FETICH-FAITH IN WESTERN AFRICA. 801 



FETICH-FAITH IN WESTEKN AFRICA. 



By H. NIPPEEDEY. 



WHILE I was living, in 1884, on the shore of the Kuilu-Niadi 

 River, a fetich-tree was shown me during a walk on the left 

 bank of the stream. It was a IlyphcBne-^lxn., the trunk of which was 

 bent down from a height of about sixteen feet till it touched the 

 ground. It had also grown in a circle around another tree of the same 

 species that stood straight in such a way as to form a crown around 

 it at a height of about ten feet. Within the circle inclosed by the 

 tree-stem lay an old, weathered elephant-tusk. I thought at first that 

 I would send a report of this curious phenomenon to Europe, but after- 

 ward concluded to make a more thorough study of fetiches and the 

 belief in them, and obtain a little clearer light on the subject. I was 

 greatly assisted in my efforts by Hiibbe-Schleiden's excellent work on 

 " Ethiopia," which I made my guide in my researches. I propose to 

 communicate in this paper what I have learned concerning the fetiches 

 of West Africa. 



The word fetich is derived from the Portuguese, in which fei- 

 tigo means a witch. The use of the word is confined to the coast, and 

 its meaning is unknown to the negroes of the interior. Various ex- 

 pressions are in use on the lower Congo for example, M'kissi for 

 fetich ; N'gille-N'gille for the means by which magic power is given 

 to the fetich ; M'lungo is a doctor ; and N'doshi are beings of a char- 

 acter similar to that of the were- wolves of European popular mythology. 

 It is much harder to exj)lain the nature of the fetich, for the negro 

 himself is not clear on that subject. I therefore fall back on my 

 authorities, Htibbe-Schleiden and Max Miiller. The former says that 

 fetichism is not a proper designation for a religion, for Judaism and 

 Christianity have their fetiches as well as the Nature-religions ; the 

 word should be used as analogous with a word-symbol or emblem, 

 as Max Miiller has shown. If we should say that the cross is the fetich 

 of Christianity, some persons would think we were guilty of blas- 

 phemy, but they would be only those who have no real conception of 

 what a fetich is. The phrase is really as far from blasphemy as sci- 

 ence is from idle chattering. The confusion of the emblem with the 

 thought represented, of the material with the spiritual, of the visible 

 with the invisible, is not religion, but superstition, whether it be the 

 worship of fetiches or of relics, idolatry or the adoration of saints. 

 Max Miiller says : " We may fancy ourselves secure against the fetich- 

 worship of the poor negro, but there are few if any among us who 

 have not their fetich or idol, either in their church or their heart. 

 The negro's religion is not belief in the power of the fetich, but belief 

 in the power of the spirit through which the fetich is of effect." 

 VOL. xxsi. 51 



