Otrupon Meyi

Ekun, the tiger, and Ogbo, the wildcat, were brothers of the same father and mother. One night Ogbo had a nightmare and went to consult Orunmila, who told him that, because of his brother, he had to make a head offering with a guinea hen: Ekun was planning to kill him and eat him. He also advised him not to tend the head of any other person, even a very close relative, and to stay alert. Ogbo carried out the sacrifice.

Ekun also visited Orunmila, intending to be able to kill his brother, and was asked for a goat for Eshu. But on the way back to his house he calculated that the goat's meat tasted better than that of weak Ogbo, and he did not make the sacrifice.

Afterward, Ekun tied up a goat, saying it was to tend his head, smeared himself with oil to look as if he were dying, and sent the leopard to tell Ogbo that only he could save him with a head offering. Ogbo remembered what Orunmila had told him, but he could not refuse his brother. On arriving he saw all the animals grieving, with an air of sadness; yet when he looked Ekun straight in the eyes, he knew at once that it was all pretense.

Ogbo proposed that another animal sacrifice the goat and that he, with the severed head, would rub Ekun's head, as custom demands. The animals agreed and the hyena handed him the head. While he prayed holding it, Ogbo moved backward with a firm step, dancing and singing praises to Orunmila. Once he was at a safe distance, he rubbed his own head with the goat's skull and fled.

Ekun, enraged, blamed the animals for letting Ogbo escape and ate several of them. In this way Ogbo was saved by the sacrifice he made, and Ekun's plans failed because of the one he refused to make.

Egherun, the most beautiful bird in the sky, accepted no suitable suitor. Ugun, the vulture, a scavenger bird and the ugliest, resolved to bend her with blackmail. He left freshly cut palm fruits beside the road and hid to watch. Egherun could not resist those fruits and took all she could reach. Ugun appeared and accused her of stealing, a fault paid for with one’s life. She offered to pay whatever he asked, but Ugun wanted nothing, except that she marry him. Egherun could not bear the shame of a trial before the elders; she accepted and went back home.

She spent several nights without sleeping and went to Orunmila. He told her to offer two roosters in sacrifice. One of them, split down the middle, she had to place at a crossroads, and then hide to watch. Ugun went out to get food for his future wife and, passing the crossroads, saw the sacrificed rooster. It is known that the vulture cannot control himself before dead meat: he came down to eat until he was satisfied and kept the leftovers to carry home.

At that moment Egherun came out from where she was hiding and accused him of stealing. Ugun replied that a man cannot be accused of stealing from his wife. She answered that this held only in the home, and that this sacrifice was not for him, so he had stolen. Ugun saw that he was lost and asked how to make up for his fault. He was told that he must annul the forced marriage and announce in public that she was no longer his wife. He did so, and Egherun went back to her home for good.

From this comes the saying: “Nobody knew when Egherun married the vulture, or when she left him.” When this sign appears, a marriage forced by coercion does not last, as long as the sacrifice is made.

A certain hunter kept a secret agreement with the Elders of the Night: they provided him with game and he promised to draw all the blood from it. His wife became intrigued because he returned with animals without a drop of blood, and she resolved to follow him into the forest without his noticing. On the previous outing, the Elders had told the hunter that, if anyone followed him, that person had to give up. He mentioned it to her, and she pretended to have no interest.

But on the next hunt she followed him. When he finished, the hunter met with the Elders, who poured the blood of the animals into a clay pot and asked whether, against their orders, he came accompanied by a spy. He denied it. Then they pushed aside the foliage under which his wife was hiding and made her come out. The hunter begged for mercy, but they answered that sorcery does not know forgiveness.

The Elders sentenced the woman: since that blood intrigued her so much, she would drink all of it. She drank the contents of the pot and fell gravely ill. To make things worse, the hunter could not go on hunting, because the beings of the night had withdrawn their favor.

Some time later he went to appease them and paid the fine they set. They agreed to soften the penalty and ruled that the blood would be shown to his wife only once a month. This is how menstruation began, which all women know.