The Mythology Book

290

T

he Dogon are a reclusive

people who live in an

isolated part of West Africa

that extends from Mali in the

southeast to Burkina Faso in the

northwest. Dogon mythology is

highly complex, relies on oral

tradition rather than texts, and has

many variations. The central myth

concerns the creation of the

universe by the Dogon high god

Amma, the birth of the twin

Nommo spirits, and the death of

Lébé, all of whom are key figures

across the Dogon tales that have

been recorded by anthropologists.

Birth of the Nommo

The Dogon creator deity, Amma,

shaped the cosmos out of clay. First

he flung clay pellets into the sky to

make the stars, and then he made

the sun and moon as two clay

bowls, inventing the art of pottery.

The sun was encircled with red

copper, and the moon with white.

With the celestial bodies in place,

Amma turned to terrestrial matters.

He took the clay, squeezed it

between his hands, and spread it

north to south and east to west to

form a flat earth, which was female.

Amma was lonely. Filled with

sexual desire, he longed to have

intercourse with the earth, but

when he tried to penetrate an

ants’ nest (the earth’s vagina), a

termite mound rose up. After he cut

the mound out of the way, Amma

was able to couple with the earth.

However, his assault upset the

balance of the cosmos, and so his

seed produced only a jackal—a

creature the Dogon associate with

deformity and disorder. The next

time Amma planted his seed in

the earth, it produced twin beings

“born perfect and complete.” Called

the Nommo (or Nummo), their twin

nature represents the perfect

balance of creation.

THE DOGON COSMOS

Large figures of a male-female pair

are common representatives of the

mythical progenitors of the Dogon. The

statues receive sacrifices intended to

protect a community from hardships.

IN BRIEF

THEME

The duality of mankind

SOURCES

Conversations with

Ogotemmêli, Marcel Griaule,

1948; “Dogon Restudied:

A Field Evaluation of the

Work of Marcel Griaule,”

W. E. A. van Beek, 1991,

Current Anthropology; Dogon:

Africa’s People of the Cliffs,

Stephenie Hollyman and W. E.

A. van Beek, 2001.

SETTING

West Africa; the beginning

of time.

KEY FIGURES

Amma The creator god;

foremost deity of the Dogon.

Nommo The first pair of twin

spirits created by Amma; also

the name for the eight

ancestors of the Dogon.

Lébé The oldest human

ancestor; a priest.

This flat earth was a

female body, with an ant’s

nest as its sexual organ.

“Dogon Restudied:

A Field Evaluation

of the Work of

Marcel Griaule”

The Nommo were hermaphrodites,

green in color, and half-human,

half-serpent. They had red eyes,

forked tongues, and flexible arms

without joints. The Nommo were

present in all water, and without

them the beginning of life on earth

would have been impossible.

The Nommo ascended to the

heavens to be with Amma. From

their lofty position, the twins saw

that their mother, Earth, was

naked. To remedy this, they

descended with plants from heaven

to clothe her. The fibers of these

plants helped to carry the watery

essence of the Nommo across the

land and bring fertility to it.

Male and female

The Nommo (or Amma, in some

versions of the myth) drew two

outlines on the ground, one on top

of the other. One of them was male,

and the other was female; from

these two outlines, the first man

and the first woman emerged.

Whereas the first jackal had only a

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291

Cave paintings from the Bandiagara

Escarpment in Mali depict figures and

symbols which are most likely of the

Dogon. Some, however, believe they are

examples of Sangha or Songo art.

single soul, these first humans and

their descendants had two souls of

opposite genders; one inhabited the

body, while the other dwelled in the

sky or in the water, connecting

humanity to nature. This dual

nature manifests itself physically;

the Dogon believe males and

females are born with physical

aspects of the opposite gender and

that there is still some feminine

essence inside of every man and

some male essence inside of every

woman. The Dogon tradition of

male and female circumcision

severs the spiritual link between a

person’s soul of the opposite gender

and is an important coming-of-age

rite in Dogon society.

Twin connections

The first two people had eight

children: two pairs of male twins

and two pairs of female twins. This

set of eight twins were also called

the Nommo. They are the ancestors

of the Dogon. These Nommo are

represented by eight animals—the

snake, tortoise, scorpion, crocodile,

frog, lizard, rabbit, and hyena—

because, according to Griaule,

these animals were born in the sky

at the same time as the Nommo,

and shared a soul connection with

them. Each individual Nommo had

both a human twin and an animal

twin, and although the eight were

different species, the animals ❯❯

See also: Ananse the spider 282–83 ■ San creation myth 284 ■ En-kai and the cattle 285 ■ Eshu the trickster 294–97

ANCIENT EGYPT AND AFRICA

Each human being

was endowed with two

souls of different sex.

Conversations with

Ogotemmêli

Diverse ideas

The first study of the Dogon

came from Marcel Griaule,

whose Conversations with

Ogotemmêli: An Introduction

to Dogon Religious Ideas was

published in 1948. Over 32

successive days, Ogotemmêli,

a blind Dogon elder, had met

with Griaule and spoken about

Dogon mythology.

Scholars today view the

study as the ruminations of

one member of the community,

rather than a detailed exposé

of Dogon thought in general.

African religions place greater

emphasis on doing the right

thing (orthopraxis) than

believing the right thing

(orthodoxy). As a result,

within any one group there

can be a range of varying

individual beliefs and ways of

describing the world and its

creation. Later studies of the

Dogon have therefore given

rise to many different myths

and interpretations.

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