Otrupon Di

There was a corn farmer who sold cooked corn, and nobody had corn except him; besides that, he had a great deal of money. He fell gravely ill, having been told to make ebbó with: four sacks of money, a rooster and a hen.

He would not do it, because he would rather put up eight sacks of money than four of corn; and he got much worse. His family, behind his back, made the rogation, and afterward the corn was shared out among everyone. Everyone had their health, and the farmer had none.

Once, a hunter went to see Orunmila so he would read him, and this Ifá came up, where Orunmila told him that to go on hunting he had to make ebbó.

Since the hunter held another belief, he paid no attention, and he was moved only by the wish to belittle Orunmila. He went off hunting, managing to take a fine porcupine. When he got back to town, he began saying that Orunmila had got it wrong and that he was nothing but a fraud. So all his friends gathered and prepared a great banquet.

When they were at the table, Orunmila's enemy chief, to belittle him, sent him word with the constable, inviting him to the party. Orunmila sent word back that, although he had managed to take the porcupine, not one of them would manage to eat it, since the table would be left set because of the hunter's disobedience.

They paid him no attention; and the man presiding over the table was, by custom, the one who carved first and served himself. So he did: he cut a piece of the animal and served it onto his plate; when he put it in his mouth, as he chewed it, a small piece of the spear they had hunted it with caught in the roof of his mouth, having broken off and stayed inside the animal's flesh. From the wound he made, plenty of blood began to pour, and the bleeding could not be stopped, and he died on the spot. At which the people, from the shock they had, could eat no more, and the table was left set.

When Orunmila's children learned what had happened, they held another party and went out singing, saying: the word of Orunmila never falls to the ground.

Note: the one who provided the porcupine to punish the hunter's disobedience was Eshu-ni.

Manduley had a daughter called Kintoshe who did not get pregnant, so she went to see an Awó, who read her and told her she would have a girl. But time passed and Kintoshe did not conceive.

One day, the Awó who had examined her years earlier at her father's house saw her and asked after her father; she told him: «It has been a long time since I had word of him.» Then the Awó said to Kintoshe: «Let us examine Orunmila and see whether Ifá confirms what I said the first time.» He took out the okpele and set it before Kintoshe, and this Ifá came up, and Orunmila confirmed it.

Then the Awó fell in love with Kintoshe, and she took to him, and she became pregnant. He went back to osode and saw that the child to be born was a girl, and afterward they set out for the house of Kintoshe's father. They arrived, and her father, taken aback, said: «What is this?» And the Awó explained: «This is your daughter, who is also my wife; she is carrying a girl, and that will be your happiness, your daughter's and mine.» Manduley said: «If you do not prove that, you will lose your head.»

Nine months later the girl was born, proving what the Awó had said; so Manduley put Orunmila at the head of his government, and his granddaughter as princess. Lodafun Orishaoko.