Vampires in Africa

Unlike the rest of the world, Africa has few vampire myths, with Montague Summers, in his study of vampire legends across the globe in the 1920s, only being able to find two examples: the *asasabonsam*, and the *obayifo,* with little work being done on this topic since.

West African vampire/witches are the origins of the Haitian *loogaroo*, Surinamese *asema*, and Trinidadian *sukuyan*. This is a direct result of the Atlantic slave trade.

## Obayifo

"Obayifo" is the Ashanti name of a type of vampire known by a variety of names to many West African peoples. In Dahomey, it was known as *asyman* for example.

This vampire was known as a witch who lived within a human community. Becoming a witch was something a person did: one was not simply born a witch. As such, they look like regular humans.

These witches attacked people, most often children, and sucked their blood. The wounds would then lead to infection and illness, killing the child. They could also such the juice from fruits and vegetables.

### Powers

These vampires could leave their bodies at night, travelling a a glowing ball of light.

## Asasabonsam

The *asasabonsam* was a vampiric monster from the beliefs of the Ashanti people of Ghana. According to R. Sutherland Rattray, they were generally humanoid in form, but had iron teeth. They lived deep in the forest where people would rarely encounter them. They say on tree tops, with their legs and hook-like feet hanging down to catch people walking beneath them.

## Witches

Instead of typical vampires, many witches in Africa are ascribed with vampiric powers, combined with more traditional magical associations.

According to Arthur Glyn Leonard's studies of the Niger River delta, witches in the region were said to leave their homes at night to meet with demons. In these meetings, they would plot the death of their neighbours, which would be done by gradually sucking their victim's blood through magical means, which would prevent anyone from realising anything was happening until it was too late. The Ibo of the region believed that the blood sucking caused pain, but was done in such a way that there was no evidence of a physical cause. Leonard believed that, instead of through magic, these "witches" were actually skilled poisoners who used an elaborate system of poisoning to kill their neighbours.

In Nigeria, is was believed that witches had the power to suck out the heart of their victim without them realising. They would do this by sitting on their roof and using magic to suck it out. Victims of tuberculosis have historically been thought to be victims of this magic.

There was a belief amongst the Yakö people of Nigeria that disembodied witches attacked people at night when they slept, drinking their blood. Ulcers were believed to be signs of a witch drinking a person's blood. They were also said to occasionally lie on top of a person to suffocate them.

Historically, anyone who suffered a hurtful condition would contemplate whether a witch had gotten to them, and witch trials were generally trials by ordeal. The most common victims would be women who were barren or post-menopausal, and the sentence was typically death by fire.

In Sierra Leone, witches were said to kill by poison, either by the witches directly infusing the victim with it, or by the witch transforming into an animal, such as a cat or rat, at night and making an unnoticeable wound on the victim, from which they would drink blood and infect the victim with a deadly illness.

Among the Ga people, it was believed that witches had a *baisea*, a special pot, which contained the blood of their victims, though anyone looking into the pot would see water. This was believed to contain their victims' vitality.

## Studies of John L. Vellutini

Vellutini did a study of African vampires in the 1980s, publishing his results in two articles in the *Journal of Vampirology.*

While he agreed there are few creatures in African belief systems that could be identified strictly as vampires, African beliefs about witches are surprisingly similar to Eastern European and Slavic vampire beliefs. Witches were generally considered powerful figures with many supernatural abilities, including the ability to transform into animals. They fed on human flesh, corpses, and blood. Some of these beliefs about witches are more similar to psychic vampirism than typical vampirism, owing to much of the consumption being done through magic, and not physical means.

People accused of being witches would be subject to ordeals, with execution if found guilty. A number of these methods used in witch trials resembled those used in Eastern Europe for suspected vampires, including beginning an execution by pulling out a witch's tongue and nailing it to their chin with a thorn to prevent final curses against the executioners, and impalement of the corpses of witches on stakes. Other similar practices include separating the head from the body and either burning the body, or abandoning it in the woods for animals to eat.

There were also methods of determining whether a deceased individual was a witch, which too were similar to methods used in Eastern Europe for identifying vampire graves. The corpse could be exhumed and examined for blood around the corpse, incorruption, or unusual swelling of the corpse. It was also believed that the graves of witches had a hole in the dirt that the witch could use to escape through in the form of a bat, rat, or other small animal. There was also a belief that, as long as the body remained, the witch's spirit could continue to operate as they had in life, and the body had to be destroyed to put a stop to it.

Witches were believed to have the power to raise the dead, and to capture the spirits of the recently deceased, which they could then turn into a ghost and send to haunt their living relatives. Witches could also create *isithfuntela*, a reanimated corpse who the witch would remove the tongue of and drive a peg through the brain of to make zombie-like and compliant, forcing them to serve the witch. These *isithfuntela* had the ability to hypnotise people and would also drive nails into hypnotised peoples' heads to cause similar effects to their own enslavement.

Velluntini's conclusion was that, while not strictly vampires, there were creatures in African belief systems that fit the role of a group of people who could defy death, people who generally died while going against community norms or through suicide, and that these people were surprisingly similar to Eastern European depictions of vampires.

He also theorised that Africa was the potential origin of the vampire legend, though this requires more research.

## Further Reading

* Vellutini, J. "The African Origins of Vampirism" in *Journal of Vampirology Vol. 5(2)*
* *Ashanti Proverbs*, Rattray, R.
* *In the Shadow of the Bush*, Talbot, P.
* *The Lower Niger and Its Tribes*, Leonard, A.
* *The Vampire: His Kith and Kin*, Summers, M
* Vellutini, J. "The Vampire in Africa" in *Journal of Vampirology Vol. 5(3)*
* *Yakö Studies*, Forde, D.

## See Also

* Devendra Prasad Varma
* Incubus
* Origins of the Vampire
* Succubus

## References

1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 1.20 Melton, J. G. (1999). *The Vampire Book*. 2 ed. p.4-7