Spatial continuities: masks and cultural interactions between the Delta and Southeastern Nigeria.

The artistic interactions between the various peoples of the Niger Delta and their Igbo neighbors who dominate Southeastern Nigeria to the north and east are not difficult to demonstrate. Art objects, including textiles, bronze shrine sculpture, and masks, have been traded between these regions for generations. More than objects alone, numerous masking and figurative traditions have crossed ethnic and regional boundaries and are practiced in both areas. The existence of shared artistic traditions counters a persistent notion in the study of African art--that of the continent as a series of discrete ethnic units, each in its hermetically sealed artistic world. Although these assertions have long been recognized as problematic (Frank 1987), their broad implications have not been fully examined. A discussion of the dynamic exchanges between the southern Igbo and Niger Delta peoples is essential for a fuller understanding of art in this part of Nigeria. It also offers an opportunity to examine the nature of interregional artistic interactions against a historical background.

The Niger Delta and Southeastern Nigeria are ecologically and culturally diverse, and both places display distinctive characteristics that account for the nature of the interactions between them. The settlements of the Delta have exploited fishing and other aquatic resources typical of a region dominated by waterways. Peoples living in the freshwater areas often combine fishing with farming. Surrounded by water, Delta communities rely on boats and canoes for transportation. Dependence on such resources has resulted in the emergence of complex beliefs in which water spirits play an important role. The Delta location facilitated early contact with other coastal communities and, since the fifteenth century, with foreign traders and, subsequently, colonial powers.

North of this coastal area occupied by Delta, Ogoni, and Ibibio peoples is the hinterland dominated by the Igbo. Largely farming land where yam, cassava, and palm trees are grown, it is bounded by the Cross River to the east and extends past the Niger River to the west. From south to north, the region gradually shifts from the lush palm-belt to parched savanna. Despite the extensive use of waterways such as the Niger, Cross, and the lower part of the Imo and the Enyong, travel often required traversing long distances on foot. Until the early twentieth century, coastal and Delta communities formed an effective barrier against direct contact between the hinterland and seaward commerce. Examining the role of these communities as intermediaries in the export trade is important to understanding their relationships with their Igbo neighbors (Floyd 1969:19-54).

Neither region was ever politically or culturally unified, and both exhibit diverse modes of social, political, and religious organization. Scholars often use the term clan to describe the largest unit of social cohesion in the Delta, while in Igboland it is the village group, consisting of from three to thirty villages. Beyond village groups there are often clans that trace their origin to a putative ancestor, but these are not effective or cohesive social units. This fragmented sociopolitical situation brought about a corresponding degree of artistic diversity: masks or figures in one village group often look substantially different from those of a neighboring group. The picture is further complicated by the independent movement of object types, names used to describe them, and the institutions that use them (Nicklin & Salmons 1982).

The diversity of artistic styles and the complexity of their distribution have been a source of frustration for those attempting to study the visual arts of these two regions. As early as 1935 Carl Kjersmeier observed, "The strong productive reciprocity among the different tribes of southeastern Nigeria ... [is] so much so that it is impossible to discern from an artistic point of view who is a creator and who is an imitator" (1935, vol. 2:28; my translation). In 1969 William Bascom commented that Igbo art is "a striking example for the existence of multiple sub-tribal styles ... that it is almost meaningless to speak of an Ibo [Igbo] style in wood carving, and almost impossible to abstract any stylistic features common even to a single form, such as a mask" (1969:103). This variety perplexed William Fagg, who maintained that "[a]rt provides one of the principal criteria for the identification and delimitation of tribes" (1965:11). Igbo artists, according to Fagg, "seem to have found little need for integrative influences in art above the level of the village and the district" (Elisofon & Fagg 1983:13).

Fagg's approach to the study of African art is based on two factors. The first is a bias toward a centralized mode of political organization over the apparent chaos of decentralized societies--a typical colonialist position that characterized the British attitude toward Southeastern Nigeria (Afigbo 1972; 1975). In this regard the decentralized Igbo were the polar opposite of the British Crown. The other reason is that, as pioneers in the study of African art, Fagg and his contemporaries were striving to establish a comprehensible body of knowledge marked by tidy classifications of cultures and artifacts. This approach was similar to the focus on the distribution of cultural traits that was then current in British and American anthropology, and is still held by some collectors and museum curators looking for easy labels to attach to their objects. Fagg's notion that each African "tribe" is its own stylistic world has become known as the "One Tribe, One Style" approach (Kasfir 1984).

This attitude was also influenced by the Romantic quest for ultimate origin and centers of creativity; the margins are consequently viewed as derivative or provincial. From such a perspective, the acephalous Igbo and their neighbors were on the receiving end of artistic innovation. In 1948 Kenneth Murray noted the resemblance of Igbo Ulaga and Oji Onu masks to Ijo masks representing water spirits. He then added:

   It is noticeable how often Ibo [Igbo] carvings show influences from the art
   of neighboring peoples, which influences, if plotted on a map, would appear
   like fingers spreading into Iboland. The Ibo are great borrowers and it is
   common now to find instances where traders have been responsible for the
   introduction to their home district of a play that they saw during their
   travels. (Murray 1948:1)

Murray is probably right in his description of how formal aspects of this type of mask were borrowed. What needs to be looked at, however, is the subtext that assigns a greater value to formal originality over creative adaptation.

As their familiarity with the distribution of art objects and styles increased, scholars realized the shortcomings of the "One Tribe, One Style" approach. Rene Bravmann's Open Frontiers: The Mobility of Art in Black Africa (1973) signaled a departure from this mode by emphasizing the flow of artifacts across ethnic boundaries. Although Open Frontiers focuses on artistic interaction, Bravmann still sees ethnic groups as cohesive and distinct units--each with its particular body of artworks. As this article shows, stylistic distributions in Southeastern Nigeria are far more complex.

The studies of G.I. Jones offer an alternative to this approach. The theoretical framework of Jones's concern with "cultural traits" may already have been out of intellectual fashion (Stocking 1995:291-97) when he published his article "The Distribution of Negro Sculpture in Southern Nigeria" in 1938. Yet, his search for the distribution of cultural traits, coupled with an extensive and intensive familiarity with the region, led him away from the synchronic approach of British colonial anthropologists of the time. Although in this early study he refers to the style regions by ethnic designators, including; Bini, Ijaw (Ijo), Igbo, Ibibio, and Cross River, he is quick to point out the fluidity of styles:

   Actually a classification according to tribal groupings is not altogether
   satisfactory. Bini art probably derives from archaic Yoruba, Ibo splits up
   into a number of different styles, and in addition, some clans imitate Ijaw
   and Ibibio work. The term Cross River is used rather than Ekoi because the
   style is common to other tribes living along and near the river. (Jones
   1938:103-4)

Thirty-five years later, in his "Sculpture of the Umuahia Area of Nigeria," Jones (1973) returned to this issue. In that article, however, he shifts the focus from ethnicity to regional distribution by examining the styles of woodcarving in four southern Igbo subgroups of the Umuahia area. Jones proposes that the styles and types of masks and other woodcarving are shared among different ethnic and linguistic groups, and he further distinguishes between masks not according to formal traits but according to the spirit that is embodied: Ibibio masks represent the spirits of the dead, Cross River masks are forest demons, while Delta masks are water spirits. Those of the Umuahia Igbo subgroups have different mixtures of these traits. Jones remarks:

   It is customary to classify West African sculpture using two criteria,
   tribe and style, on the assumption that there is a correlation between
   them.... However, I am really concerned with an area over which a
   particular culture trait--in this case a type or style of sculpture--is
   distributed. This area may or may not coincide with a linguistic or
   political area. (Jones 1973:59)

Jones's studies were followed by Herbert Cole and Chike Aniakor's Igbo Arts: Community and Cosmos (1984), which provides a detailed and nuanced picture of art in Igboland. Both Jones and Cole remain concerned with what we can term a "geography of style"--the process of mapping out stylistic distribution. What is missing from such an approach is a diachronic perspective that can explain how this distribution evolved. The specific configuration of mask genres, and their interpretation in any given locality, can only be discerned in light of the historical process that created it (Bentor 1995).

Understanding the dynamics of masking in Southeastern Nigeria requires another important analytical shift, away from imposed categories of style and toward locally named and identified genres of masking. A genre often includes several formal types of masks, accompanied by their costumes, music, dance steps, and an organization such as a masking or secret society that uses them. Masking genres are ever evolving and changing. In a given village group, each genre is well defined, but because each group has a unique history, the array of mask types, mask names, and sponsoring associations often vary greatly from one location to another. It is this complex pattern of changes over space and time that is my concern here.

The East-West Trajectory: Ekpe, Okonko, and Mmanwu Masquerades

If we examine a broad band of southern Nigeria from the Cross to the Niger rivers (Fig. 2), we can trace a pattern of continuous artistic change. Limiting the scope of investigation to masking, we can see how these traditions flow in and out of each other with no assumptions of a hierarchy that distinguishes between original and derivative styles. Moving from east to west and from south to north, we begin in the Cross River, where the Ekpe (or Ngbe) secret society is a dominant institution. Ekpe masqueraders appear only in functions of the society, such as initiation and burials of members, not in community-wide festivals. Performances of the society's masks were documented east of the Cross River by Malcolm Ruel among the Banyang (1967:216-58), by Elliot Leib and Renee Romano (1984) among the Ejagham, by me at Arochukwu west of the river (Bentor 1994), and by others. Many functions are held out of sight in the Ekpe lodge. At burial ceremonies several processions, each one associated with a grade of the society, go from the lodge to the burial place. Accompanying each group is a single masquerader dressed in a tight-fitting knitted body suit; he carries a whip, but does not wear a wooden mask or headdress (Fig. 1). Among the Cross River Igbo, the generic term for all Ekpe society masks is Okonko (Figs. 3, 4). While the semantics of the word Okonko are not clear, it seems to be of Igbo origin.

The Ekpe secret society aided in the creation of a Cross River trading network by facilitating trade along and away from the river. There, membership in Ekpe helps cement relationships of trust and even commercial credit in the Cross trade network. Ikwo Ekpo (1978) and Simon Ottenberg and Linda Knudsen (1985) have suggested that the Cross River serves as a corridor for the transmission of the institution with its masks and costumes.

Ekpe among the Aro

From east of the Cross River, Ekpe expanded to Igbo communities in the Arochukwu, Bende, and Umuahia areas to the west. With its extensive ties throughout the region, Arochukwu is a magnet for different masking traditions. Oracular activities, trade, and a network of settlements have extended the Aro reach over the Cross River, Ibibio, and Igbo areas, and to the edge of the Delta in the Ikwerre area. As Aro people moved between these settlements and their hometown at Arochukwu, they absorbed and modified many different genres of masking to fit their needs. As a result, the annual festival at Arochukwu, is a veritable encyclopedia of Southeastern Nigerian masks, where the complex history of the Aro is collapsed into a visual heterotopia (Bentor 1995).

The Aro people are the result of the mingling of several Igbo, Cross River, and Ibibio ethnic elements. One of them, the Ibom Isi, who came from the east across the Cross River, is credited with introducing Ekpe and its masks to Arochukwu. Today membership is open to all Aro groups. In Ekpe ceremonies at Arochukwu, many songs are sung in Cross River languages, although most members do not understand them. The use of a language other than the one used for everyday speech adds a powerful aura to the society. For the Aro, the Ekpe society continues to serve as an important instrument that links them together. An Aro person living in an outlying Aro settlement who wishes to join the Ekpe society or to progress in its graded system needs to travel to Arochukwu to do so. In the past, the bodies of notable Aro who died at a settlement were dried and taken to Arochukwu for burial. Today, if an Ekpe member is to be buried at the settlement, the masquerader and other ritual paraphernalia of the society must be brought from Arochukwu (Fig. 5).

For the Igbo, yam is a crop of the greatest cultural importance, and in southern Igboland the New Yam festival, which welcomes the new harvest, is a major annual celebration. The Ekpe society arrived in Arochukwu from the other side of the Cross River area, where yam is not a major food item. Thus, despite its expansion into the yam-growing area, the society does not take part in these festivals. At Arochukwu the power of Ekpe is suspended for the duration of the celebration. Shortly before it begins, Ekpe members formally close their lodge and ceremonially reopen it after the festival (Bentor 1995:172-73).

As the Aro people absorbed the Ekpe society and many other mask-using institutions, they in turn helped extend the Cross River network westward into Igboland. Item and Bende oral traditions often ascribe the introduction of Ekpe to Aro traders or to those returning from a visit to the famed oracle at Arochukwu. At Abiriba the tradition is that their Ekpe was purchased from the Efik of Calabar with whom Abiriba traders were in close commercial contact (Abalogu 1978). The Ekpe costume at Abiriba includes a puffy collar like that worn by Ekpe masqueraders of Calabar; the collar is absent at Arochukwu and in the middle Cross River areas.

Okonko Masquerades

As we move away from the Cross River and into the interior of Igboland in the Umuahia, Ngwa, Ohuhu, and Nkwerre regions, the Ekpe society, with its strict hierarchies and important religious and judicial roles, disappears. In its place we find a related institution called Okonko. Okonko masks have no uniform formal appearance. Some wear Ekpe-like knitted body suits (Fig. 6). More often, the costumes are a rough, net-like, woven string garment without a wooden mask or a headdress (Fig. 7), though the impression of a tight body suit is maintained. In the Ngwa area, the masquerader often dons an Annang Ibibio-inspired helmet mask (Fig. 8), and in the northern section of Okonko distribution, a raffia "fur" is often woven into the garment (Cover).

Thus, the strong connection of the Okonko society and its masks to the Ekpe secret society of the Cross River is suggested by the shared term Okonko and by its body-suit costume. In addition, oral traditions claim that the Okonko society was established by the Aro people. (2) There are also noticeable differences, however. Unlike Ekpe, Okonko is a masquerade society. Membership is less formal, often including most male members of the community (Green 1958:157), and there are no separate initiation requirements for each grade. Okonko has played some religious and judicial roles, but its main purpose is to provide entertainment at communal festivals--especially the New Yam festival, which is held when the new crop is ready for harvest around July or August. As opposed to the single Ekpe masquerader, Okonko masks often appear in large numbers.

In the borderline area of Uzuakoli and Ovim (between Bende and Okigwe), the side-by-side existence of Ekpe and Okonko is attributed to Aro influence; this region was on one of the major trade routes used by the Aro (Azunna 1972:5-6). The Ibibio masking tradition called Ekpo is also found here. Its origin is ascribed to two local slave dealers who traveled beyond Arochukwu to the Ibibio area (Azunna 1972:46-47; see also Fox 1964:57-60).

Igbo peoples in the Orlu and Isu areas west of Okigwe celebrate Okonko festivals. Unlike the New Yam harvest festivals of southern Igboland, these Okonko celebrations mark the beginning of the farming season around March or April, following the prevailing pattern of northern Igboland.

Just south of Orlu, the Okonko society provides the basis for the Umuowa village group's social organization, and membership is universal among men. A very elaborate affair, Okonko is celebrated there over sixteen days in several stages. On the opening day, an Eke market day of the Igbo four-day week, masks from each of the five villages of Umuowa parade at the communal marketplace. During the next six days, masks perform within these villages. On the eighth day, Okonko members return to dance at the market, but no mask performs. (3) On the night of the last day, an Okonko mask walks all around the edges of the village group, marking the boundaries of the community with the sacred palm frond (omu). (4) The masqueraders wield a large machete and wear either a knitted body suit like that of the Cross River Ekpe or a rough, net-like costume with a profusion of raffia. One mask from Umubu village in Umuowa has a conventional costume--except for the rubber gorilla mask of the type used in the film Planet of the Apes. Brought to Umubu for a funeral ceremony in 1976 by the deceased's son who lived in Manchester, England, it is now an integral part of the village repertoire of masks (Fig. 9).

Mmanwu Masquerades

Farther to the northwest, in the area between Nkwerre and Orlu, the Ekpe-Okonko complex comes into contact with Mmanwu, the dominant genre of masking in north-central Igboland. Like Arochukwu and Abiriba, Nkwerre was an important center of iron smithing and trade. As a result, one finds both Okonko and Mmanwu masking societies there, along with the war dance Ekperipe, whose origin is in Ohafia just north of Arochukwu. Some Mmanwu masks, particularly the popular dancing Oji Onu, have now become part of Okonko in this area. (5) Even farther north, in Umueshi of the Nwabosi clan, northeast of Orlu, Okonko and Mmanwu exist side by side. Each genre, however, plays a very different role. Village groups to the north and east of Umueshi are strongholds of the Mmanwu tradition, in which masks play a judicial role, for example, placing injunctions on a disputed piece of land. Not to be outdone, Umueshi adopted the Mmanwu masquerade (Fig. 10); because of its ties to land disputes, Mmanwu functions within extended families or kindreds. The Okonko society, however, is much more entrenched there. It consists of five grades, each with an elaborate initiation process. While most Okonko masks at Umueshi are of a generic type, using the body suit with a profusion of raffia, there are also many elaborate and unique masks of great inventiveness (Figs. 11, 12). (6)

The South-North Trajectory: Owu, Egbukere, and Ulaga Masquerades

Another trajectory of fluid masking adaptation links the Niger Delta with the Igbo hinterland. The dominant masking genre of the Delta embodies water spirits. Known collectively as Owu, this genre typically includes long horizontal head-dresses representing aquatic animals such as sharks, crocodiles, and hippos, which often incorporate human features. Groups in the Ikwerre region share these masks with the Delta and have developed several distinct genres, including one called Owu and another called Egbukere or Egbukele, as has been described in Ekpeye and Abua by G.I. Jones (1939), Ekpo Eyo (1968), and John Picton (1988). Prior to the establishment of Rivers State, these groups were considered, at least by outsiders, to be Igbo, but as Picton suspected, some people at Ahoada, being now in Rivers State, no longer stress their Igbo affiliation, preferring to emphasize their riverain links.

As we move north along the Niger River, the horizontal headdress with an aquatic theme gradually becomes smaller, and the marine animal is replaced by a less specific animal or by a bird with a large beak and human features. Curled horns are sometimes added at the back to balance the large open mouth. These masks are called Ulaga or Uraga, and as noted earlier, Kenneth Murray observed that they show clear affinities with masks in the Delta. Murray suggested that Igbo traders along the Niger introduced them in Igboland (see also Jones 1984:151-53; Murray 1948). Such traders were likely to be Aro from the settlements around Oguta or from Awka in north-central Igboland. Aro traders often lived for extended periods in their trading areas, interacting with local populations. Today Ulaga is a minor type of mask that is largely used in children's masquerades.

Eventually the horizontal headdress was incorporated into Mmanwu, the dominant masking genre of north-central Igboland, where it plays marginal roles. When acting as a crowd controller at festivals, it is called Oji Onu (black mouth); when providing entertainment during funerals, it is known as Mmanwu Igbada (dancing mask or spirit). These masks, found in a broad band from Okigwe in the east to Onitsha in the west, have become very popular in recent years as an expression of youthful exuberance (Osadebe 1981). Its costume is made of indigo-dyed cloth similar to that used to wrap corpses. Thus its appearance readily illustrates that, like other Mmanwu masks, it represents "the dead among the living" (Fig. 13).

Confluences

The two trajectories of masking traditions, the Ekpe-Okonko and the Owu-Egbukere, meet in the Orlu area. (7) Northeast of Umuowa and Orlu and west of the Urashi River across from Umueshi is the Umuma-Isiaku village group, also of the Nwabosi clan. Its masking genre exemplifies this confluence. Umuma-Isiaku has an autochthonous tradition of origin: they do not claim to have migrated from any other place. They trace their ancestry to a person called Owakpa, whose thirteen children established the Umuma-Nneseii segment of the Nwabosi clan (Igwegbe 1989:9).

Although not all villages in Umuma-Isiaku celebrate Okonko festivals, it is the main masking genre of the community (Igwegbe 1989:14). (8) Others are Mmanwu, prevalent in the area to the north, and Okoroshia, found in the region to the west. Oral tradition does not recall the specific circumstances of the introduction of Okonko to Umuma-Isiaku, but admits that Okonko was adopted from neighboring Umunubu in Nkwerre to the south. In an opening address at the 1988 Okonko festival at Umuegbu, one of the Umuma-Isiaku villages, the chairman of the organizing committee commented:

   We are told that Okonko society or Ekpe came over to this place from
   Arochukwu/Ohafia. Some say it came from Nkwerre in those early days.
   Whatever the case, it has come to stay. It has been embraced by the people
   of Umuegbu as their traditional dance.

In the words of Basil Igwegbe, a member of the community who studied the festival, "Okonko in Umuma-Isiaku is a stage in the evolution of Ekpe culture which may have started among the Ekoi of Cross River State of Nigeria spreading to Igboland through the people of Arochukwu" (1989:15).

The Ekpe origin of the Okonko society at Umuma-Isiaku is unmistakable. Like Ekpe in the Arochukwu region, the society has a structure consisting of seven grades. Some of its terminology also refers to Ekpe. For example, the name of the generic mask used as a crowd controller during festivals and funerals is Ogbaoso Ekpe, "messenger of Ekpe" (Igwegbe 1989:16) (Fig. 14). The Ekpe greeting "Ojeh, ojeh" is often used by those in the Okonko society. The Okonko opens with processions of members marching according to seniority. They wear a George, or madras, wrapper and carry brass bells. The textile is widely used as prestige cloth during burials and ceremonies from the Delta through southern Igboland to the lower Cross River areas (Aronson 1982:123-24, 141, n. 1, 2). Originally imported from India, it is now commonly available in local substitutes. While not limited to Ekpe members, the cloth and bells constitute the customary dress of the society.

Anyone familiar with Ekpe in the Cross River and Okonko in southern Igboland would expect the masks at Umuma-Isiaku to conform to the main features found in those regions. However, as soon as the masks made their appearance at the 1988 Okonko festival at the Umuma-Isiaku village of Umuegbu, it was clear that in their shape and decorations they did not follow these predictions. The masks came out in groups of three or four accompanied by an orchestra, each group representing a ward of Umuegbu. Their long horizontal headdresses representing different aquatic creatures were very much like the Owu and Egbukele masks of the Delta and Ekpeye regions. Instead of the net-like costume, however, the masqueraders wore trousers with many pieces of colorful printed cloth attached to them (Fig. 15). One such headdress shaped like a crocodile had fantastic added details of light bulbs, airplanes, a snake, and figures of a palm-wine tapper and a rider (Fig. 16). Another, with a shark-like appearance, had fins, paddles, and flags (Fig. 17). Instead of Ekpe-Okonko features, then, the masks incorporated visual elements of the other trajectory coming north from the Niger Delta. (9)

Not all masks were of the same type. Several, representing a snake or a star, seemed so fanciful that it is difficult to relate them to an existing tradition (Figs. 18, 19). A few masks represented Mammy Wata (Fig. 20), a water spirit found in different forms and under different names in many parts of west and central Africa. While her specific meaning is embedded in local traditions, she is often portrayed as an alluring Caucasian woman. Mammy Wata tempts, rewards, and finally destroys her male followers or torments and empowers her female followers. In these complex roles she embodies the challenges and ambiguities of modernity. Thus, while strictly speaking Mammy Wata is not part of the Owu masquerade complex, she is a water spirit and, at least in southern Nigeria, often the concern of groups living near streams and rivers (Gore & Nevadomsky 1997; Jell-Bahlsen 1989).

On the second day of the festival, a masquerader wearing a very large cone-shaped costume surmounted by a tilted carved human head was ushered in by a group of elders. It moved slowly, then stopped near the area where Okonko elders were sitting, and remained there without moving until the event was over. This was Gburugburu ("All Around"), the name being the highest title of Okonko in Umuma-Isiaku (Fig 21). In shape it was much like the Cross River or Umuahia type of Ekpe mask also seen at Arochukwu (Fig. 22). Although it remained stationary, it occasionally made a sonorous, low-pitched sound identical to the Ekpe shout. In the Cross River area, the source of this shout is one of the most guarded secrets of the society; it is only heard from within a well-hidden enclosure. At Umuma-Isiaku the source was obvious, and the sound generated little attention.

How does one account for this strange congruence? Further investigation made it clear that the Delta connection was not only recognized but intentional. Society members referred to the headdresses as Isiowu ("Owu head") or Egbukele. One group of masks was singing "Owu gbara moto" ("Owu rides a car"), which was explained to me as a reference to the great distance traveled by the masks from the Delta. Another song was "Egbukele na mba, anyi nwe Owu" ("Egbukele traveled abroad, we are owners of Owu"), again a reference to the process of adopting and adapting Owu at Umuma-Isiaku once it left the Delta (Igwegbe 1989:17).

Umuegbu's 1988 Okonko festival took place after a lapse of more than a decade. For much of this period the community had been handicapped by internal strife between traditional and progressive elements. As a result, well-to-do residents failed to support community projects. After the rift was mended, as a mark of reconciliation it was decided to revive and modernize the festival. Indeed, unity and brotherhood were the main themes of the opening address given by the chairman of the organizing committee.

Another theme was the potential of the festival to become a tourist attraction. The organizing committee required that all masks and costumes be new. Most of the headdresses were produced by several local artists, while members of Okonko contributed cloth for the rich costumes. Whereas residents were adamant that all these masks had previously existed in Umamu-Isiaku, the newly reconstituted festival undoubtedly gave the community an opportunity to recast its regional identity. Traders and businesspersons from Umuma-Isiaku have extensive ties in the Niger Delta and in the modern city of Port Harcourt. Acknowledgment of their historical connection with Okonko and its easterly orientation was thus combined with an orientation toward the Delta.

Stilts Dancers on the Move

As discussed above, from their base at Arochukwu near the Cross River, the Aro people established a wide network of settlements throughout southeastern Nigeria. A large concentration of such settlements is found in the region of Oguta and Ihiala just east of the Niger River toward Orlu. Here the Aro developed a sphere of commercial enterprise that included the Western Delta (Chizoba 1983). Although they have lived in the area for many generations, they have maintained a clear cultural separation from their neighbors and maintained ties to Arochukwu.

The Ekpe masquerader does not perform at the settlements. Instead, the main masking genre of the Aro settlers of Oguta-Ihiala is called Ekeleke. Ekeleke masqueraders dance gracefully on short stilts, wear George-cloth wrappers, and cover their faces with a piece of lace. Atop their heads is a figurative headdress (Figs. 23, 24). Like Owu, Ekeleke was brought up from the Delta into Igboland, but its adaptation there was of a character somewhat different from that of Owu or the other genres discussed above.

Ekeleke (Ikeleke) is an important masking genre in the northern area of the Western Delta among the Urhobo and Isoko peoples (Cole & Aniakor 1984:204-10; Nicholls 1999:55-57). Aro traders in the Western Delta brought it north to Oguta and Ihiala along the Niger (between Aboh and Onitsha) and inland to the Mgbidi area just west of Orlu. At Abiaziem, near Oguta, Aro settlers say they learned about the masquerade though Aro in the Ikwerre area (Chizoba 1983:31-40). In turn, Aro settlers around Ihiala recall that they brought Ekeleke over from Aro Egbu, near Oguta, but they too are aware of its origin among the Urhobo (Nwankwo 1986:21).

Ekeleke was not adopted by the indigenous population of Oguta-Ihiala, whose masks belong to a special genre of the northern Mmanwu (Fig. 25). (10) The stilt masquerade remains confined to the Aro communities in the region. Aro Ekeleke masqueraders often wear a special type of George cloth known as "Aro George." It is embroidered with the Aro mascot, a coat of arms bearing a traditional symbol known as the Aro knot, which emerged during the 1950s as a pan-Aro symbol; later, specially embroidered George carrying the mascot became the Aro national dress. These settlers clearly recognize that they have borrowed Ekeleke from the Urhobo people, but because no other local group uses these masks, Ekeleke has come to signify their distinct Aro identity in the area. (11)

The different ways various peoples have adopted and adapted foreign masking traditions, and even incorporated them into the group's sense of identity, go a long way toward defying an essentialist notion of cultural authenticity that equates ownership with ultimate origin. As we survey the fluidity of styles, genres, and organizations that support masking, it becomes, evident that we are witnessing not merely a pattern of distribution over a given geographic area but also deliberate and creative amalgamations of diverse possibilities suggested by the historical experience of any given community. The particular combination of masking traits found in any locality is the result of a conscious decision by participants to use cultural resources of their region to fashion a specific genre.

Thus we see that the masking traditions discussed here form continuums of various configurations of formal features, of mask-using organizations, of occasions for mask performance, and of names of associated institutions as well as mask genres and types. Each of these elements can move independently of the other variables. As demonstrated above, the configuration of a masking tradition cannot be determined simply by plotting the location of a community along these cultural trajectories. Instead, historical circumstances particular to each village group, and sometimes individual villages, create a singular sense of regional identity, an identity that is then articulated in the visual forms of the masks.

[This article was accepted for publication in September 2001.]

(1.) Leib and Romano (1984:54) recorded the terms Okum-ngbe in the Ejagham language and Idem-Ikwo in Efik.

(2.) A handwritten document in the National Archive, Enugu, recalls the introduction of the Okonko society into the Aba area in the not too distant past. Although anonymous and undated, from its context and content it was clearly written by a Christian convert as part of a conflict with members of the Okonko society in the Aba area of Ngwa before 1921:

   The Okonkor is the leading secret society among the people of these parts.
   It originated from Arochukwu. It was an innocent play organized by a few
   members just to amuse themselves ... as many important men and elders join
   the club, they soon make it to gain Supremacy over other clubs.... Every
   member is sworn not to disclose the secrets of the Society excepting at the
   formation of a Branch Society in some other countries for the purpose of
   money making. In this way it spread among the countries but the Aro people
   being cunning use of the greatest care to introduce it to a certain limit.

Another document in the same file recalls that the Okonko Club at Amuma, also in the Aba area, was established around 1902 and that the unseen sounding instrument that identifies the society is called Ekpe (National Archive, Enugu: Long Juju of Arochukwu and Okonko Society, 1920, Abadist 13/4/54; see also Oriji 1981).

(3.). Interview, Nze D.E.O. Ojinnaka. Umubu Umuowa, March 12, 1988.

(4.) Public interview, Nanyere Nwoga, head of Okonko at Umubu village and many Okonko members. Umubu Umuowa, March 15, 1988.

(5.) Interview with H.R.H. Eze Justus O. Ogochukwu, Eshi of Nkwerre. Nkwerre, December 7, 1988.

(6.) Interviews, Eze C.A.D. Obi, Eze of Umueshi, in Umueshi, March 15 and March 24, 1988.

(7.) The Owerri area lies in the triangular region between the two trajectories and the coastal communities. Based on his studies in the 1930s and '40s, Jones claimed that there were no masks in this area (1984:154). Masks are sometimes used today, but they are marginal and not an integral part of any major cultural institution.

(8.) I am grateful to Basil Igwegbe, a sculptor from the community, for his valuable observations expressed in personal communications (1988-99) and in his B.A. dissertation (Igwegbe 1989). These have supplemented my own study of the festivals.

(9.) I recorded my surprise upon seeing the masks by commenting in my notes, "They sing like Ekpe but look like Owu."

(10.) The Mmanwu of the Oguta-Ihiala area is very different from the dominant Mmanwu genre of north-central Igboland. Its performances consist of four masqueraders with an elaborate fiber costume but without carved masks. This genre was discussed in detail by F. Nnabuenyi Ugonna (1984).

(11.) Jones documented Ekeleke in the Orsu area just north of Orlu and noted that it is a marginal type of mask in an area dominated by Owu, Okonko, and a third genre called Okorsie. He recorded that it was introduced "more recently" from the Isoko and Western Igbo groups. He does not mention an Aro connection (Jones 1989:55-56). In a personal communication (July 10, 1989), however, he indicated that an Aro involvement in the introduction of Ekeleke is likely. Cole also documented an Ekeleke performance at Agwa, northwest of Owerri, where he noted that the Arochukwu "colony" at Agwa and elsewhere seems to be the main Ekeleke dancers (Cole & Aniakor 1984:204-10). In the accompanying photograph (fig. 319) the dancers wear an "Aro George" wrapper.

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ELI BENTOR is an assistant professor of African art history at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. He also served as the chair of the Program Committee for the Twelfth Triennial Symposium on African Art (2001).