The Totemic Ancestor of Umuoru People in Delta State, Nigeria [Part two]

This mysterious   ingenious act by the alligator earned it a great place in the hearts of the people of Umuoru. They declared the alligator a sacred animal and not to be killed for any reason. It became the integral part of the Umuoru tradition. In Umuoru, the alligator grows old and dies a natural death. Whenever it dies, it is considered as the death of a hero. The village wails over its death and hails its passage to the ancestors.

The alligator is subsequently given a burial equal to a hero. During the burial, it is wrapped in a white cloth, and then certain rituals are performed. Before it is buried, gunshots of tribute are fired into the air to finally mark the exit of an ancestor. Thereafter, cries of “our father is gone”, rents in the air as it is laid to rest.

There is a story about a particular season of drought in Umuoru land and some non-indigenes who were of the opinion that the reverence of the alligator was a mere facade, decided to kill one out of so many alligators that paraded the Umuoru soil. They made a sumptuous meal of it.

Soon after, the mystic realities downed on them when their skin began to shrink just like the alligator’s. Villagers who saw them knew they had committed an abomination and were en-route to death. But for the timely and costly intervention of the Oracle, their case would have become a tragic history.

Over the decades, there has been a great deal of multicultural and socio religious changes which have led to the gradual relegation of the reverential attention given to the alligator by the Umuoru people.

Christianity in particular has been a major threat to Umuoru people’s devotion to the alligator. However, in spite of this onslaught, the alligator still exists till date and revered. The myth of the reality surrounding the “mysterious alligator” cannot be wiped away from the oral tradition and sociology of the Umuoru people.

One may disparage this story as a mere myth, fable or even a traditional animal right protection code, but the truth still remains that the Umuoru and African Tradition in General has always thrived on mysteries.

In other parts of the world, the tradition of revering animals are being totemic abound with very strong story. One of such countries is china. The Chinese have a mythic and totemic worldview of the Dragon; their reverence for the Dragon has become part of their daily lives, beliefs and practice. Also in the native Indian-American culture, the Peacock is an animal that is regarded as a sacred bird.

Symbolically, the connotations and allusions of people relating to animals as part of their cosmology is possibly emanating from the fact that both man and animals are occupants of the earth’s surface and need each other for survival. Or possibly the anthropological findings of 1857 in a cave inn Neanderthal, Germany, indicating that man evolved from higher animals may be true.

The alligator called Awu by the Umuoru indigene is a messenger of the ancestors to the Umuoru people. They revere it and have institutionalized it. It has always been honored as a representation of the ancestors.