iron, seeds into plants, and people into animals.35 Iron smelting depended on the proper management of ké by ironworkers, who had to refrain from violence of any kind, both during the smelting process and during wars with enemies. Because of the danger associated with metal, feuds within a given Grassfields polity or with its allies could not be fought using iron weapons.36 Ké saturated the sacred sites and forests of the chieftaincy’s landscape and was essential to reproductive and agricultural fertility, childbirthing, rainmaking, and spider divination.37 Grassfielders believed this force or energy to be indigenous to the region, in other words, to have preceded the arrival of the founders and settlers of the chieftaincies. Chieftaincy founders had had to rely on spiritualists among their adversaries to make the land habitable and to protect the new settlers from the potentially harmful effects of ké. In many chieftaincies, this initial negotiation is memorialized in periodic masquerades to recognize ké, during which the descendants of the autochthonous populations dance before the fo and the notables.38
Grassfields political philosophy was and is bound up in a belief in ké. In 2002 the late fo Marcel Ngandjong Feze of Bandenkop explained the role of mysticism and magic in chieftaincy governance by saying, “It’s not that I must be the greatest magician in the region. It’s that people must think that I am the most powerful magician in the region.”39 In the instability and insecurity of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, early rulers had to remain vigilant against plotted rebellions from within or beyond chieftaincy bounds. The presence of an invisible, tenuously controlled energy in the land must have made the founders of Grassfields chieftaincies uneasy, and they took every possible measure to harness ké to their advantage. The management of ké was a primary purpose of Grassfields secret societies, and a significant part of Grassfields governance was devoted to its regulation for the health of the community. Notables and spiritualists did not have a monopoly on ké, however. Others both within and outside the chieftaincy could access ké and put it to malefic use. These unregulated uses of ké, beyond the control of the leaders and protectors of the chieftaincy, were the most threatening to collective and individual well-being.
GOD, LAND, AND SACRED SITES (CHUEP’SI): THE SPIRITUAL ALLIANCE
Given the continuous mobility and competition among Grassfielders and their often antagonistic relationship with the autochthonous dwellers as they settled the region, claiming the right to occupy lands and legitimizing the chieftaincy’s presence constituted another essential part of Grassfields political philosophy. That Grassfielders believed the landscape hosted God is evidenced in the term Si, which means both god and land in the language groups Medumba, Fe-Fe, and Ghomala (spoken in the Nde, Haut-Nkam, and Mifi Departments, respectively).40 The connection between land, religious practice, and Grassfields moral economy was physically embodied in sacred places (chuep’si) that served as sites of protection, justice, reconciliation, and familial or community identity. Grassfields sacred sites were the visible manifestations of a spiritual alliance between the living humans and the spirits, ancestors, and gods inhabiting the chieftaincy. The chuep’si also served as historical markers inscribed into the landscape of gung, designating the rightful occupants of a plot of land and legitimizing the presence of Grassfields settlers on the territory. As sites where justice was meted out by notables and chiefs, wills were read aloud before witnesses, and conflicts were resolved, chuep’si were places of mediation where people negotiated legal contracts and relationships with each other.
In each chieftaincy, these sacred sites marked the interstices between the material and the spiritual worlds. The Grassfields are situated in a volcanic, mountainous region that straddles the margin between forest and savannah, five degrees north of the equator. Massive rounded boulders are balanced on hilltops, resembling giant pebbles tossed about by a child at play. Grassfielders offered sacrifices to the gods at these sites embedded in the landscape of gung. Larger sacred sites that served the spiritual needs of the entire chieftaincy were situated at or near extraordinary natural phenomena in the landscape, such as rock formations or caves often adjacent to a source of water, such as a stream, a waterfall, or a spring. In Baham, the chieftaincy sacred site is called feuveuck and is located near Chiala, the chiefly district at the center of the polity.
At feuveuck in Baham, the flow of water appears to come from the face of the rock itself. As one walks down into its depths, entering the vast, cavelike crevices between the rocks, the air suddenly becomes cooler and more humid. Sounds echo off the rock, amplified by the acoustic space. The boulders form alcoves and partitions, and the spatial arrangement inside the site recalls a human dwelling; present-day inhabitants describe one area as the kitchen, another as the parlor of the gods. The stones inside feuveuck bear signs of sacrifice: orange remnants of palm oil splashed against the rock, white grains of salt collecting in crevices, scattered djem djem (pods full of seeds, associated with twins), and small chicks, strutting along the ground beneath the rocks as they peep.
Like other Grassfields community sacred sites, feuveuck marks the gathering place of the forefathers of Baham at the time of gung’s foundation. At these sites, the founding fathers are said to have planned the settlement of the chieftaincy, selected its leader, and thanked the gods for their guidance and protection.41 Whether for the site’s history or its natural characteristics, the community believed that divine benedictions for the chieftaincy were first channeled through feuveuck. To ensure the continued benevolence of the gods, the living had to carry out sacrifices, which served too as a reminder of the presence of the divine in this sacred site and the need to adhere to the moral norms of justice upheld by the forefathers. Sacrificers, guardians of the site, and kamsi (lit., nobleman of God) officiated at community sacrifices to express gratitude to Si, to purify the chieftaincy of mystical attacks, to promote harmony among the residents, both living and dead, and to ensure reproductive and agricultural fertility. For inhabitants of Grassfields chieftaincies, acts of sacrifice at cheup’si carried collective identity and memory, and thanksgiving: they were acknowledgments of the spirits in their lives, who could bless or curse them.
Chuep’si also served as loci for the administration of justice at different levels. The administration of justice reflected the involvement of spirits and gods in the mediation of human conflict, crime, and punishment.42 Major community sacred sites such as feuveuck were the locale for public confessions or truth-telling ceremonies undertaken after times of conflict or misfortune.43 Public confessions or declarations of innocence occurred most often at district-level chuep’si, presided over by district chiefs (wabo or mfonte) and the site guardian, and attended by all inhabitants. On rare occasions, if truth-seeking or public confessions involved an entire chieftaincy and its inhabitants, they were held at the chieftaincy’s communal sacred site. In 1967, after the long period of independence-era war and violence in Baham, a public confession meant to restore peace was held at the chieftaincy’s central sacred site, or feuveuck.44
Serious matters of justice were brought before the fo, and smaller conflicts were dealt with at the district or compound level. The fo’s jurisdiction included cases of criminal acts and transgressions of the chieftaincy laws, including murder, rape, flagrant adultery, theft of precious objects, insulting the fo, or repeat offenses. The fo also intervened in smaller cases when an agreement could not be reached. The fo’s court resembled a trial and was carried out not on the sacred site but in the fo’s palace. In serious matters brought before the fo, guilt or innocence could be a life or death matter. In the fo’s court, the defendant, the accuser, the witnesses, and those presiding carried out the trial in an elaborate performance including investigation and witness testimony during which the accused and sometimes the accuser underwent various truth-telling trials.45 The ultimate symbol of justice and honesty in the Grassfields was the tortoise. Only the fo could use the tortoise in rendering judgment, and the verdict could not be appealed.46 While the accuser and the accused declared their respective version of events, a tortoise was released. If it crawled to the feet of the fo, the defendant was declared innocent. If it crawled toward the defendant, he was considered guilty. Depending on the gravity of the crime, the punishments entailed hanging, live burial, sale into slavery, banishment from the chieftaincy, or bodily
