Encyclopedia of African Religion

symbol of the god of the whites who has so often

caused us to weep, and listen to the voice of lib-

erty, which speaks in the hearts of us all.

This call was nothing less than a call for
Africans in Saint-Domingue to draw from within
themselves and from their own beliefs for victory.
This is Boukman’s famous prayer in its original
Creole version:

Bon Dje ki fè la tè. Ki fè soley ki klere nou enro.

Bon Dje ki soulve lanmè. Ki fè gronde loray. Bon

Dje nou ki gen zorey pou tande. Ou ki kache nan

niaj. Kap gade nou kote ou ye la. Ou we tout sa

blan fè nou sibi. Dje blan yo mande krim. Bon

Dje ki nan nou an vle byen fè. Bon Dje nou an ki

si bon, ki si jis, li ordone vanjans. Se li kap kon-

dui branou pou nou ranpote la viktwa. Se li kap

ba nou asistans. Nou tout fet pou nou jete potre

dje Blan yo ki swaf dlo lan zye. Koute vwa la

libète kap chante lan kè nou.

Garvey F. Lundy

See alsoBois Caiman; Ezili Dantò; Fatiman, Cécile;
Lwa; Makandal; Vodou and the Haitian Revolution;
Vodou in Haiti

Further Readings

Flick, C. (1990).The Making of Haiti: The Saint
Domingue Revolution From Below.Knoxville:
University of Tennessee Press.
Fouchard, J. (1972).Les marrons de la liberté.Paris: Ecole.
Geggus, D. P. (2002).Haitian Revolutionary Studies
(Blacks in the Diaspora). Bloomington: Indiana
University Press.
James, C. L. R. (1989).The Black Jacobins.Toussaint
L’Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution(2nd
rev. ed.) New York: Vintage Press.
Trouillot, H. (1971). La guerre de l’independance
d’Haïti: Les grand prêtres du Vaudou contre l’armée
française.Sobretiro de Revista de Historici de
América, 72 , 261–327.

BUBEMBE

Bubembe is one of the Ssese Islands of Lake
Victoria (Ennyanja Nnalubaale) in the country of
Uganda. The Ssese Islands were also known as

“the islands of the gods.” They are located in the

region of the Buganda people (also called

“Baganda”). Ruled by kings (kabakas) who were

seen as divine, the precolonial kingdom of the

Buganda, now an administrative district of

Uganda, was one of the largest and most powerful

kingdoms in the Lake Victoria region. According

to Buganda legend, Kintu, the first Bugandan

king, founded both the sacred and physical worlds

of the Buganda, returning after this life to the

sacred realm from which all thekabakasorigi-

nated, “disappearing” from the physical realm

rather than dying. Likewise, from this sacred

realm, they continued to interact with human

beings. In like manner, certain cultural heroes

were translated into the sacred realm after this

life, becominglubaale or guardian gods, whom

the Buganda traditionally venerated in several

temples on various Ssese Islands and throughout

Buganda country.

The chief or dominant libaale in traditional

Buganda cosmology was Mukasa, who was the

guardian of Lake Victoria and protector of the

King. Although temples to Mukasa are located

throughout the Buganda region, the primary tem-

ple is on Bubembe Island, making it the most sig-

nificant of the Ssese Islands. The legend suggests

that Mukasa and his brother Kabaka (also

“Kibuka”) were once human beings. They were

the sons of Wanema, who was the son of Musisi,

the son of Bukulu and his consort Wada. Bukulu

reportedly came from the Supreme God, Katonda,

the creator God, who lives in the sky, and Bukulu

subsequently made his home on the Ssese Islands.

Because each temple had a priest and Bubembe

Island was the main location of Mukasa, the chief

guardian, the priest of Bubembe was considered

the chief priest, to whom other priests deferred

with respect to authority and prestige. Given the

status of Bubembe, only the King, a few of the

higher priests, and the immediate worshipers of

Mukasa, who resided on Bubembe, could interact

with and implore him to act on their behalf. The

temple at Bubembe was distinct in other ways. For

example, Mukasa’s sacred emblem was the pad-

dle, and each of his temples contained a paddle

that the priest had blessed. For reasons that may

have been hidden to anthropologists who studied

the Buganda in the early 20th century, like the

Reverend John Roscoe, however, the temple on

Bubembe contained no paddle.

Bubembe 139