Ìjàpá and the Rock of Yams
A famine tale in which Ìjàpá wheedles the secret of a magic yam-store out of the lizard, loads himself too heavily to leave, forgets the opening words, and is smashed and mended by insects.
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A famine tale in which Ìjàpá wheedles the secret of a magic yam-store out of the lizard, loads himself too heavily to leave, forgets the opening words, and is smashed and mended by insects.
The Yorùbá wey dem quote, the proverbs, oríkì, ẹsẹ Ifá, word list headwords, Odù names and citations dey exactly as the corpus record dem, for every language.
Dis na one tori about hunger time, wey talk about Ìjàpá the tortoise and one lizard wey find one big rock wey dey open if person talk command, and di rock full of yam. Ìjàpá use sweet mouth enter di secret, load im body pass wetin e fit carry, come forget di words wey e suppose talk to commot, and di farmer smash am, den cockroach and ant patch am but e no smooth. Di places wey dem patch na di rough parts for tortoise shell. A. B. Ellis record am for English for 1894 .
Dis na one out of four recorded tori wey dey explain di marks for tortoise shell. Di oda ones na alo-the-tortoise-and-tela, alo-the-dog-and-the-tortoise and alo-the-tortoise-helps-the-animals, and dem compare dem for alo-why-the-tortoise-shell-is-marked.
Di person wey tell Ellis di tori start say: "My alo is about Tortoise" .
Hunger dey dat time, and food scarce well-well throughout di land.
One day di lizard dey inside farm dey find wetin to chop when e see one big rock wey full of yam. Di owner of di farm dey near di rock. E shout "Rock, open," and di rock open. E enter inside, take yam, come outside again, talk say "Rock, shut," and di rock close.
Di lizard see all dis things, and hear wetin di man talk, den e go house.
Di next morning as cock crow, e go di rock, talk say "Rock, open," enter inside, carry yam come out to take go house go chop, talk say "Rock, shut," and di rock close. E dey do dis thing everyday.
One day Ìjàpá meet di lizard for road dey carry yam, come ask am where e see food, my friend.
Di lizard talk say: if I tell you dat one, and carry you go di place, dem go kill me.
No, Ìjàpá talk, I no go talk any word give anybody. Abeg carry me go.
No wahala den, di lizard talk. Make you come call me tomorrow morning as cock crow, and we go go together.
Di next morning, long before cock crow, Ìjàpá come lizard house. E stand outside come shout kekere-ke, di Yorùbá word for how cock dey crow, wey Ellis talk say e come from keke, di cry of di hen, and e compare am to English word "cackle" . E shout am again. Den e enter inside go wake di lizard, say cock don crow.
Make you let me sleep, di lizard talk. Cock never crow. No problem, Ìjàpá talk. And di two of dem sleep till cock crow.
Den di lizard get up and di two of dem go together. As dem just reach there, di lizard talk "Rock, open," enter inside, take yam, and come out.
Time don reach to go, e talk. Take your yam make we dey go.
Wait small, Ìjàpá talk.
No wahala, di lizard talk. Rock, shut. And e waka go without waiting.
Inside di place, Ìjàpá pack yam well-well. E put yam for im back and yam for im head; e put yam for im hand and yam for im leg.
Di lizard don already go house. E light fire, den lie down for im back with im leg for up like person wey don die, and e stay like dat throughout di day.
When Ìjàpá don ready to go, e wan make di rock open. But e no fit remember wetin e suppose talk. E talk plenty, plenty words, but no be di correct words, and di rock remain close.
After small time di farm owner come. E open di rock and see Ìjàpá inside. E hold am beat am, and beat am well-well.
Na who bring you come here, di man ask. Na di lizard bring me come, Ìjàpá answer.
Den di man tie rope for Ìjàpá body carry am go meet di lizard. When e reach di house, e see di lizard dey lie down for im back with im leg for up like person wey don die. E shake am talk say: dis bald-headed elf talk say na you carry am go my farm go show am where my yam dey.
Me? di lizard talk. You fit see am yourself say e no possible. My body no dey for condition to commot. I don dey sick here for three months, dey lie down for my back. I no even know where your farm dey.
Den di man hold Ìjàpá smash am. And Ìjàpá, as e dey groan and cry, talk with voice wey dey pity:
Cockroach, come patch me. Ant, come patch me.
And di cockroach and di ant patch am. And di places wey dem patch am na di parts of Tortoise wey rough.
Di way di tori work na say better trickster win di main trickster, and di tori take time explain well-well how di lizard take win. Di lizard do three different things right. E talk di risk clear when dem first ask am, wey come make im agreement look like friendship instead of carelessness. E commot on time, say "Rock, shut" and waka go without waiting, wey no be wickedness but normal sense for person wey dey take from store wey dem hide. And e prepare alibi before time: e light fire, lie down like person wey don sick for three months throughout di day. Dat last detail mean say di lizard know say dem go catch Ìjàpá and say Ìjàpá go call im name. No be say e get luck. E understand how tortoise dey behave correctly.
Ìjàpá own mistakes arrange one after di oda in a particular way, and each one na different style of wanting pass wetin di arrangement allow. E force secret commot wey dem no give am freely. E try make time run fast by making fake cock crow, wey be di only real clever thing wey e do for di tori and wey fail immediately. E delay to commot so dat e fit load im body pass wetin e fit carry. And den e no fit remember two words, wey be di cleanest joke for di tori: di price for di extra yam na di sentence wey for allow am carry any of dem commot.
Ellis notice dis pattern and write am inside footnote for dis tori, di last one among im six tori:
For dis tori, Tortoise normal cunning fail am. Make person note say, anytime wey dem show say dem beat am or e no succeed, di reason why e no succeed na because of greediness .
E list im examples, and for dis particular one e explain say "here his greediness makes him stay behind, to get more yams" . Dat one na generalisation wey collector make across all di stories wey e gather, for 1894, and na di single sentence wey useful pass for analysis inside im folklore chapter.
Di famine setting no bi ordinary decoration. Di corpus point out throughout owe-hunger-food-plenty say hunger na di constant subject of dis cycle, and di story make sure say di lizard sef dey steal. None of di two animals get dis yams. Di farmer beat one thief and di other one deceive am, and di story no preach moral lesson about di theft at all: wetin e dey punish na greed and wetin e dey reward na foresight.
Di ending turn di story to aetiology, and how e happen na something wey make sense to explain well-well, because no bi say di shell just crack and remain cracked like dat. Ìjàpá scatter finish into pieces, and then two insects come join am back together when e call dem, and di marks na di seams of repair work wey no perfect. Because of dat, di tortoise na object wey dem mend, and di mending na act of kindness. Di corpus note as analysis say dis ending generous well-well for story wey dey punish person: di last thing wey happen to di thief na say two of di smallest creatures for di world come when e call dem and join am back together.
Dis type of story appear three times for different places inside nineteenth-century record, wey bi unusually strong evidence for single Yorùbá story.
Parkinson, 1909. Di same plot with one man wey im name na Tela for di lizard role, wey dem collect from Ọ̀yọ́ informants and dem tell am with song for opening spell instead of spoken command. Di way dem tell am distinct reach to get im own file, alo-the-tortoise-and-tela.
Bouche, 1880. Di editor of Parkinson article note say similar story, wey get lizard for dat role, dey inside Bouche, Étude sur la langue Nago (Bar-le-Duc, 1880), and say di Nagos na part of di Yorùbá. Dat version, according to di editor summary, match Ellis own pass Parkinson own: di tortoise stay back to load himself with yams after lizard don go house, e fail to commot because e no know di spell, and di farmer catch am . Dis compiler never see Bouche directly and e report di editor summary as e bi.
Di same editor still note one related Akra (Gã) story, "The Spirits in the Rat-Hole," inside Zimmermann Grammatical Sketch of the Akra or Ga Language (Stuttgart, 1898, as di date print for Parkinson editor book), p. 193, where spider and im son take di roles . Dat one na neighbour tradition instead of Yorùbá variant, and dem record am here because di comparison between spider-trickster and dis character na di standard one, wey dem discuss for yoruba-alo.
Na evening dem dey tell am, as dem discuss for yoruba-alo. No song dey inside Ellis version, but two lines of performed sound dey, di fake cock-crow kekere-ke and di pitiful call to di cockroach and di ant, and both of dem na voice work instead of narration. Parkinson variant replace di spoken command with song.
The evening storytelling tradition, the call-and-response frame that opens it, riddles as a separate discipline, and the Ìjàpá cycle read as a body of ethical and comic literature.
Twenty-nine Yorùbá proverbs built around Àjàpá the tortoise, the tradition's central trickster animal, presented with the original, a literal gloss, a named translation, and the situation each is spoken in.
An Ọ̀yọ́ variant of the magic yam-rock tale in which the rock opens to a song rather than a command, and Ìjàpá betrays his friend by bringing the whole country to empty the store.
The Yorùbá tradition holds no single account of the marks on the tortoise's shell, and this file sets the four sourced narratives side by side to show what varies and what does not.
What A. B. Ellis's 1894 collection contains, why its tale texts are usable, and exactly where its colonial framing has to be refused.
Sixty-seven Yorùbá proverbs on hunger, eating, restraint at table and the difference between a full house and an empty one, each with the original, a literal gloss, a named translation, and the situation it is spoken in.