Her now old English interviewer, Mary Smith tells BBC the story of a book she published in 1954
Nigerian history is largely undocumented by Nigerian journalists and historians who ordinarily help with these causes.
In 1954, anthropologist, Mary Smith published the book Baba of Karo, about Baba from the hamlet, Karo in the old Islamic caliphate of Sokoto.
The book was also edited by Smith and her husband, the Jamaican Michael Garfield Smith, an anthropologist learned in Hausa — he contributed cultural context to the book.
The book was republished in 1981 with a foreword from Hilda Kuper.
Baba of Karo
Baba was born in the farming hamlet, Karo, near Azarewa, old Sokoto Caliphate — encompassing Zaria and Kano, in pre-colonial Nigeria in 1877, the daughter of a Hausa farmer and Koranic teacher.
On August 23, 2018, the BBC published another episode on The Witness Podcast, a historical podcast, hosted by Alex Last "about the stories of people who were there." This episode interviews Mary Smith, interpolated with excerpts from the book, Baba of Karo.
Of what drew her to Baba, Smith who was only a young woman then told The BBC, “there’s just one or two people in life that you remember the whole atmosphere of the person, what they were like and she was a very, very amazing woman.”
Smith, who was on a research, anthropological sojourn to Nigeria in 1949 had encountered Baba and interviewed her over the next few weeks about her life’s and societal stories — she wrote it down verbatim and it became the book, Baba of Karo.
ALSO READ: Ladi Kwali, the first woman on a Nigerian Currency
What Baba represents
The book represents a progeny to the documented stories of 19th century Nigerian women — who are largely undocumented, barring the pivotal, celebrated figures.
In the stories of the uncelebrated women lie the true insights into every day life and struggles that the more celebrated ones might not represent — despite representing female strength and the limit of female capability.
Baba didn’t speak any English, and that’s what made the feat remarkable. It marked the forging of beauty inside telling struggles — Mary Smith is now in her 90s taught herself fluent Hausa.
What led to the encounter?
Smith had followed her Jamaican husband to document Nigeria’s largest tribe, the Hausa when she encountered Baba.
Smith had been erroneously interviewing young women on the story of that land when Baba asked her, “Why are you asking these young women about life when they've had barely anything to tell you about life? They're too young”
Immediately, Smith said she felt Nana’s warmth and intelligence. Even though she was poor, she was culturally rich in ideas and history. Smith even intimates how Baba took over the entire interview.
Baba’s words; slavery and war
According to The BBC’s narrator, it was a time when Nigeria was not an idea — formed or vague. Slavery also existed at the time — the local form of it through barter and exchange of children for monetary loans. However, those slaves also had rights.
Baba’s family had slaves, but she acknowledges that anybody could become a slave during the time of intense and unpredictable warfare, but they wee captured by raiders during the time of intense warfare.
According to the book, “Baba of Karo”, Baba says her family was captured at night at her Uncle’s place in Ubangida — 3 of her uncle’s children, 10 slaves and his pregnant wife were kidnapped and took them to Katsina.
Their hands were tied across their breasts with shoulders following each other in unison.
The book further says, “In the days, there was always a fear, war, war, war. They caught a man and they made him a slave or else they killed him.”
The Sokoto Caliphate was constantly at war with itself, with factions fighting each other, often ending in slavery.
The books emphasizes upon this that, ”In times of war, the chief would order the drummer to climb up on a high place and beat the deep drum so the villagers and people surrounding hamlets should come inside the town halls.”
While Baba’s family got their people back, they paid a huge ransome after tracking their people into Katsina in a gruelling affair.
Baba also tells a story where her family staged a dramatic rescue of her aunt, Rabi who had been kidnapped and kept at the Emir’s palace in Abuja. Her father puts Rabi on his back and escaped with her.
ALSO READ: Madam Efurunoye Tinubu, the Nigerian Kingmaker who aided the abolition of slavery
How the story documents discovery of drums
There’s a unified sense of drum appreciation peculiar to all Nigerian tribes.
It continues, “The drum rhythms said,” come in, come in, come in.” Drums are a core part of cultural Nigerian communication and points to the natural nature of conception and culture.
Despite cultures largely being unmixed at the time, the natural phenomenon of invention and discovery can be aligned through the effects of making drums a means of communication — also inherent in cultural Yoruba and Igbo histories.
Sometimes, ideas are not copied, people just discovered things independently. It also lends credence to the speculative belief that once a person has an idea, at least five other people have the same idea at the same time.
That might just be true.
Baba’s Marriages, feminism and lack of stigma for divorced women in old Northern Nigeria
The book documents how Baba was being forced to go marry another person by the elders when he she wanted the Blacksmith’s son, Maigari.
She says, “When Aunty Rabi came home, I knew she would help me. I told her that I didn’t like the marriage and she said,”very well, go and break it up.”
Women had the freewill to marry and divorce despite their fathers consenting to their unions
Baba was married four times in a society where divorced women and widows were not stigmatized. The concept of freewill was the reality and women were allowed to express themselves.
For example, Baba told Smith that her sister-in-law, Hasana married 11 times — one of those men, Hasana married four different times. Contrary to popular opinion, women have not always been held to slavery in marriage.
When Baba was to marry Malam Maigari, but at the time, her father wanted her to marry her cousin, Duma who had money.
ALSO READ: The twisted legacy of FESTAC 1977
She tells her marriages from perspective that, “There was Malam Maigari who wished to marry me, I promised him that I would come to him later. Duma came to visit me, I accepted his money because father wanted me to do so.”
She continues that, “But because I didn’t really. Love him, I left him ager a few years — Duma was tall, handsome and sensible, we lived together in peace with no quarrelling.”
Upon divorcing Duma, she observed the Iddah — a customary 90-day solitary period of celibacy for divorcees before fulfilling her promise to marry Maigari before divorcing him amicably, 15 years later to marry Malam Hasan — a farmer and prison warden.
Hasan died, but then she entered into a ‘marriage of shoes’ — where the couple live separately — with Ibrahim.
Later in her life, she also made her husband marry her best friend, whom she wanted to live with. After initially disagreeing, her husband agreed.
Entry of Colonialists
The book documents changing tides through Baba’s rise to become a woman as the British made their maiden entrance into Northern Nigeria.
They soon created the colonial protectorate of Northern Nigeria. That stopped the raiding and local slavery, but kept the Caliphate — it was welcome news for Baba.
Baba was documented in the book the entry of the British was a coming to pass of her uncle’s predictions who felt the British were going to stop raiding.
Baba goes further to tell stories of rituals of childbirth, prostitution, criminality and spiritual possession in the book, but the pinnacle of the book is that, Baba represented the stark truth of a pre-colonial, Muslim Hausa women.
She was eloquent and knowledgeable. Through her, we have some linkage to the past and stark truths that would have gone undocumented.
Baba dies shortly after telling her story in May, 1951.
from pulse.ng - Gist https://ift.tt/2NLqeE4
What do you think? Leave Your Comments Here ;)