In the villages of Boabeng and Fiema the monkeys are not wildlife.
Boabeng-Fiema Monkey Sanctuary, near Nkoranza.
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The Monkeys They Bury
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The Monkeys They Bury
In the villages of Boabeng and Fiema the monkeys are not wildlife. They are relatives.
The tradition says a hunter found a fetish object in the forest, and with it came the monkeys — the black-and-white colobus and the mona — and it was made clear that they belonged to the god, and that the god's children were not to be touched.
So for generations nobody touched them. They came into the villages. They took fruit off the trees and off the tables. Nobody shot at them, and children grew up alongside them, and the two species divided the town without much comment.
And when a monkey dies, it is buried. Properly. There is a cemetery in the forest and the rites are the rites — a coffin, a burial, and in the old practice a period of mourning observed by the person who found the body, as for a relative.
There was a bad stretch when new churches told people the old prohibitions were nothing, and the monkeys were hunted, and their numbers fell. The communities argued it out and put the protection back — this time as a sanctuary with a management committee and gate receipts, which is the same rule wearing modern clothes.
The monkeys came back. They will sit on your arm for a banana. Their grandparents are buried in the trees behind you.
If you visit Ghana. Boabeng-Fiema Monkey Sanctuary, near Nkoranza.
In the villages of Boabeng and Fiema the monkeys are not wildlife. They are relatives.
The tradition says a hunter found a fetish object in the forest, and with it came the monkeys — the black-and-white colobus and the mona — and it was made clear that they belonged to the god, and that the god's children were not to be touched.
So for generations nobody touched them. They came into the villages. They took fruit off the trees and off the tables. Nobody shot at them, and children grew up alongside them, and the two species divided the town without much comment.
And when a monkey dies, it is buried. Properly. There is a cemetery in the forest and the rites are the rites — a coffin, a burial, and in the old practice a period of mourning observed by the person who found the body, as for a relative.
There was a bad stretch when new churches told people the old prohibitions were nothing, and the monkeys were hunted, and their numbers fell. The communities argued it out and put the protection back — this time as a sanctuary with a management committee and gate receipts, which is the same rule wearing modern clothes.
The monkeys came back. They will sit on your arm for a banana. Their grandparents are buried in the trees behind you.