By Ajekigbe Adewale Olayemi
CALABASH carving (Igbafinfin) is a traditional handcraft profession domesticated in Oyo, Southwestern Nigeria and has become part of the people’s tradition and culture. It is an ancient indigenous handcraft and holds significant aesthetic, cultural, social and economic value in local communities, making it an important part of their heritage and identity. Calabash carving is an inherited profession that has been from one generation to the next but is losing ties with the community culture and heritage due to modernization and religious beliefs.
Calabash/gourd is carved with creative and traditional designs on which is being used to perform traditional rites, to offer gifts to visitors, decorations and to honour royalty. There are different types of calabashes that come in different sizes which determine their uses. Calabash can be decorated in different techniques and methods depending on the skills of the carvers. The techniques or methods for carving calabash are scraping and carving. There are some calabashes that are not scraped or carved but shaped to size before use. They are used naturally after harvesting and opening but the outer warm yellow has to be washed.
Gourd and calabash carving are derived largely from the ancient motifs and techniques as an exceptional imagination craft. This is because the design/inscription/motifs or incision on the calabash comes on an imaginary skill of the carvers. The designs, motifs and inscriptions on the calabashes symbolize different traditional and social meanings.
Calabash carving involves processes. In the olden days, the process of calabash carving stops at the rubbing of the white natural substance on the calabash. It appears white, natural and ordinary after the process. But the introduction of the black lead to trace the lines/motifs on the calabash brings out the beauty.
Social and cultural values of calabash carving
Calabash carving promotes culture and traditional handcraft in the community and serves as domestic, traditional and religious purposes. Calabash carving, being ancient traditional handcrafts with the display of imaginary skills on the calabash has its indispensable benefits.
The size and types of calabash determine its uses. From the ages past, carved or decorated calabash served as gift to Alaafin of Oyo. Yoruba traditional rulers use calabash to entertain visitors with kola and other entertaining items. The biggest decorated calabashes are used during traditional wedding rites to carry marriage materials — wife’s gift, cloths and other valuables for the ceremony. It is also very useful instrument for the Elegbe, Obatala, Oduduwafor appeasement and traditional rites preparations. It is also used to soak traditional roots/leaves for medicine purposes and to store or arrange clothes in the olden days.
The use of calabash plays a very important role at the over 400-year-old traditional festival in Osogbo, South West Nigeria, known as Osun Osogbo festival.
During this festival, the calabash is used by the ‘’Arugba’’(calabash carrier), a votary virgin who bears the Osun spiritual calabash that contains sacrificial materials meant to appease and worship the Osun goddess.
The social functions of calabash are not farfetched from domestic and ceremonial uses. Calabashes are domestic materials for eating and drinking purposes.
Challenges (Risk of disappearing) and opportunities
Most of the practitioners of calabash carving have reached advanced age, making it difficult to practice and the total lack of interest of successors within the families and community is putting the practice at risk of disappearing. The younger generations are also not interested in taking up the practice due to social evolution. Conclusively, though calabash carving is endangered, the practice still remains relevant to communities, so its knowledge and understanding should be transferred to the younger generations for continuity.
•Ajekigbe is Assistant Chief Curator,
National Museum, Oyo.
READ ALSO: UNESCO steps in to protect Yoruba culture
and then