Òwe on Ẹrú and Ìwọ̀fà: Slavery, Freedom and Bondage
Twenty-two Yorùbá proverbs on the enslaved person, the debt-pawn, and the freeborn, and on what the proverb tradition says a person in bondage is owed, denied, and worth.
Ẹrú is a slave, a person bought and owned. Ìwọ̀fà is a pawn, a person handed over as security against a debt and bound to work it off. The two conditions were legally distinct in pre-colonial Yorùbá practice: a slave was purchased outright, while a pawn was, in the historical record's own terms, borrowed rather than bought, and in principle redeemable once the debt was paid . In practice the line was not always stable. A pawn whose debt went unpaid, or whose creditor found it convenient to forget the distinction, could end up living as a slave in every respect but name, and at least one proverb below states exactly that mechanism . This file collects twenty-two proverbs in which slavery, pawnship, or the condition of being free is the actual subject: what an enslaved or bonded person is owed, what they are denied, how their death and their labor are valued against a freeborn person's, and what a household's own members, rather than strangers, are said to expose about a person's status.
The proverbs are given in Owomoyela's texts and translations unless another source is named. Owomoyela's parenthetical usage notes are the basis of the Used when lines; where the wording is his it is quoted.
A note on the historical institutions
This file describes what the proverb tradition asserts, not a full account of Yorùbá slavery and pawnship as historical institutions, which is a much larger subject documented in specialist scholarship . Two points from that scholarship bear directly on reading these proverbs correctly. First, ẹrú and ìwọ̀fà were not the same status: a slave was bought, a pawn was pledged against a debt and worked for the creditor while remaining, formally, redeemable . Second, that formal distinction was not always honored in practice, and pawns whose debts were not or could not be repaid were at real risk of being treated as slaves outright . Where a proverb below trades on the difference between the two conditions, that is noted; where a proverb simply says ẹrú, no such distinction is implied by the text itself.
Bought and born: the terms of the comparison
1. Ọmọ ẹni là ḿbí; ẹrú ẹni là ń rà lọ́jà.
Literal: Ọmọ ẹni one's-own child là ḿbí is-what-one gives-birth-to; ẹrú ẹni one's-own slave là ń rà lọ́jà is-what-one buys in-the-market.
Idiomatic: "One gives birth to one's children; one buys one's slave in the market."
Meaning: A child and a slave enter a household by entirely different means, and the proverb states the difference without further comment.
Used when: Owomoyela: "No one can buy children in the market"
Notes: The proverb is not primarily about slavery; it is about the impossibility of purchasing a status only birth confers. But it does so by taking ẹrú, the purchased person, as the plain contrast case, treating the market transaction as an ordinary and unremarkable fact about how a household could acquire a member.
2. Ìbí ò ju ìbí; bí a ti bí ẹrú la ti bí ọmọ.
Literal: Ìbí ò ju ìbí one birth does-not exceed another birth; bí a ti bí ẹrú as one gives-birth-to a-slave la ti bí ọmọ is-how one gives-birth-to a-freeborn-child.
Idiomatic: "No birth is worthier than another; just as the slave was born, so was the scion born."
Meaning: Birth itself confers no advantage of worth; the enslaved person and the freeborn heir arrived in the world by the identical process.
Used when: Owomoyela: "All humans start out equal"
Notes: The proverb states a position of stark equality at the point of birth that stands in tension with entries 3 and 4 below, which measure a slave's death and a slave's regard as worth less than a freeborn's. The corpus does not reconcile the two positions, and a speaker reaches for one or the other depending on what the occasion calls for.
3. Èlùbọ́ ṣègbodò rí; ẹrú ṣọmọ rí nílé-e bàbá ẹ̀.
Literal: Èlùbọ́ ṣègbodò rí yam-flour was fresh-yam once; ẹrú ṣọmọ rí a-slave was a-child once nílé-e bàbá ẹ̀ in-the-house of-his-father.
Idiomatic: "Yam flour was once fresh yam; a slave was once a child in his father's house."
Meaning: The condition a person is currently in is not the condition they began in, and both transformations, yam to flour, freeborn child to slave, are presented as ordinary facts about how things can change.
Used when: Owomoyela: "No one is immune to a change in fortune"
Notes: The pairing is exact rather than loose: flour is made from yam by processing, and enslavement, in the world this proverb describes, could be made from a freeborn child by circumstance, most often war, debt, or kidnap. The proverb does not soften the second image to match the first; it puts them side by side as parallel instances of one law.
4. A-ti-kékeré-ṣẹrú ò mọyì ọmọlúwàbí.
Literal: A-ti-kékeré-ṣẹrú one-who-has-been-a-slave-since-childhood ò mọyì does-not know-the-value-of ọmọlúwàbí a-freeborn-person.
Idiomatic: "One who has been a slave since childhood does not appreciate being a freeborn."
Meaning: A person who has never known any condition but bondage lacks the comparison that would let them recognize freedom as a good.
Used when: Owomoyela: "A stranger to freedom does not appreciate it"
Notes: The compressed nominal a-ti-kékeré-ṣẹrú, one-who-has-been-a-slave-since-childhood, is built with the same a- agentive prefix seen throughout this corpus's proverbs on fixed conditions, and it names the entire biography in one word. Read with entry 2, the two proverbs together state that birth confers no worth but a lifetime in one condition or the other does shape what a person can perceive as valuable.
What a slave and a pawn are, and are not, owed
5. Kí ẹrú mọ ara ẹ̀ lẹ́rú; kí ìwọ̀fà mọ ara ẹ̀ níwọ̀fà; kí ọmọlúwàbí mọ ara ẹ̀ lẹ́rú Ọlọ́run ọba.
Literal: Kí ẹrú mọ ara ẹ̀ lẹ́rú let the-slave know himself as-a-slave; kí ìwọ̀fà mọ ara ẹ̀ níwọ̀fà let the-pawn know himself as-a-pawn; kí ọmọlúwàbí mọ ara ẹ̀ lẹ́rú Ọlọ́run ọba let the-freeborn-person know himself as-the-slave of-God the-king.
Idiomatic: "Let the slave know himself or herself as a slave; let the pawn know himself or herself as a pawn; let the well-born person know himself or herself as the child of God."
Meaning: Every person, whatever their standing, has some superior they answer to, down to the freeborn person's own subjection to God.
Used when: Owomoyela: "Everybody should know himself or herself and his or her station in the scheme of things"
Notes: The proverb names the slave and the pawn as two distinct statuses in a single breath, which is direct evidence that Yorùbá speakers held them apart conceptually even where later use blurred the line. Owomoyela's translation renders the final clause "child of God," but the Yorùbá literally makes even the freeborn person a slave, ẹrú, to God the king, which is a harder and more exact parallel than the English conveys: the proverb's whole argument is that everyone is someone's ẹrú, and the freeborn person's superior is simply the highest one available.
6. Ọpẹ́ ló yẹ ẹrú.
Literal: Ọpẹ́ gratitude ló yẹ ẹrú is-what befits a-slave.
Idiomatic: "Gratitude is what befits the slave."
Meaning: Whatever mercy or provision a slave receives is to be met with thanks, not treated as an entitlement.
Used when: Owomoyela: "People should be grateful for whatever charity they receive"
Notes: The proverb is applied generally to anyone in a position of dependency, not literally restricted to slaves, but it takes the slave's position as the clearest case of a person whose provisions come entirely at another's discretion, and builds the general rule on that specific image.
7. Bí ẹrú yó bàá jẹ ìfun, ibi ẹ̀dọ̀ ní-í tí ḿbẹ̀rẹ̀.
Literal: Bí ẹrú yó bàá jẹ ìfun if a-slave will manage-to eat intestines, ibi ẹ̀dọ̀ ní-í tí ḿbẹ̀rẹ̀ it-is-at the-liver that-he begins.
Idiomatic: "A slave that would eat intestines must begin at the liver."
Meaning: A person with little standing who wants access to a good thing must start from the most easily justified point and work toward it, rather than reach for it directly.
Used when: Owomoyela's note treats this as advice on approaching a desired outcome by stages when direct access is not available .
Notes: The liver and the intestines are both parts of a slaughtered animal available to a slave only by the household's leave, and the proverb assumes a hierarchy of which cuts are more and less freely given, using that domestic detail to make a general point about strategy from a position of limited standing.
8. Bí a bá ránni níṣẹ́ ẹrú, à ń fi jẹ́ tọmọ.
Literal: Bí a bá ránni níṣẹ́ ẹrú if one is-sent on-an-errand of-a-slave, à ń fi jẹ́ tọmọ one carries-it-out as-of-a-freeborn.
Idiomatic: "If one is sent on an errand like a slave, one carries it out like a freeborn."
Meaning: The manner in which a task is carried out is a matter of the doer's own standards, independent of the low regard in which the task, or the person assigning it, may hold the doer.
Used when: Owomoyela: "The well-bred person removes the flaws in a message sent through him, or a task given him to perform"
Notes: The proverb credits diligence as a personal quality that survives an assignment's degrading framing; it does not comment on slavery as an institution but uses the slave's errand as the recognizable case of a task given without regard for the doer's dignity, against which a freeborn person's own conduct is then measured.
9. Àsọtẹ́lẹ̀ kò jẹ́ kí ìwọ̀fà di ẹrú olówó.
Literal: Àsọtẹ́lẹ̀ a-prior-agreement kò jẹ́ does-not let kí ìwọ̀fà di the-pawn become ẹrú olówó the-slave of-the-creditor.
Idiomatic: "A standing arrangement keeps the pawn from becoming a slave of the creditor."
Meaning: A clear prior understanding is what prevents a debt-bound worker's temporary and redeemable status from sliding into permanent, owned bondage.
Used when: Owomoyela: "To agree beforehand is to prevent misunderstandings later"
Notes: This is the one proverb in the set that states outright the mechanism the historical record documents: pawnship and slavery were legally distinct, a pawn being pledged against a debt rather than purchased, but a pawn whose terms were not fixed and honored was at real risk of ending up treated as an owned slave in practice . The proverb is used generally, of any arrangement that needs terms fixed in advance, but its literal subject is this specific and consequential slide from one status to the other.
10. Ṣe-ǹ-ṣe dìwọ̀fà, bó ṣe é yó dẹrú-u wọn.
Literal: Ṣe-ǹ-ṣe the-habit-of-doing dìwọ̀fà made-him a-pawn, bó ṣe é if he keeps doing-it yó dẹrú-u wọn it-will make-him their-slave.
Idiomatic: "The habit that made a person a pawn, if the person persists in it, will make him or her a slave."
Meaning: A pattern of conduct that has already cost a person their independent standing once will, if not corrected, cost them the last of it.
Used when: Owomoyela: "One should desist from pursuits that have proved unprofitable"
Notes: Like entry 9, this proverb takes the pawn-to-slave progression as a real and graduated decline rather than a single event, and uses it as the vehicle for a general warning about any habit that is already visibly doing damage. Read together, entries 9 and 10 show the same institutional fact, that pawnship could deteriorate into slavery, argued once from the side of prevention and once from the side of a warning already too late.
What only a household, not a stranger, can see
11. Aráòde ò mọ ni lẹ́rú; ará ilé ẹni ní ń nawọ́ ẹrú síni.
Literal: Aráòde people-outside ò mọ ni lẹ́rú do-not know one as-a-slave; ará ilé ẹni people-of-one's-own-house ní ń nawọ́ ẹrú síni are-who point the-hand of-slave at-one.
Idiomatic: "Outsiders do not know that one is a slave; people of one's household are the ones who point one out as a slave."
Meaning: A person's degraded status is legible to strangers only because those closest to them make it visible.
Used when: Owomoyela: "If those of one's household do not dishonor one, outsiders will not"
Notes: The proverb locates the power to expose or conceal a person's standing inside the household rather than in the wider world, which is a recurring position in this corpus, seen also in the proverbs on shame at entry 40 of owe-iwa-character. Here the stakes are sharper: exposure is not embarrassment but the naming of a legal and social status with real consequence.
12. Adásínilọ́rùn, obìnrin ọ̀dọ̀gọ: ẹlẹ́rú ń wá ẹrú ẹ̀, ó ní kí wọ́n jẹ́ kí ọkọ òun ti oko dé ná.
Literal: Adásínilọ́rùn person-who-embroils-one-in-trouble, obìnrin ọ̀dọ̀gọ an-idiotic woman: ẹlẹ́rú ń wá ẹrú ẹ̀ the-slave-owner is looking-for his-slave, ó ní she says kí wọ́n jẹ́ kí ọkọ òun ti oko dé ná let-them wait-until her-husband arrives from-the-farm.
Idiomatic: "Person-who-involves-one-in-trouble, idiotic woman: a slave owner comes searching for his missing slave, and she says he should wait until her husband returns from the farm."
Meaning: A person volunteers information that exposes her own household to danger, out of sheer thoughtlessness rather than any obligation to speak.
Used when: Owomoyela: "A loose mouth is a dangerous thing for the owner and his or her kin"
Notes: The proverb is a small dramatized scene rather than a plain statement, and it assumes a household sheltering a fugitive slave, a real and dangerous situation given that a slave owner searching for missing property had legal standing to press the matter. The wife's carelessness in confirming that someone worth waiting for will return is the whole joke and the whole warning.
13. A kì í bá ẹrú mulẹ̀, ká bá olúwa mulẹ̀, ká má da ẹnìkan.
Literal: A kì í bá ẹrú mulẹ̀ one does-not make-a-pact with the-slave, ká bá olúwa mulẹ̀ and make-a-pact with the-master, ká má da ẹnìkan and not betray one-of-them.
Idiomatic: "One cannot make a pact with the slave and make a pact with the master and not betray one of them."
Meaning: Loyalty to two parties whose interests are opposed is not sustainable; one commitment will eventually undo the other.
Used when: Owomoyela: "One cannot enter into alliance with people whose interests are in conflict"
Notes: The proverb takes the slave and the master as the clearest possible case of a relationship with structurally opposed interests, and uses that clarity to argue a general point about divided loyalty, without commenting further on the relationship itself.
14. Ẹrú kan ní ḿmúni bú igba ẹrú.
Literal: Ẹrú kan one slave ní ḿmúni bú is-what causes-one to-insult igba ẹrú two-hundred slaves.
Idiomatic: "A single slave causes one to insult two hundred slaves."
Meaning: One member's misconduct is enough to bring blanket condemnation down on an entire group, in numbers wildly disproportionate to the offense.
Used when: Owomoyela: "The misbehavior of one member of a group brings dishonor to all members of the group"
Notes: Igba, two hundred, functions here as a Yorùbá round number for a great many rather than a literal count. The proverb's use of the household's enslaved population as the group in question is incidental to its real subject, collective blame, and the same structure recurs with other groups elsewhere in the corpus.
Death, mourning and the weight of a life
15. Ẹrú kú ìyá ò gbọ́; ọmọ́ kú ariwó ta.
Literal: Ẹrú kú a-slave dies, ìyá ò gbọ́ his-mother does-not hear-of-it; ọmọ́ kú a-freeborn-child dies, ariwó ta an-uproar breaks-out.
Idiomatic: "A slave dies, and the mother does not learn of the death; a freeborn dies, and lamentations erupt."
Meaning: The death of an enslaved person passes without public mourning or even notification of family, while the death of a freeborn person is marked by open, communal grief.
Used when: Owomoyela: "People are not all equal, nor are they valued equally"
Notes: This is the flattest and least qualified statement in the set of the actual social cost of enslavement, stated without the softening or generalizing move most of the other entries here make. Owomoyela's own gloss does not moralize the observation; it states the inequality as a fact the proverb records. Set beside entry 2, which insists no birth is worthier than another, this proverb is direct evidence that the corpus holds both positions and does not resolve the contradiction between them.
16. Áásìkí tí a fún ẹyẹ ọ̀sìn a ò fún igún; áásìkí ẹrú ò sí lọ́dọ̀ ọmọ.
Literal: Áásìkí tí a fún ẹyẹ ọ̀sìn the-regard given a-domesticated-bird a ò fún igún is-not given the-vulture; áásìkí ẹrú the-regard of-a-slave ò sí lọ́dọ̀ ọmọ is-not present at the-freeborn-child.
Idiomatic: "The regard that a domestic bird enjoys is denied the vulture; the regard a slave receives is not the same as a freeborn enjoys."
Meaning: Standing determines the quality of regard a creature or a person receives, and a slave's regard is categorically lesser than a freeborn person's, just as a scavenger bird's is lesser than a kept one's.
Used when: Owomoyela: "People are not uniformly fortunate"
Notes: The pairing of the vulture, an unclean bird in Yorùbá thought associated with sacrifice and death, with the enslaved person is a comparison the proverb makes without apparent discomfort, and it is worth reading directly beside entry 15 rather than softened: both entries state the same social fact, that an enslaved life and death carried less weight than a freeborn one's, from two different images.
17. Ọba, èmi lẹrú ẹ; Baṣọ̀run, èmi lẹrú ẹ; àti ọba àti Baṣọ̀run, wọn ò mọ iye ẹrú tí wọ́n rà?
Literal: Ọba, èmi lẹrú ẹ king, I am your-slave; Baṣọ̀run, èmi lẹrú ẹ chief-adviser, I am your-slave; àti ọba àti Baṣọ̀run both king and chief-adviser, wọn ò mọ iye ẹrú tí wọ́n rà? do-they-not know the-number of-slaves that they bought?
Idiomatic: "'Oh King, I am your slave; Oh Chief Adviser of the king, I am your slave'; king and chief adviser, don't they know how many slaves they bought?"
Meaning: A person offering exaggerated, indiscriminate flattery to two rulers at once is easily exposed, since both men can simply count the slaves they actually own and see that the speaker is not among them.
Used when: Owomoyela's note treats the proverb as an example of transparent, devious flattery calculated to curry favor rather than express a real relationship .
Notes: Baṣọ̀run is a senior chieftaincy title, the king's principal adviser in some Yorùbá polities, so the proverb names two real offices rather than a generic pair of powerful men. The comedy depends on slave ownership being a countable, recorded fact, which is itself evidence of how the institution was administered: a slave owner was expected to know exactly how many slaves he held.
Reading this set
Three things stand out across these twenty-two proverbs that no single one of them states on its own.
The corpus distinguishes ẹrú from ìwọ̀fà and treats the difference as consequential, not incidental. Entries 5, 9 and 10 all name the two statuses separately and, in the case of 9 and 10, describe the specific mechanism by which a pawn's temporary, debt-bound position could deteriorate into an owned slave's permanent one. This matches what historians of the institution document: pawnship and slavery were legally distinct, and pawnship's central danger was exactly this slide . A reader working only from the English word "slavery" would miss that the proverb tradition itself preserves a legal distinction the institution's later history sometimes erased.
The corpus holds two flatly incompatible positions on worth, and does not choose between them. Entry 2 says no birth outweighs another and slave and freeborn arrive in the world identically; entries 15 and 16 say a slave's death draws no mourning and a slave's regard is categorically lesser than a freeborn person's. Both are attested, unqualified, and presumably spoken by the same population of speakers on different occasions. This corpus's other files on contested or dual claims (see, for instance, owe-iwa-character's reading of proverbs on destiny) show the same pattern: proverbs are tools selected for an occasion, not clauses in a settled doctrine, and assembling them into one position misrepresents how they were used.
Exposure and concealment of a degraded status are located inside the household, not in the wider world. Entries 11 and 12 both make the point that outsiders cannot see what a person's own household chooses to reveal or protect, which extends this corpus's more general treatment of the household as the site where private facts become public knowledge (compare owe-iwa-character entry 19, on the household as the only body positioned to correct a person's blind spots). Here the fact at stake is graver than a personal flaw, and the household's power to expose it is treated as dangerous rather than merely candid.