Bashorun Gaa’s House And Notre Dame

As I followed the news about Notre Dame’s recent misfortune, I eventually started to reflect on Basorun Gaa.

Notre Dame has been in the news and needs no introduction.  Notre Dam’s construction started  in 1160 and was reported completed in 1260. According to Wikipedia is one of finest example of the French Gothic architecture. Just in case you are behind in the news, it is a Catholic cathedral that was ravaged by fire during the month of April, 2019.

Some of the readers are wondering who the heck is Bashorun Gaa? Well, Bashorun is a tile among the Yoruba of West Africa most of whom are domiciled in South Western part of Nigeria. After the king, the Bashorun is the next most presitigious chief among the Yoruba. According Samuel Johnson (I always have to add that he is Yoruba) in his book the History of the Yoruba, Bashorun is a shortened version of “Iba Osorun”, a title of the person in charge of the Orun festival.

Gaa was a notorious Bashorun who practically usurped the king, murdering several king in succession as he and his family unleased a reign of terror among the Yoruba. Eventually there arose a very smart, king Adegolu Abiodun who did not want to be killed by Gaa and he created a new custom of visiting Gaa every morning and prostrating to him. According to custom, Gaa should be the one to prostrate to the king but not wanting to die like his predecessors, Abiodun had no choice but to do this.  Robert Smith in his book “Kingdom Of The Yoruba” put Abiodun’s reign between 1770 and 1789.

The downside was that each morning Gaa had to give presents to Abiodun and that depleted his resources. To improve his cash balance, Bashorun Gaa decided to consult his fetish priests who can make some potent fetish that would allow him to become very rich.

One of Gaa’s fetish priests rose to the task and provided a soap which Gaa was to use to bathe himself before and after sunset. The fetish did make Gaa rich, but not in the way that you would have expected. Fire broke out in his house ( probably more like a compound with several houses) and razed everything down.

When the news broke, all the people in Oyo and her provinces, from the Alaafin (the king) all the way down donated money to Gaa. He had more than enough to repair his houses and a great deal of surplus afterwards.

Of Notre Dame was not burnt down due to some concoction provided by fetish priests. However, Notre Dame, a famous and powerful institution now has more money than it needs for the repairs (according to the reports in the media), just as Bashorun Gaa, a famous and powerful individual became rich from his misfortune.

Powerful institutions and individuals can profit from their misfortune in ways that others cannot.

To read my book “A Jar of Clay, Part 1: Made In Nigeria”, please click here.