambaga, but he
waS drowned when crossing the river at Zongoiri on the
way.
Atter A-salagi oame Adakali and various others of
wham nothing is known.
They were followed by }Jiyeaba.
A-liyeaba. sided Wli6b. the Kusasis and helped them to
defend Yuiga a~amnst the Nars Chakosis who had come round
from the East.
Twioe this happened and twioe Aliyea.ba
"",(1.1') oaptured and taken to Sansane-hIango. He was delivered
up each time at the Na l s re'luest, but after the second
ocoasion the Na refused to alloW him. to return to Teshi.
After AraztlIl1a, the 9th Chief, died the Chieftainship
passed to his adopted son Akologo,whose fat her waS one

12..
Al'ami ldampruss1, but it returned to the properfam11,y
on Akologo's death.
___ ~oOo, ____
, , ,. , .. I' .. , , ,

TAN G A.
Dambungu., son of Na Kulba was the first Chief.
The Te.nga la.nds were at that time bush.
He appears to
have colleoted people from Detok (Angpal~)
in Zebilla
and various other places.
He was himself virtually
Tindana, but he handed over the responsibilltf' .to a man
from. Sakom nearlby,
whose family still performs the duties
involved.
Dambungu's brother Salifu vias Na of Mamprussi-, and
on the latter's death Dambungu returned to Gambaga. and
suooeeded him.
But not vnthout a strUggle.
The story is that he was opposed by another brother
. I
the then Chief of Kurugu, and fratrioidal war was the
result.
In the ensuing struggle Dambungu was supported
by the following people:-
neburi, Chief of. Bulkwere (his brother)
Da,uda.? Chief of W:okambo
·Mamboda., Later made 7th Chief of Bavlty. but at that
time II ving in Bulkwere.
The Chief of Kurugll was supported by all of Ra
Salifu's sons, among whom were four future Nas.
A battle took plaoe at Bulkwere and the Chief of
Kurugll was defeated.
He fled to Dagombe. opuntry and
I)a.ID.bl,ll'lgU- waS inStalled as Na.

14.
Kurugu, however t
was not finished with, and betore
long he brought a torae whioh he 1s supposed to have
raised from among rene~rade Oagombas, against hia
brother Oebun at Bulkwere..
Oeburl was slain and his
body foully mutilated.
Kurugu, feartul ot the
Qonse~uenoes,
dispersed his army and fled almost alone to
his own oountry.
The man who aotually killed Deburi i8
said to have been one Ibrahim, son of Na Sal1fu. He
impl ored Na Oambungu's forgiveness, ' but the latter wa.
so furious at the way In whioh his brother Deburi had
been butohered that he urged Deburl's ~ Mahama to ri8~
up and ldll Ibrahim in his turn.
Mahama aooordinll1
sot@.t him. out and killed him. near Sakku.
In the meantime the Chief of Kurugu had been
discovered shelter~ in a woman's house over to the West.
Re esoaped, but was interoepted again near walewale by
Da.mbungu's people.
In the battle which followed he. was
slain.
It is interesting to note that this was not the only
oocasion on which certain DagomOaS tought against the. Na.
of Mamprussi.
','/hen Beriga was ooming, from. his town ot
B1mshi to suooeed his brother Na Pari at Naler1gu. he was
met by one Yibgadama.. son of Na Oambuogu.. in Ga.mha,ga.

Yingadama wanted to be tia so engaged Beriga in
battle. ~n spite of the number of his people, however.
he was def.eated, a-nd Gambaga burnt to the Ground.
Yingadama was driven away and Beriga beoame Na.
soon afterwards, however, news was brought. one night
that Yingadama Vlas ooming V£Lth an army of Dagombaa fram.
near Gushiego, and was
encamped at. Jawendi inside the
Oambaga Distriot.
Na Beriga started off immediately
wi th a large following and attaol{ed Yingadama at dawn.
The Dagombas were routed, and Yingadama fled Southwards,
never to be heard of again.
It should bE~
mentioned that on both these OOOa.aiOllS
when Dagombas were led against :&Lamprussi the expedition.
took place against the orders of the Na of Yendi.
Dambungu appointed one Bakala, son of the Chief of
&.llkwere to be Chief of Tanga in his stead.
But Bakela
never lived in TangS..
He merely paid ocaasional visits.
for the purpose of placating the fetish.
He died in
Bulkwere.
It then appears that there was a long inter-regmun,
and the next. man we hear of is one Atalata, a very old
man who t d been born in Tanga but who was
related to
pusiganaba, the oust.odian of the fetish Bungwa.

Nothing alsa is known until the Coming of ABDAHAMANI.
a . ~n of Nyem.has1, Chief ot Nagbo in Mampruss1.
who
arrived in Tamgai
as- Chief about the sama time as the
British arrived in Ga.mbaga.
He found the Kusasia hostile,
however, and soon returned to Gambaga.
About. 1898 .Amore, son of
the M&hema who had slain
,
Ibra.him, oam.e fram.. Oballa, a vil,lage near the site ot the
old telegraph station in Gambag&.
He ruled until !911 when he. was. succeeded by
Mahama. his son, who still rules.

\1[ 0 K A !It i:i u.
" . "'J'I'I""~"
Before the country we now know as. Wokambo
{-
waS inhabite.d by B~mObas the Southem hal;.,whiah was all
bUsh/ belonged nlhminally to Sinnebaga. while the Northern
balf was occupied by the Chief of Binduri and his
Nabnam bas • When al~ these. were driven out by the.
Bazaberimies. and Chakosis this large and particular~
fertile ~rea also became buSh.
Some years later Blmobas
came in and settled at Natenga, but it was not until just
before the arriva.l of Europeans that the Chief of
Wom.e.mb o
proper, which is miles away to the East, migrated
wi th many of his people and settled at Danugu.
To-<iay
there are some 8000 B I mobaS in the English Vlokambo, not
counting m.any thousands in other parts of the Mandated
area as well.
rfb.e original Vlomambo is in French
Territory and 1s still knovm as suah.
There is a Chief
who is of the same family as the one ruling here.
~t first tile Danugu people were administered by the
British.· This waS before the. Germans came along and put
their flag there, · but wnen the Frontier waS made (see page
281 DantIgU became · (Jerman':· . The · Chief lDooti now) soon
returned to the real \'Iokambo and remained there till after

tne war. '~hen the bbWldary was IIlade between oritisn
and, Frenoh ~dated Territory and the Chief, Lari, was
separated from all those of his people liVing on the
1:)1'i tish side. ~or a. time there was no Chief in the
tsriDish halt and then early in t92) the Chief deoided to
orosa over and settled down in British Territory.
He was
immediately made Chief of British Wokambo and the Frenoh
found somebody else to fill the offioe on their side.
wokambo has the distination of having sent the first
of its Chiefs, IssaKa, son of Na Atabia, back to Nalerigu
Qi/~r
to be Na Jia or Na Jaringa, but it is not ~te certain
v
which of them it was.
___ -=000_._. _, _, ._,_._,
I" ,.,. '" , ,. "" '

K U S !.~ NAB li.
Much has alveady been said about Kusanaba
in the Kusasi Legend given in Cha.pter 1 (see I!age 1.0)
and again in Chapter 11 (see page 18 J. There is not
much more known about him and his people to re.cord.
One thing does seem oertain, hm'lever, and that is
that at. the time we first came into Toendema Kusana~a
more nearly resembled a Cilief in the rea ~eaning of the
word than any other Kusasi did.
Had we knmm more about him thirty years ago and
concentrated more
on his development it seams almost
possible that he might have evolved into a head Chief
To~I1Jema.
for k-Eo] 1o! leaving out the hlamprussi Areas of Teshi and
TangS. p(;D~pS.
As it was, however, we f.ound him to be
in a compe.ratively small way with few people, so we merely
accepted him as a Chief. and then passed on to find the
next one.
Finally we he,d a string of Chiefs - mostly
erstwhile Tindanas -
all very pleased vrit:b.. the new
power thrUst. upon them, and all frantically jealous of
each other.
From that day on any sort of cohesion
between 'them was impossible.
Even last year, when they
were asked if they would care to elect a Tribal Chief

frClll. among themsel vas. for Toendama only. instaad ot
joining in vo.th A ~olle
and mUting with them under a
alogla leader, they refused point blank.
They so.1d
they would IlIlite under the Chief of Bawku or nobody at all.
Even Kusanaba asks for nothing more than that he shall be
recognized as the senior Chief in 'l'oendema., evan. II this
gives him no authority over the others.
___ o00 ___
, , " .. , ,-, '"
""" .. "

Sol.
ZEBILLA.
,. , . . ,. ,. ~. ,~, . -' - ,.
kention has already been made of how the
original settlers in Zebilla were two brothers named
,Aputoba and Abiongo from Detokko in the Talansi oountry
(Frafra).
The present Zebilla people are very vague as
to their history, but the followir~
interesting legend,
whioh has many parallels in native folklore, is told fairly
oonsistently.
It is said that Aputoba was a great hunter and that
his sister had befn':in marriage to one of a party ot
travelling Mamprussis..
They took her aw~ to Gambag;a
where she lived with her husband.
One day many years
later she returned with some people to see her relatives
in Detokko.
She told of a fierae bush-aow which was
prowling ahout the water-holes outside Nalerigu and
preventing the people from drawing water.
Aputoba rose
up, went to Gambaga and killed the bush-aow.
As a reward
for hiS good work the Ha gave him a fetish and told him
to go and find a good place to put it. Aputoba vlandered
about until he came to some bush oountry in Kusasi which
he liked.
He decided to settle here and called it Detok,
after his old home.
He had many descendants, of whom the
pnesent Ghief is one

Z 0 N G 0 I R I.
The Zongoiri people are Gbingbinga-Kusasis
and,
as mentioned already, were found by the Gballl-
Kusasi s on the lands of I\nr'abaga. under Widinaba, and from
which they were promptly driven out.
l~e
story goes that when the Gbingbingas got
down to Zongoiri the oountry was practioally all bush
except for a small settlement ot Namprussis.
This
settlement appears to have been known as Bulkwera.
There
was. a Chief. named Sebiobaba, son of the Na, and it. is.
supposed his father oonsidered him too tar away fram
NalerigU, for he was called up to reside at the top of the
ooarp.
He did so, and built a new Bulkwere whiah is the.
one we know to-day.
Befora going he gave all the, land
to the Gbingbingas. with the exception of Y1buni, where
there were some other hlamprussis residing.
Their
descendants. are still there, and the Tindana is named
Akpieri Mamprussi, while his son .AmbimbWli is Headman and
a followe,r of Zongoiri.
Yibuni has about twelve
compounds onlM.
The ruling family in Zongoiri are of.ten said to be
Talansi Frafras. This., however, is not the oase. They
IV\..(.. Gbingbingas. But ona of their. anoestors. - Atasaka b.

8;.
name - journeyed to Tongo in the Talansi oountry to
plaaata the great fetish in the Tong hills and invoke
its aid in begetting o.hildren by his, favourite wife who
remained barren.
On his. return he brought a fetish from.
To~ with him.., and this oame to be greatly thought of
and respeoted by everybody, even Talansis Cloming som.etimes
to placate it. It as. therefore no wonder that the Chief
is often looked upon as a Talansi himself~natives who do
not know the story.
Zongoiri had not produoed a, Chief. when we arrived in
Gambaga, so one Awendi, gran son of Atasaka,was appointed
to the position.
In the early days of the Administration Zongoiri was
the home of tha Moronaba, or Chief. of the .Moshis J
who had
I
been driven out. ot 'Nagaciugu by the Frenoh.
He was. allowed
to stay at Zongoiri provided he swore loyalty to the
British. This he did, and many of his followers J joined
the Regiment.
On the death of. the Moronaba, the majority
of his people left zongoiri and returned to French Territory
Zonzoiri has sometimes been described as a. Hausa town.
There is here an instance of the way in which Hausa influenoe
has SO
often altered a name, or even ohanged it
altogether, in places to vIDiot Hausas have penetrated.

84.
longoiri ia not a Hausa town at all.
Ita proper name
is Kpo~a. and a.a suab it is still known by ma.Ill KiJBasia.
The first Chief of Kpombaya was ona Annd1 Kusas;i.
who was appointed soon after our arrival in Gambaga.
[is father was named Zongbweogo which means"Hausa".
Following a. very usual custom when several children in a
family have died previously a new baUy is often given same
exotio name in the hope that this will protect it from
the siokness. that carried off. the others.
This was done
in the case of. Zongbweogo.
He escaped the sickness, and
in time became about. the most important man in KpombB\Ya..
He used to trade-
corn with the M.a.mprussis and they oame
to speak of Kpombaya as Zongbweiri. which means tiThe- Hausa.' s
house.. "
Zongbweiri is usually pronounced Zongoiri by
Europeans, and so it has come to be written in the maps.
In the 193 t Census there were only 9 Hausas in the
whole of the Zongoiri Sub-Division whioh has a population
of over 5000 ..
A be.tter example of Ha.usa influenoe changing a name.
is perhaps. that given by Withersgill in his. booklet "Thft
Moshi Tribal!.
There it is. said th.at the Moshi town of
Tinga Kurgu, i.e. fTOld town ll was turned by the Hausas

85.
into Tankurku.
Incidentally h'uropea.na have corrupted it
atill furtharinto TenlmcillGU.
___ 000_. _, ._._. _, ._,
" " , . , , ( ,

86.
WIDINABA
As mentioned 1n the Kusa.si le~end (see page W)
VI1d1naba was one of the earliest homes. of tha KUsas1a who
Grossed the hills and oame into what is no .. aritish.
Territory. The Gbingbinge.s were thew~irat. and then the
Salansans1 oama weI' ~rom
lColsablaga with the Gballls
and drove them out. I
Wben the Salansens1 (the original
Kusasisl
and the Gballa. broke up into faotions, and
dispersed to various plaoes,
some of the Oballls remained
behind, and it is their desoendants who form the greater
part of the Widinaba population to-day.
I t seems propable that the Bimbas, who oame in much
later, stayed for a. time in Vlidinaba before passing an
down to their home 1n Binaba.
______ ~oOo.~O ______ _

81.
TIL I.
The people of Till- are Gballi - Kusa.sis and
therefore the. same a.s the inhabitants of Widinaba and
U16 Lamboya section of Zebilla(see page ~).
'rhey do not own . their land, however J for this belongs
to the remnants of the Gumbo people, most of whom mit;Bated
to Agolle after family quarrels more than a hundred years.
ago.
The ruling family at Till is Gbaill and the Chief
now lives on f.riendly terms with the Gumbo Tindana, though
this was not always the case.
The first Chief was Alrulbila, made soon after the
British arrived.
_______ 000-.-. -. -..- .-.-.
". , ,. , '" Ii ' ,

88 ..
B I NAB A.
The Bimba-Kusasis, who inhabit Binaba, oame
fram Biengu, near Zawgo, and are Di.uoh the same as the
Zawga people.
They came fattly recently and settled at
eo pla.ce oalled Dagbanga which was then inhabited by some
Mamprussis (see page q q ) ..
Whether they drove the Mamprussi settlement out, or
whether the hlamprussis cleared out on their own account
is not certain, but go they did for some reason or other.
The Chief of Binaba has rieen from a comparatlve~
unimportant persOIl to a position of some importanoe ..
Before the Administration took over there was only
a handful of people at Binaba and they had no Chief.
Then Zongoiri seems to have stepped in when he became
a Chief, and he appointed one Abuguri to be Headman at
Binaba.
Later there were arguments a.s to whether Binaba.
was to belong to Kusa.na.ba 01' Zongoiri, but on the 16th
May, !906 it was deolared independent of both.
About
this time Abugurl paid a visit to thaNa, after which -hL
was raoogn~ad aa a Chie! instead of eo Headman.
_______ 000 ______ _

Ie U G R I.
The Kugri people are probably the most
interesting in the oountry of Kusasi.
Many years ago
the Kugri lands belonged nominally to Binduri, and up to
the time the Chakosis oaused Ara.zubi t
Chief of Binduri,
to leave 1:a.la.ga,
there were a few Nabnamba--Kusasis living
there ..
When Arazub1 moved to Gumshe, however, the
Kugris also appear to have fled for safety from Kugri to
YUiga in the Upper Volta, stopping for a short time at
Yeragungu in Bawku on the wa~r.
Later when Samida was Chief and living at Tangaia
the Nabnambas came back and settled for a short :ti:mJl. period
at Tampielim in Bawku and then went on to what is now
Binduri.
'ilhile there, one of them appears to have bouiht
a slave from some passing traders.
The slave was named
Asunka and was a.lso of the Ha.bnamba tribe, having been
ca.ught in the Frafra country by the Bazaberimies and sold
to the traders who had intended taking him to Salaga ..
Asunka was apparently a man of some character, and
wllen the next Chief 'i1inyam came and settled at Binduri he
reoeived him as a gift from his owner.
Asunka soon
became a &reat favourite with the Chief and waS apparently

9Q.
of some oonseCl..uance in Binduri.
At this time Kutri was was s till deserted., and
\tinyallt deoided to put. AsUIlka down there f or the purpose
, \
of oolleoting another toll - in addition to the one he
himself already took at Binduri - tram all travellers
prooeeding to Sirinebaga and Gambaga.
This toll was ta.ken
as a matter of oourse by Bawlo.l, Binduri and Sinnebaga, and
oorresponded to the well-known IIfitotl
in the Hausa States
which was a tax. that had to be paid by everybody on leaving
a country..
The Moshi word for "nto" is Il!eragoll and
ASWlka. came to be known as Feragonaba i.e. Se,rkin Fi to, Or
the Chief of tolls.
It was not long before Feregonaba attracted a great
ma.ny of his Nabnamba relatives from Bincluri, and by the
time he died, and his son !gill'S suoceeded him tha Kugri
people ware. more or less independent of Bindurl and
oollecting the"Ferago" on their own account ..
In 1895 the Kugris fought and routed the troops of the
Na of Mampl"USs1.
The oasus belli, as so usual, was a
series at "woman palavers" between Mahama, the aClt1ng
Ohief at Bawku. and AgUre, the new Chief in Kugri.
During one of thosa palavers Yakubu Mamprussi., brother
of Maharna and also of the present Chiaf Abuguri, waS

proaeeding via Kugri with some aattle and shee
. P
whi~
he proposed to sell in Gambaga.
lie was refused~passage
I'
until the woman Qonoerned was brought from BawkQ and
delivered safely to Agure.
Not long after there was more trouble between Bawku
and Kugri, and when Ma.ha.ma gave out that he was now ready
to go to Gambaga to be made Chief by the Na the Binduri
people warned him that Aggre was making preparations to
hold him. up on the road.
Yakubu, his brother, was therefore sent seoretly by
Wokambo to the Na (Benga) to inform him of Agurers
intentions and to ask if perhaps the Na would agree to
send representatives. to Bawku to install Ma.ha.ma as Chie!
on the spo~instead of the latter having to prooeed to
Gambaga. for the oeremony.
The Na refused and sent
Yakubu back to say that he proposed to send an army against
the Kugris and a.nnilhila te them.
On hearing of the Na's intentions the Kugris sent two
men - Daramani and Aoheriga -
to the Limam of Gambag,a.
with two sheep and 20.000 oowries, and begged him to
interoede with the Na on their behalf.
treat and captured both the messengers.
The Na refused to
Daramani he sold
for gunpowder, but Acheriga esoaped and brought baak to

';)c..
Kugri news or the ooming war.
Atter a short stay in Gambaga Yakubu returned to
Bawku and the day atter his arrival the Na I s €;un8. were
heard in Kugri, twenty miles away.
Manama the aoting Chief, started off for Kugri with
twelve horses to see the slaughter of the Kugris.
But on
arrival in Binduri what was his astonishment to hear that
the Mamprussiahad suffered enormous losses. and were being
driven bao.k to Gambaga by the men of Kugri.
News had
heen brought t~
the effeot that Agure proposed to advanoe
f
on Binduri and Bawku when he return~om harrying the
Mamprussis.
Gambila was Chief of Binduri and he decided
to withdraw on Ba,wku
wi th Liahama.
A few days later, however,
the people of Tangsia,
Poyamiri, Gumyokko, K.ado, and one or two other seotions
under Binduri came and beGbed Gambilla to return, saying
that they wished to have no dealinga with Kugri and would
stand by him if Aggre 1:1 really did come.
Gambila
therefore returned to Binduri, and Agure appears to have
decided to rest on his laurels, for he made no advanoe
against him. ..
The Hat s army was commanded by one Jakeso, Chief
butoher in Gamba.ea, and it is said that he brol.l6ht 400 guns

and 50 horses.
93 •
~e story goe.s that the Kugris left their houses.
full ot peto, but no water anywhere,
and retired into
hiding up on the hill where ghe Reat House now stands..
A few remainoo in the village, including an old patriarch
wi th a long beard Il8med Agbanabawindi who was a stranger.
'fhey were all killed by the illamprussis who thought
Agbanabawindi 'was Ab'UI'e himself.
They then started to
drink the peto, and in due cour se the Kugris, who had by
now been reinforced by people fram Binduri,~, Zorse,
Tampielim, and other plaoes, descended upon them and killed
great numbers.
The enemy fled, and were followed as far
as the MoEagO river, where people fram as far away as
Zebilla arrived in time to assist in giving them the ooup
de graoe.
Na Beriga. was enraged at the defeat and started
preparations for the complete subjugation of Agolle the
following dry season.
He proposed to bring Chakosis from
Sansane-Mango t,\Ild to ask the Na of Yendi to assist him with
his Dagomba.s, as they had done in the pas.t during the reign
of Na Kulba.
During the rainy season, however J
the Europeans
arrived in Gambaga. and the Na was. deprived of an

94.
opportuni ty of taking his revenge.
For very many years after this the Kugri people
rejoiced in the faot that they had never been oonquered
,by the Mamprussis.
They are still proud of it, but
they have very diffeoont feelings for 1a.mprussi now-e.-days,
and the present Chief Asana, a son of Agure, oame recently
to the Chief of Bawku to be confirmed as a Chief aocording
to Mamprussi custom.
Kugri was deolared independent of Binduri in t910.
Iil' i9~ it was visited by ~ Governor Thorburn, who was
aooompanied by the Ha of hlamprussi Ora Wibiga).
A most interesting entry was made in the Distriot
Recoed Book on July tOth, 19t4 by the Distriot Commissioner.
It runs as follows:-
ITChief said he had heard that the Germans were
0going to take this oountry. He expressed great
"disinolination to be under G'erman rule and affirmed
"that he would personally lead all his people agains.t
it them in suoh an event.1f'
______ ~oOo ______ _

PUSIGA
TIle history of Pusiga has been re.lated, mostly
in Chapter Vi.
Now-a-days Pusiga Sub-Division is receiving a oonstant
flow of. immigrants frOIll French T.erritory, largely Yanga4
and Busangas, the result being that less th2Il halt the
total population is Kusasi.
);usiga itself. from the usual collection of scat"tered
compounds, is ~ecoming
quite a village, consisting largely
of Hausa.a.
00o, ____
----

'm;IP Al~
SAfELLIGA, BUGUR!. KAONRT.
" • # • • , , ~ , , , , '" , ..... J ~ , ~ , , , , , , .. ~ , ".' , ., _' t .. ,
Tha above tour SUh-Qinsioona have alreadl
been disaussed under Binduri in this Chapter..
Allot
them. with t.ha 8Xaeption ot Sapelliga are in the ManQated
Area. . The KUsaaia in both Sa.pell1~ and BuCuri form
cmnaidarahll less than hal! t.ha I population, ow1nl to t.ha
,

TIM. 0 N 1 ..
. ' ".t .. .. .. " " ~ .. ..t
The land on which the T1moni people live. is
said to have at one time f orlned part ot the Ma.mpI~si
SUb-Division 'ranga.
But the Chiefs af Tanga \vara. always,
so
effete, until Europeans came and established them a
bit more firmly, that the people. or Timoui do not ever
seem to have paid much attention to them ..
The. original 1nha.b1tants., like those of Tanga, say
they oame from Datok in Zebilla. so are probably of
Talan~i desoent. Previous. to this., however. they say
that they were in Sawur~ near Bansi in Binduri.
But this
seems doubtful.
Sometime at the beginning 0, the present oentury, or
possibly earlier, a ma.n named Alubandi settled in Timoni.
Alubandi was the son of one Alwoh, whose father wa.s ntlmed,
Rauya. a Kassena who came fr01ll Janogo in Kassena cOWltry
to peregu in Taw.
Atter he 1 d been in T1moni. 8. few years. Alubat)di seems
to have got himSe.lf eleeted Headman at the timK house of
ana Aj1libe. Kusas1. In MarCh ~909 Tlmoni was deolared
inciBpendent at Tange. and since. then Alubandi has bean
known as Chie!.

A lear or so atter this a man named A1I1nd1 , whosa
...
father bad been"T1nda n a ot Timoni,cl.a1mecl that. ba should
be Ch1ef. inStead ot the strancer Aluband1.
Ke waa told that
Ed tber he or hi. son should suoaeed Alubandi when he died.
In the. meantime they were t.o leave Timoni.
Aluband1
still l1ve:t and Aw1ndi is dead.
BUt h1a sons atill l1V8
1n Binduri. and preSl.Ul1ably when Alubandi cUea the promise
made in th.a pa.st aonoorn1~ his sucoe.ssor will be fulfilled
__ ~oOo, __ _

') ,.. \..)
/.
GUkBO Nlill.\ AHD KALBH.31 .~Ai34i.
~ - • .. , • '.' • I' I' .. ~
. '.' ,_ ..
These two interesting person~lities
of the
past have been referred to already in Chapter lli.
Their stories up to a point are inte~voven,
so it will
be more convenient to consider them together •
Long before the Mamprussi Chiefs that we know noVi in
Molle oame, and before the Bimbas had come to Agolle, and
even perhapS before the other Kusv,si clans came dO\m from
'~idinaba,
,.
theaa were living at Boiya in Binaba some
MaIll:prussiS. who had oom~ from Gambaga. Boiya ViaS then
known as Gtllllho and the leader of these M.amprussis vias
Gumbonaba..
A short distanoe awa:,r at Dagbanga (near the
present Rest House of Binaba) G~bonaba had some relatives.
One of them had a daughter who married a Kusasi named A,raJIl
from Biengll (near Za,wga in French Territory;.
!ram had
a son by her who waS named Agbida.
ThiS youth was always
being bullied and illtreated on account of ius hlampru:;.si
ffiother.
APparently his mother's people were related t,Q
the Na., and when the latter heard how the boy was bei~_
treated he sent people to fetch hit'1l to Gembaga.
Here the
boy spent s.ometime, and then the nO. made e. fetish for h:LID.
and sent lum baok witil it LO Bienr_.;.l~
He s:;.id that it 'uri:ul i

~oo
proteot him from the people, and, owtng to its power to
~ing either gooc1 or bad fortune to the people, aooording
to his instruotions, would in
time oame to be gr~atly
respected by everybody ~
Agbida oame hame and was. known
as Kalensinabe..
When Agbida died nobody suoaeeded him. as oustodian
of the fetiSh for a. long time.
Finally his. grandson
A-dita took on the job and he seems to have gained'
considerable respeot thl'oughou'L most of the Northern part
of Toendema.
Whether it was. before his time or a.fter that
the Kusasis sp.read CNer Toendema is not Imown.
All that seems to be lmown is that at some remote
period there was GumbonaIJa. funotioning as. a. great fetish
man in Boiya and Kalensinaba functioning in tha same way
at Biengu.
The latter was the junior of the two.
Then we came to the time when a Gumbonaba named
Zawunugu died and his relatives tought over the suooession •
There were two main pam.ies, and finally that to which the
senior members of the family belonged moved to Kasongo
in Zebilla.
The younger branch stayed at Boiya and one
Amoga became the Naba. He died a few days atter returning
from Nalerigu. and than his elder brother Asayidiga, who was
in Kasongo, got himself made Naba.
tie moved over to

i01
Yarugll, near the tite Volta., and settled down there.
He
was succeeded theI\! by one Lalungu.
During the latter! s
day, however,
there were more family quarrels and Lalungu' s
brother Abangada lett YorUomu, crossed over into Agolle,
and settled at Mogonori to the North of Bawku.
After Lalunguts dea~ nobody suoceeded tor a number of
years.. but one day a sorcerer indicated to ihangada t s son
Atelangu, who was living in hlogonori, that he \'{as the new
Naba.
He went to Nalerigu, was made Naha, and returned to
&ogonori.
Later on a. marauding band of ChakosiS drove
Atelangll and his people to YeragungtJ., where h.e himSelf,
his wife and amId, were all killed.
The Naba.shiP
lapsed again for many years, and this was during the period
when Seteem was Chief of Bavlku, i.e. roundabout t800, or
a. little later.
Later, when Bako was Chief of Bavlku, Azoah became
Gumbonaba., and returned to Mogonori again where he and his
descendaIl ts have lived ever since.
After Azoah came
,AZoteba, Abelimbur1 and the present man AbUoouri •
.A$ can be easily understood Gumbonaba is to...d,ay rather
a nonentity.
He is just a Kpamberi under the Chief of
Bawku, not even a Sub-Divisional Chief, and there are only

lO,-
a felt old people to-day who know that nearly two aantur*ea
MO Gumbonaba. was perhaps. the most important man in
'foendema..
The Gumbo people now retain none of their Mamprussi
charaoteristios at all.
They've forgotten the language
and have adopted all the Kusasi customs.
This is evell
m.ore than the present six 1iamprussi Ch.:Lefs have done.
The
remnants of the junior branoh of the family still live
near Boiya anti o'lm some land, including t.bat of Till.
To return to Kalensinaba..
It seems mora than
probable that after Gumbonaba ceased to function properly
the fame of Kale.nslnaba f s fetish spread further South, and
the Bimbas, having oome from Biengu, his . own town, would
doubtless have oontinued to plaoate it.
'Nhat happened to Kalensinaba when t.he French took all
that part of the country is somewhat vague, and there is
no account of him at all in the local District Recorda.
Thera 1s an old man who says he is Kalensinaba living now,
and who croased over
into British Territory a few years
ago..
Ee is named Atiga and says his brother Akllmpagi was
Kalensinaba before him, though they both belong to a junior
branch of the old ruling family..
He says his fathar was
made Chief of Biellbu by the French and that later they

lOJ ..
put mos~ of his family in prison, as a result of which he
~rossed into British Territory.
ffe lives now more or less
unnoticed a~ Widinaba ..
000, ___ _
---­ ",,.,i*'

.. - .. -- . ....-...-...-.....
Bawku
Triba.l Chief.
/
~RUSSI
Sinnabaga
Binclur1
Tashi
~
J
l
.1
T~a )1
VlokambQ -
( Alandatad Area1
~
Kassana
~R.u~SI
-
lW.:JAo.1.;. •
Z~bil la
Zongoiri
Widina.b~
Till.
Binaba
K%"Ti f
Pusiga - ~Mandat.ed Are..,!}
Tempana do
~ Sape lliga --as ~
~ rluguri 1'1..- ,W;;I ~.. . ~
t IW;biri dG- ~
- Timoni i
t
,
NyoJr,kO
l
Kuka J
Sabu (Bulugui;
.j
t ID."iga.
(
y .~ . ..
~
Zabagu. '-.
\. t
~
-
\ Gumbo
"-
....
~
htinkOh"U.
J
.(
i . cHiEFs~
j
sua~l VlSlOIUJ..
~~
~ -
~ ,i'" q~ik.l •
4- ~
?
~
\ f
\ . l:.e r a.&"1lIlt:;'1l J;
;). (s~e und~r G~O and
Kal~n?il1sba. on .raga 91 COIl
J
_--:.:_-l<~'
!.!.I
. u.o!!! ... ,~,!o.I!f4+ 0.1 ~o ... ~LQr~.-=-, _____________ ~ .JI

l:3liillURL ~ Aj,iHffi. i .
.. Zure is oalled a. Kpamberi but he is really only so in
pame) for he oontrols. a. tiny area only.
SHlliEBAGE BP &BERI.

•·-1
a"'4W&
I , .. , .... ,"""1.
2.~ ). %lJalleu
. I ,,",~I
4.Ban1';'i~1
.u'J?i!NDII. L .
,;,~ .. C", .. ,." •
OBMB6UGlCA Ia T.B.E6. OF THE lWi OF UiiPRUSSl CUW'1IaED LARGKLY
. - WQii i.a • . G .lein;mY;X· § iUSlURI OF THE i.&iPlWSSI maE.
~ , , , '.' , "':' .. , .. ( .. ~ ,. .... ".
5.uaywegama
6 Hewsa
• 1
.... ·1
1
~ , ....
I
1 " .. ,"""'t
f.iWBl 1 ~8) 8.Tampwr1. 9.~Kapangaj
1, .. "" .... , ....... "
10-. Vlont.oal1
. 1
1.1 .• Ata.bia
1 '- ;--;-,- ':-:--: .. ~~=-r-.-:-.. , . , , , , , ~~
12. Yamuaa(Ha Jaringa) tJ.Kurugu W.Habp1s1.(Sulamani)
1 . J. -
, c' r. -., .. ', ;.:. -... , , , . , , , 1 1 .
1.5: Bongo{fiai.uiiai i6.lia J1a (,ADdan:1) 1
.'
., 11.Kulba
.1
1"" , : .:~~
18.SaJ.Uu 19.Dambungu
1
I· . , , ... , . , .. . , , ... . 1-, ····,···· - ' ", ·1· . , . , , , . , ,1
20. Yimgu{Dawra) 2t.~ari( Yimha.shi 2.2..Ber1ga. 24. ZOre.
1 -- 1 . 1
25.\71bi ga 2:).Sigiri(Su1aman1}- 1 .
26.WafoO,;aharna)

APPBNDlX G.
(." ~ ~ ,
LAil.S UONGgaNING SUC~BSSIOH TO 1JJdPRUSSl
CHIEFTAINSHIPS AS REGORDill BY ~RUSSl
. ClUEFS Ili THE lill SASl .DIs'rRICT.
. ....--.. -----: 000: -..---.----. .
Rule-i.
On the death of a Chief he ia followed
by the eldest man surving who is son of a previous Chief.
If this is not his own brother it could only be his cousin.
For any uncles he may have had would have occupied the
stool already, even though they were younger than he.
(see next rule.)
Rule-ll.
After his Qouains(if any) and brothers
(if any) he is succeeded by his brother{s sons in order of
seniority - if his brothers had reigned - or even by hia
own son if the latter was the senior of the~ all.(see how
Mombada's own son fuaha.ma, became Chief af BaViku instead of
Parnall, son of his elder brother Bako)
N.B.
In no circ~t~ces oould a brother be passed over
in favour of a son or nephew even if the son or nephew
was older than the brother. (see how well it is
recognized that Bawa, brother of Abuguri the present Chief
of Bawku is senior to his hephew Nambie, son of Zongbweogo,
although Nambie is an older man than he.)
The following extracts from the genealogioal trees
of the Chief of Bawlru, the Ns, and Chief of Binduri help
to illustrate thes~ t~o
rules.

5,. fuahama(Seteem)
1 -
1",·,···",,1
6. Bako I ~oda
~ ____ ~l !
1,,··,,·.,1 1,,·· .. 1····· .. 1 .... .. ·1 .. .. ··1 ·1· '
akyimna.ba Pamal1 8.A1ahama. 9Zong-10 .Abuguri.Haruna. YakubuBawa'
1 bweogo '
1 1
Amamii Nambie (older than Sawa, his
. uncle:, but junior in rank
When .MaIlbodf, died his brother Bako' s son Nakyjmnaha
was the heir but he died juat before, being enswoled.
Pa.mal1, Na.kyimnaba • s young brother, was younger than
hlahama who therefore took Nakyj mne,ba 's place, and
succeeded Mamboda, his own father. Mahama was followed
by his brother -Zongbweogo.
on zongbweogo1s death Pamal1 should have succeeded
before Zobgbweogo' s brother AbW];Uri,aB pamali, though
younger than Zongbweogo was older then Abuguri. H.owever,
parnali predeceased Zongbwe6go, as Abuguri suooeeded.
In this particular case, however, it is generally
held that Pama11 would have been: turne.d down by the He
even i! he had been alive, beoause it is said that on one
oooas1Qo Pamali oommitted an indisore.tion with the Na~s
wife,
still that does not alter the rule-, and all agree
in stating that. had Pamali n~ offended the Ua, and lived
l~ enougtt, he would have been Chief before AbUgUri.

Sifuila.rly, aooording to this rookonong the next Na. of
fuamprussi should be. the Chief of Paragu if he is older
than Wun1, for he bears the same relationship to Wuni
as Pama.li did to Abuguri. ',Chis is illustrated below
by the extract fram the Nats genealoeical trea:-
1;.8. t s TRBb.
Na. Sa1ifu.
1
1
1 ... , .. ,., ... .. ·1··,· · ......... , ·1·····,· ·1
2O.Na Y~u\Dawura)2i.Na Pari(Yimbashi) 22..Beric;a.24.Zore
1 _ 1 ' 1
25. Wibiga. I· ...... . .... ,1 1
23.Sig~ri Chief of 1
( Sulamani J Par a~'1l 1
1
1
1
1· .. " ...... "·,, .. ,,1 ·11 1
26.1Ja Wafo (ilial1a.ma ) Wuni ~a.hama lssa Adam
l:11lWUR.L I S rr~
Na l'a.m.pouri
1
t. 'tesla
2. Arazubi
1
1·· , ... , , ..... ·1
3. ~ani 4.Sanida.
1",,,,,' . 1
5.Vfinyr 6.Asi y iri
I . ' . ,I "", . ,1· . ,I·
I.o~bita.. 8.Yirimiya Azabo 1~.Abindogo
1.·' ....... ·1
9. SaI .ifu ~O.NykelIl8
1
,
Ayamdogo
::'].
Danaba.
In the ca.se of NOS. 9. and to, Salifu and Nykema, it.
will be seen tha.t the rules were broken and it was only
/ in ',929 that the rightful man AbindoGo got the stool.
His 'la~~
brother Aza.bo is almost blind so was exoluded.

L~u.li.l-1l1.
~J one of the following di::.t Jilities.
may exclude the rightful heir, in whioh case the stool
passes to the next man, or even fur~er than that if
necessary:-
(i)
Blindness or loss of one eye.
(iiI Leproay.
(iii). kadness.
(ivl
(v)
Finger or toe missing.
Deformity.
(AnU . ,ethel" disfigurament is apparently not a sufficient
ceuse for rejeotion.)
(vi)
Bad char'aater or perhaps even incompetency.
(vii) Left-handedness.
(viii) Behaviour discreditable to a member of the Chief' a
family e.g. oontinual drunkenness or excessive oonsorting
with the common people.
Rule-lV.
The real heir may renounce his rights of his
own free will for any reason if he so wishes, but once
he has done this he can never claint the stool on a fut.ure
occasion

;.n~r
one of the following di£{ Jilities.
may exclude the rightful heir, in which oase the stool
passes. to the next man , or even fur~her than that i!
neoessary:-
(1) Blindness or l oss of one eye.
(1i ~ Leprosy.
\1i1). kadness.
(iv).
(v)
Finger or toe missing.
Deformity.
(ANi' ·ether disfigurement is apparently not a suffioient
ceuse for rejection.)
(vi) Bad char'auter or perhaps even incompetency.
(vii) Le ft -handedness.
(viii) Behaviour discreditable to a member of the Chief IS
family e.g. continual drunkenness or excessive oonsorting
with the common people.
Rule-1V ..
,rrhe real heir may renounce his rights of his
own free will for any reason if he so wishes, but once
he has done this he can never claim the stool on a f.u.t.ure
/
occasion

riA N 0.01>1 •
< ,..,-. L. I
~
~ . A
.J3 1/\1 AfM
~ .
\.'P~00 GA NClA)
f4J
1<1151' "'ABA
o
"Z. 0 ):; ~,,_, 1\_( __
/
tJ