The Igbo Culture Thread

[Hiphoplives4eva]

I've seen a lot of threads here pertaining to certain aspects of Igbo culture and it seems to me that a lot of it is misunderstood. I've created this thread to give a very basic analysis of Igbo culture in general and to show that I'm not being biased, I'll start with a bad aspect of Igbo culture before anything else. Feel free to add to the thread or correct me if any parts of my analysis are incorrect.

I'll start with the Osu Caste System.

1. Osu people (ndi osu), are the descendants of people who either sacrificed themselves to a deity (in order to escape punishment for a crime) or given up as a sacrifice to a deity i.e. by their village if they wanted to seek favour from the gods. This sacrifice resulted in them having to live near the deity's shrine and do menial tasks there.

2. I think that the reason why the osu status passed down to one's children is because the Igbos believe in reincarnation; so if you were one thing in life and you died, you would come back and become that same thing again. I think that it was to show us that not even death could sever an osu person's connection to the gods.

3. Osu people were not allowed to cut their hair so they had a rugged appearance that made their status visible to anyone that passed them by. They had to remain separate from freeborn Igbos (nwa diala) i.e. couldn't go to the market with them, couldn't invite them in their homes or visit them, couldn't take take chieftaincy titles, couldn't marry them etc.

4. All of these stipulations are not practiced anymore, as the osu and oru/ohu caste systems were officially abolished in 1956, with the exception of the marriage one (all over Igboland) and the chieftaincy title one (in a handful of villages).

5. I think that the marriage one still exists because of superstition. Many Igbos believe that if you marry an osu person then you become osu too or that your marriage will be cursed in some way or another.

6. There is no connection between the osu caste system and the Transatlantic Slave trade. It's highly unlikely that many Osu people were kidnapped and taken to the Americas as most Igbo slave traders would have been too afraid to even approach them, let alone kidnap them. It's possible but unlikely.

Can't remember all of the Igbo posters so someone please tag them or anyone interested in Igbo culture if you know them.

@Hiphoplives4eva @Golden @Ugo Ogugwa

Great summary.

The Osu system is an archaic system and hardly practiced, however its an interesting look on how black people settled disputes and issues. Fear of punishment by a supernatural diety was truly the only way to put the fear into people so they could act right. I think the Osu system was an unfortunate result of that.

 

[phcitywarrior]

My mother's side of the family and my father's mother side are Igbo. Growing up we'd always go to the east for Christmas as is tradition for many Igbo people.

I'll update this thread later when I get some time.

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

Ekumeku Movement
Ekumeku Movement - Wikipedia
Western Ibo Society and its Resistance to British Rule: The Ekumeku Movement 1898–1911* | The Journal of African History | Cambridge Core

The Ekumeku Movement consisted of a series of uprisings against the rising power of the Royal Niger Company of the British Empire in Anioma people in present day Delta State. The British penetration of Nigeria met with various forms of resistance throughout the country. In the south, the British had to fight many wars, in particular the wars against the Ijebu (a Yoruba group) in 1892, the Aro of Eastern Igboland in 1901–1902, and from 1883–1914, the Anioma.

Opposition was strong in Anioma land where a series of wars were waged against the British. The Ekumeku, who were well organised and whose leaders were joined in secrecy oaths, effectively utilised guerrilla tactics to attack the British. Their forces, which were drawn from thousands of Anioma youth from all parts of Anioma land, created many problems for the British, but the British used forceful tactics and heavy armaments (destroying homes, farms, and roads) to prevail. The Ekumeku, however, became a great source of Anioma nationalism.
The Ekumeku Movement is unique in Anioma history and Igbo history in general for two reasons. First, the length of time the movement endured, comprising Military campaigns over a period of thirty one years. Secondly it is the outstanding example in Anioma Civilization of an attempt to unite previously disunited states to resist the colonial army. You have seen that one crucial reason for Anioma defeat was the great discrepancy of scale between the average Anioma community and the colonial army. The British decided on a preemptive strike, and in December 1902 sent a powerful expedition which systematically destroyed a number of towns and imprisoned their leaders. This, it was assumed, was the end of the Ekumeku.."the Ekumeku and other secret societies have been completely broken".

In 1904, the Ekumeku rose again. This time the changed their tactics, mistakenly, it would seem in retrospect, abandoning the united guerilla warfare of 1898 for the individual defence of each town. The last act of the Eureka drama began in late 1909. The occasion was a succession dispute in Ogwashi-Uku. One of the claimants, Nzekwe, the son of the last Obi, feared that the British would deprive him of his throne, and decided to fight for his inheritance.
On 2 November 1909, the British sent an expedition to Ogwashi-Uku but they failed in the expedition. The British perceived, in the whole Asaba hinterland, a sympathy with the Ekumeku, and a disposition to throw off government authority. In 1911, there was a final round-up of Ekumeku leaders in various towns that was followed, once more, by imprisonments.
The acting lieutenant-governor of the southern provinces sent an agitated telegram to Lagos: "Whole country is above area...is the state of rebellion." Reinforcements arrived from Lokoja, and the British proceeded to a confrontation at Akegbe. We quote both the contemporary British accounts of the battle at Nkwo market.

With the invasion of Ndoni in 1870 and bombardment of Onicha-Ado (Onitsha) on 2 November 1897, the stage was set for the Ekumeku war that engulfed the whole of Anioma. The Royal Niger Company (RNC) commanded by Major Festing engaged Ibusa in 1898, and in 1904 it was the people of Owa/Ukwunzu against the British in a war that W. E. B. Crawford Coupland requested for more arms to crush the western Anioma communities. Owa would once again engage the British in 1906 in battle that S. O. Crewe lost his own life. On 2 November 1909, it was finally the turn of Ogwashi-Ukwu who matched the British. In this war the British sustained many casualties with the death of H. C. Chapman.

Although the Ekumeku failed in 1914, but the western Anioma treasure their memory as imperishable legacy. Heroes included Dunkwu Isus of Onicha-Olona, Nwabuzo Iyogolo of Ogwashi-Ukwu, Awuno Ugbo, Obi of Akumazi, Agbambu Oshue of Igbuzo, Idabor of Issele-Azagba, Ochei Aghaeze of Onicha-Olona, Abuzu of Idumuje-Unor, Idegwu Otokpoike of Ubulu-Ukwu are still remembered in Anioma land. The Ekumeku War is one of the most vigorous campaign of opposition to the British empire and inspired later rebellions such as the Mau Mau of Kenya.

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

 

[JA_Carter]

whole album is Igbo highlife at it's finest

 

[Anwulika]

Traditional Hairstyles in Igboland:

Decorative hairstyles were uncommon for Igbo men, although this may have been different for some communities.

However, for Igbo women, hairstyles usually denoted what state or condition they were in.

There were once styles for spinsters, for married women, and for barren-women, mourning women, and those about to have a child. Even women in disgrace, or past child-bearing age were required to display these facts by the hairstyle designated to their particular case.

Doing Ministry in the Igbo Context

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

Nsibidi (also known a nsibiri, nchibiddi or nchibiddy[)
Inscribing Meaning: Nsibidi / National Museum of African Art
Nsibidi - Wikipedia

Nsibidi (also known as nsibiri,[2] nchibiddi or nchibiddy[3]) is a system of symbols or early writing indigenous to what is now southeastern Nigeria that are apparently pictograms, though there have been suggestions that some are logograms or syllabograms.[4] Early forms appeared on excavated pottery as well as what are most likely ceramic stools and headrests from the Calabar region with a range of dates from at least 400 AD[5][6] (and possibly earlier[7]), to 1400 AD.[5][8] Nsibidi was used to decorate the skin, calabashes, sculptures, and clothing items, as well as to communicate messages on houses. There are thousands of nsibidi symbols, of which over 500 have been recorded. They were once taught in a school to children.[9] Many of the signs deal with love affairs; those that deal with warfare and the sacred are kept secret.[9] Nsibidi is used on wall designs, calabashes, metals (such as bronze), leaves, swords, and tattoos.[2][10] It is primarily used by the Ekpe leopard society (also known as Ngbe or Egbo), a secret society that is found across Cross River State among the Ekoi, Efik, Igbo people, Bahumono and other nearby peoples.

Outside knowledge of nsibidi came in 1904 when T. D. Maxwell noticed the symbols.[4] Before the colonial era of Nigerian history, nsibidi was divided into a sacred version and a public, more decorative version which could be used by women.[10] Aspects of colonial rule such as Western education and Christian doctrine drastically reduced the number of nsibidi-literate people, leaving the secret society members as some of the last literate in the symbols.[11] Nsibidi was and is still a means of transmitting Ekpe symbolism. Nsibidi was transported to Cuba and Haiti via the Atlantic slave trade, where it developed into the anaforuana and veve symbols.[12][13]

History
The origin of the word nsibidi is not known. One theory traces the word to the Ekoid languages, where it means "cruel letters", reflecting the harsh laws of the secret societies that hold nsibidi knowledge.[14][15] In Calabar, nsibidi is mostly associated with men's leopard societies such as Ekpe. The leopard societies were a legislative, judicial, and executive power before colonisation, especially among the Efik who exerted much influence over the Cross River.[5]

Origin
The origin of nsibidi is most commonly attributed to the Ejagham people of the northern Cross River region, mostly because colonial administrators found the largest and most diverse nsibidi among them. Nsibidi spread throughout the region over time and mixed with other cultures and art forms such as the Igbo uri or uli graphic design.[5] In 1909 J. K. Macgregor who collected nsibidi symbols claimed that nsibidi was traditionally said to have come from the Uguakima, Ebe or Uyanga subgroups of the Igbo people, which legend says were taught the script by baboons,[3] although one writer believes Macgregor had been misled by his informants.[16]

Status
Nsibidi has a wide vocabulary of signs usually imprinted on calabashes, brass ware, textiles, wood sculptures, masquerade costumes, buildings and on human skin. Nsibidi has been described as a "fluid system" of communication consisting of hundreds of abstract and pictographic signs. Nsibidi was described in the colonial era by P.A. Talbot as "a kind of primitive secret writing", Talbot explained that nsibidi was used for messages "cut or painted on split palm stems". J.K. Macgregor's view was that "The use of nsibidi is that of ordinary writing. I have in my possession a copy of the record of a court case from a town of Enion [Enyong] taken down in it, and every detail ... is most graphically described". Nsibidi crossed ethnic lines and was a uniting factor among ethnic groups in the Cross River region.[5]

Uses
The Ikpe from Enyong written in nsibidi as recorded by J. K. Macgregor
Nsibidi was used in judgement cases known as 'Ikpe' in some Cross River communities. Macgregor was able to retrieve and translate an nsibidi record from Enyong of an ikpe judgement. The record is of an Ikpe or judgement case. (a) The court was held under a tree as is the custom, (b) the parties in the case, (c) the chief who judged it, (d) his staff (these are enclosed in a circle), (e) is a man whispering into the ear of another just outside the circle of those concerned, (f) denotes all the members of the party who won the case. Two of them (g) are embracing, (h) is a man who holds a cloth between his finger and thumbs as a sign of contempt. He does not care for the words spoken. The lines round and twisting mean that the case was a difficult one which the people of the town could not judge for themselves. So they sent to the surrounding towns to call the wise men from them and the case was tried by them (j) and decided; (k) denotes that the case was one of adultery or No. 20.[17]

Ukara Ekpe
An example of a material called Ukara which is covered in nsibidi motif . The Igbo 'Ukara' cloth of the Ekpe society, covered in nsibidi
Nsibidi is used to design the 'ukara ekpe' woven material which is usually dyed blue (but also green and red) and is covered in nsibidi symbols and motifs. Ukara ekpe cloths are woven in Abakaliki, and then they are designed by male nsibidi artists in the Igbo-speaking towns of Abiriba, Arochukwu and Ohafia to be worn by members of the Ekpe society. Symbols including lovers, metal rods, trees, feathers, hands in friendship war and work, masks, moons, and stars are dyed onto ukara cloths. The cloth is dyed by post-menopausal women in secret, and young males in public. Ukara was a symbol of wealth and power only handled by titled men and post-menopausal women.[18]
Ukara can be worn as a wrapper (a piece of clothing) on formal occasions, and larger version are hung in society meeting houses and on formal occasions. Ukara motifs are designed in white and are placed on grids set against an indigo background. Some of the designs include abstract symbols representing the Ekpe society such as repeating triangles representing the leopard's claws and therefore Ekpe's power. Ukara includes naturalistic designs representing objects such as gongs, feathers and manilla currency, a symbol of wealth. Powerful animals are included, specifically the leopard and crocodile.[5]

In popular culture
Nsibidi was the inspiration for the Wakandan writing system shown in the 2018 Marvel Cinematic Universe film Black Panther.[19]

 

[Sinnerman]

Can't believe I missed this thread

Posted. I'm doing some historical research into us Igbo peoples so I'll update soon

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

WEST-AFRICAN ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE:THE CASE OF IGBO
Catherine Obianuju Acholonu & Erich Fred Legner
“WEST-AFRICAN ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE: THE CASE OF IGBO – DISCUSSIONS ON A NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE ON THE WEST AFRICAN ORIGIN OF MOD

Warning: Long Read
Part 1

Introduction​

A researcher analyzing the sounds in languages spoken around the world has detected an ancient signal that points to southern Africa (meaning Sub-Sahara) as the place where modern human language originated. The finding fits well with the evidence from fossil skulls and DNA that modern humans originated in Africa. The detection of such an ancient signal in language is surprising. Because words change so rapidly, many linguists think that languages cannot be traced very far back in time. The oldest language tree so far reconstructed, that of the Indo-European family, which includes English, goes back 9,000 years at most.

Quentin D. Atkinson, a biologist at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, has shattered this time barrier, if his claim is correct, by looking not at words but at phonemes — the consonants, vowels and tones are the simplest elements of language. Dr. Atkinson, an expert at applying mathematical methods to linguistics, has found a simple but striking pattern in some 500 languages spoken throughout the world: A language area uses fewer phonemes the farther that early humans had to travel from Africa to reach it.

Some of the click-using languages of Africa have more than 100 phonemes, whereas Hawaiian, toward the far end of the human migration route out of Africa, has only 13. English has about 45 phonemes. This pattern of decreasing diversity with distance, similar to the well-established decrease in genetic diversity with distance from Africa, implies that the origin of modern human language is in the region of southwestern Africa, Dr. Atkinson says in an article published on Thursday in the journal Science.

Language is at least 50,000 years old, and the time that modern humans dispersed from Africa, and some experts say it is at least 100,000 years old. Dr. Atkinson. If his work is correct, he is picking up a distant echo from this far back in time….Dr. Atkinson is one of several biologists who have started applying to historical linguistics the sophisticated statistical methods developed for constructing genetic trees based on DNA sequences. Some linguists have regarded these efforts with suspicion.

In 2003 Dr. Atkinson and Russell Gray, another biologist at the University of Auckland, reconstructed the tree of Indo-European languages with a DNA tree-drawing method called Bayesian phylogeny. The tree indicated that Indo-European was much older than historical linguists had estimated and hence favored the theory that the language family had diversified with the spread of agriculture some 10,000 years ago, and not with a military invasion by steppe people some 6,000 years ago, the idea favored by most historical linguists. Dr. Atkinson’s finding fits with other evidence about the origins of language. The Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert belong to one of the earliest branches of the genetic tree based on human mitochondrial DNA. Their languages belong to a family known as Khoisan and include many click sounds, which seem to be a very ancient feature of language. They live in southern Africa, which Dr. Atkinson’s calculations point to as the origin of language. But whether Khoisan is closest to some ancestral form of language “is not something my method can speak to,” Dr. Atkinson said.

A recent finding that the number of phonemes in a language increases with the number of people who speak it prompted his study. This gave him the idea that phoneme diversity would increase as a population grew, but would fall again when a small group split off and migrated away from the parent group. Such a continual budding process, which is the way the first modern humans expanded around the world, is known to produce what biologists call a serial founder effect. Each time a smaller group moves away, there is a reduction in its genetic diversity. The reduction in phonemic diversity over increasing distances from Africa, as seen by Dr. Atkinson, parallels the reduction in genetic diversity already recorded by biologists. For either kind of reduction in diversity to occur, the population budding process must be rapid, or diversity will build up again. This implies that the human expansion out of Africa was very rapid at each stage. The acquisition of modern language, or the technology it made possible, may have prompted the expansion, Dr. Atkinson said.

What is so remarkable about this work is that it shows language doesn’t change all that fast, rather it retains a signal of its ancestry over tens of thousands of years,” said Mark Pagel, a biologist at the University of Reading in England who advised Dr. Atkinson. Dr. Pagel sees language as central to human expansion across the globe. “Language was our secret weapon, and as soon as we got language we became a really dangerous species,” he said.

CATHERINE ACHOLONU RESEARCH CENTER​

In several recent articles presented by the Catherine Acholonu Research Center at various Fora including the 2011 Igbo Studies Association Conference, Howard University, Washington DC, USA; the 2010 World Igbo Congress, Philadelphia, USA and a recent lecture at the African Studies Center, University of Nigeria, Dr. Acholonu has continued to emphasize the thesis of an Igbo origin of language, argued most convincingly in volumes 2 and 3 of the African Adam Trilogy: They Lived Before Adam: Pre-historic Origins of the Igbo, The Never Been Ruled (2009) and The Lost Testament of the Ancestors of Adam: Unearthing Heliopolis/Igbo Ukwu – The Celestial City of the Gods of Egypt and Dravidian India (2010).

This recent article in New York Times, by Nicholas Wade ex-raying new research findings that use mathematical methods of biological DNA analyses to analyze phoneme frequencies (frequencies of sounds and tones of vowels and consonants) as they occur in various distant languages of the world to determine language origins, has not only lend much weight to our own conclusions, but it has made the Igbo language and cultural area a subject for international linguistic and historical discourse.

The conclusion by the Atkinson research team that language originated in the Western part of Sub-Saharan Africa supports our own thesis of an Igbo origin of languages because Igbo language is based in the Western part of Sub-Saharan Africa. Also the conclusion that this ancient mother-language left Africa during the earliest ‘Out of Africa’ migrations is the same as our own conclusions that Homo Erectus left Africa with a Language and a Culture intact, and not, as animal-like ‘primitive man’. Our thesis that the San (Khoisan) Bushmen of the Kalahari were among the earliest carriers of this Proto-Proto-Igbo mother tongue, was also confirmed in the Atkinson research findings.

Therefore, Igbo scholars worldwide ought to seize upon this added scientific evidence provided by Dr. Atkinson’s research[1] to bring global research interest/funding to Igbo studies to save it from extinction and to restore its pride of place as the mother language of humankind. This will have powerful ripple effects on the study and development of Igbo culture, Igbo identity and on the restoration of the soul-essence of Igbo civilization as the mother of world civilizations, for as Dr. Mark Pegel, a biologist at the university of Reading, England, argues (see above), “language is central to human expansion across the globe” and as such central to human civilization.

EVIDENCE FROM PRE-HISTORY BACKING UP AN IGBO ORIGIN OF HUMANKIND,LANGUAGE, CULTURE AND CIVILIZATION​

Our claims to an Igbo origin of language, culture and civilization are not based on spoken language alone, but on the equally compelling fact that among the archaeological discoveries at Igbo Ukwu by British archaeologist Thurstan Shaw, were several inscriptions on pottery and bronze, which when compared with ancient Middle Eastern inscriptions (Egyptian and Cretan Hieroglyphics, Hittite, Old Phoenician, Old Sumerian, Proto-Palestinian, etc)[2] show several striking similarities. This shows that there was a civilization of note, based in Igbo land, now lost, which might have birthed the Middle Eastern civilizations and writing systems, but also their spoken languages.

Equally compelling is the discovery of an Early, Middle and Late Stone Age Homo Erectus (the ancestor of Homo Sapiens Sapiens or Modern Man) habitation in Ugwuele, Isuikwuato, Abia State in Igbo land in the early seventies by a team of archaeologists from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka[3]. This adds tons of weight to an Igbo origin of the ‘Out of Africa’ migrations of Early Man; but to also an Igbo origin of human language and culture; while the Igbo Ukwu inscriptions backed up by the mythologies and written records of the Egyptians, Sumerians, Dravidians, Hebrews and Kwa peoples of Nigeria lend credence to a Post-Deluge Kwa-Igbo origin of civilization[4].

INDELIBLE SIGNALS OF THE MOTHER-LANGUAGE ARE RETAINED THROUGH THOUSANDS OF YEARS​

Dr Pegel noted[5], most interestingly, that “What’s so remarkable about this (Atkinson’s) work is that it shows language doesn’t change all that fast — it retains a signal of its ancestry over tens of thousands of years”. We wish to demonstrate how signals of Igbo language has been retained in some of the most ancient as well as the most modern languages (and cultures) of the world, proving without any shadow of doubt that the Igbo was the mother of languages such as Sanskrit, Egyptian, Sumerian, English and Semitic languages[6], or at least that Igbo is the longest surviving child of a global mother language spoken by gods and men alike.

Linguists believe that when words from two or more separate languages share similarities in sound and meaning, it is a sign of borrowing or common origin.[7] Using this method, hundreds of words have been found of similar sounds and meanings with those of Igbo language across several languages of the globe, showing, indeed that signals of the mother language are retained “through tens of thousands of years”. In fact there is over-weighing evidence in the Adam Trilogy[8] that every language retains traces of cultural and historical experiences it has lived through in the course of millennia. There are even several traces that Igbo was the language spoken by God when he ‘spoke’ creation into being and that it was the language spoken by the first Homo sapiens family – Adam’s.[9]

Here are listed words from diverse ancient and modern languages that have retained Igbo signals in the form of common sounds and meanings with the mother language, and in some cases, powerful evidence of having originated in an Igbo cultural environment.

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

WEST-AFRICAN ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE:THE CASE OF IGBO
Catherine Obianuju Acholonu & Erich Fred Legner
“WEST-AFRICAN ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE: THE CASE OF IGBO – DISCUSSIONS ON A NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE ON THE WEST AFRICAN ORIGIN OF MOD


Part 2

EGYPTIAN WORDS OF IGBO ORIGIN​

The Egyptian word for ‘gods’ is NTR or Neter. It means ‘Guardian or Watcher’. Its Igbo equivalent/original is Onetara (meaning – ‘He who guards and watches’ over a thing on behalf of someone else). The Igbo original is more explicit, for it shows that these lesser gods are answerable to a Higher Being.

The highest and oldest of the known gods of Egypt was Ptah. He was the father of all the other gods. His name, Ptah, means in Egyptian, ‘He who fashions things by carving and opening up”.[10] The Igbo original of this word is Okpu-atu (meaning ‘He who moulds/fashions things by carving and opening up’. Igbo word tuo/atu means both ‘to carve and to open a hole’). Ptah’s rule over Egypt began as early as 21,000 BC! If his name and the collective name for the gods of Egypt, Neter, were Igbo in origin, it implies that an ancient civilization of Igbo extraction existed in West Africa, where the gods, and not men ruled, by at least 22,000 BC; that Egypt was an originally Igbo-speaking civilization and that early Egyptians were Igbos.[11] These linguistic pieces of evidence suggest that the earliest Egyptian civilization (the time when gods and not men ruled Egypt) before Pharaohnic rule began in 3,100 BC was based in West Africa and not in North Africa – the civilization, now lost to which the Igbo Ukwu archaeological findings belong.

Ptah’s son was called Ra, meaning ‘Sun/Daylight’. It’s Igbo original was Ora (which in Afa – the cult language of Igbo native priests, also meant ‘Sun/daylight’).
The grandson of Ra was called Osiris by the Greeks and Asar by the Egyptians. Osiris’ was associated with the number ‘seven’. No one knows the meaning of his name in Egypt[12], but in Igbo language Asaa means ‘seven’!
The son of Osiris was called Horus. This is a Greek version of a native Egyptian word Heru, which means ‘Face’, as in ‘Face of the Sun’. Its Igbo original is Iru – ‘Face’. Horus was known as the Lord of the Horizon. The Horizon being known to the Egyptians as the land of the Rising Sun, a place located in the Southwestern direction from Egypt - the original mythological home of the gods of Egypt. Our analyses shows that this land of the Rising sun was known in several other world mythologies as the Center/Navel of the Earth. The actual cartographical center of the earth, as indicated in all old maps of the world is ‘Median Biafra’, for median means ‘Center’. Biafra is the ancient name for the place now known as Igbo land. It’s location on world maps shows that Igbo land was the true ‘navel of the earth’. Igbo land was thus, that Land of the Rising Sun/that Horizon Land to which Egyptian mythologies and pyramid records refer as the Heaven of the Egyptians. The international word ‘Horizon’ is thus derived from the name ‘Horus’, which in itself is derived from Igbo word Iru – ‘Face of the Sun’. To demonstrate their genetic claim to being the true god-men who lived in this land of the gods, Igbo initiates marked themselves with the symbol of the sun – ichi, a word derived from another name of the Sun/daylight, chi, which is also the name of the spirit of God in Man and from which originated the Greek word Christ[13].

Egypt’s most ancient god is called Amun/Amen/Ammun. He is a god residing under the earth and his name implies ‘Hidden inside the bowels of Earth’. According to Martin Bernal[14] the word Amen is derived from imn which is pronounced Amana. These two words have Igbo origins. Igbo equivalent of imn (Egyptian words are usually not written with vowels) is ime ana, and means ‘inside the earth’, while amana is equally an Igbo word referring to the Earth religion, further supporting an originally Igbo-based Egyptian religion and civilization.

Egyptian words with Igbo sounds and meanings are legion. They include but are not limited to the following:
Egyptian: Musi/mose/msi – ‘to give birth’ (Igbo – mmusi ‘to give birth to many children’). From this word is derived names of Pharaohs such as Thoth-mose (‘Born of Thoth’), Rameses (‘Descended from Ra’), etc. The fact that many pharaohs of Egypt bear this word in their names would tend to add weight to an Igbo origin of Egyptian civilization and divinities.
Egyptian: tuf - ‘to throw away’ (Igbo: tufuo – ‘to throw away’)
Egyptian: akhu – ‘fire/light’ (Igbo: oku – ‘fire/light’). Akhu is the sacred vernacular name for the Giza Pyramid – one of the greatest wonders of the world. Its native Igbo name implies that an Igbo-speaking team of ancient engineers possibly constructed it, especially because noted in They Lived Before Adam, many key words in Egyptian Engineering lexicon are cognates of Igbo language.
Egyptian: aru - ‘body/form’ (Igbo: aru - ‘body’)
Egyptian: ba - ‘heart’(Igbo: obi – ‘heart’)
Egyptian: Busiris ‘House of Osiris’ (Igbo/Nri/Nsukka dialect: ‘Obu Osiris’ – ‘House of Osiris’).
Egypt was known as ‘Black land’. Probably the word ‘Egypt’ could have been derived from the Igbo word Ojikputu, which means ‘Pitch Black’ (Orlu dialect)
Egyptian: hike – ‘power/strength’ (Igbo – ike – ‘power/strength’
Egyptian - hekau – ‘word of power’ (Igbo - ike okwu – ‘word of power’)
Eguptian xut/pronounced kut ‘sunrise’ (Igbo ukutu ‘dawn’ – Orlu dialect)
Egyptian sa ‘to shine’ (Igbo saa ‘to shine’ - Orlu dialect)
Egyptian satu ‘shine down’ (Igbo satuo – ‘ shine down’ - Orlu dialect)
Egyptian tua ‘glorify’ (Igbo too ‘glorify’ Orlu dialect)
Egyptian hru ‘the day dawns’ (Igbo horo ‘the day dawns’- Orlu dialect)
Egyptian xerkert (pronounced kirkir) ‘pieces’ (Igbo kirikiri ‘pieces’ - Orlu dialect
Egyptian transitive –k ‘you’ Igbo transitive –k ‘you’ as in si ku - ‘say to you’ - Nsukka dialect).
Egyptian borrowings from Igbo are in two groups: words borrowed from Orlu/Okigwe dialectal family are far older in chronological time that those borrowed from the Anambra dialectal family since Orlu/Okigwe are held by Igbo historians[15] to belong to the autochthonous (non-migrant descendants of Homo Erectus) group. This implies that the earliest roots of Egyptian civilization, when the gods and not men ruled Egypt, began among the autochthons of Igbo land, but did not end there. Latter-day migrant Igbo priest-kings continued to exert influences in Pharaohnic Egyptian civilization.[16]

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

Part 3

SUMERIAN / SEMITIC​

Sumerian language is classified among Semitic languages. In The Gram Code of African Adam, Dr. Acholonu asserted that there were not any signd that Semites had a language or a culture of their own, for every aspect of their language and culture was borrowed from the Hamites. Two full-length books and one thousand pages of hard core research information later, this idea it is ever more convincing. In fact, there are more than enough clues indicating that the word ‘Semitic’ is a misnomer, and that Semites were a branch of the Hamitic stock, whose origins began precisely in the West Africa rain forest region of Nigeria. As in ancient Egyptian, some of the names of the earliest gods of Sumer were derived from Igbo language. Some of these gods, according to Sumerian cuneiform records lived on earth before the creation of human beings. One such god was called ZU. His name means in the language of the gods: ‘He Who Knows’. The word Zu has an equivalent in sound and meaning in Igbo, namely Izu, which means ‘Wise and Knowledgeable’.
Another Sumerian god with an Igbo name was the Stone God Ullikimmi, for his name means in Igbo ‘Stone Cable’ – Illi nkume. Also an early Storm god of Sumer, who fought a protracted war with the stone god was called Kummiya. In Igbo this name translates as Nkume Iyi. Nkume Iyi is the pebble used by rainmakers to make rain. Iyi implies ‘Rain’ and ‘Storm’. Sitchin[17] noted that Ulli Kummi means ‘He who contends with Kummi’, which in Igbo would translate into Olu Kummi ‘He who fights Kummi’. It is obvious that these gods were Igbo-speaking, leading us to conclude that Egyptian and Sumerian mythological origins are traceable to one and the same place - Igbo land.
A Babylonian tablet in the British Museum (No. 74329)[18] catalogued as containing an otherwise unknown myth, but narrating aspects of the story of Cain’s lineage, (the tablets call him Ka’in), says Cain’s descendants are called Amakandu – meaning ‘People Who in Sorrow Roam’. After the death of Kain, his family buried him in a place called Nudun, which means ‘Excavated Resting Place’ (Biblical ‘Nud’), also called Dunnu. The last settlement of this group of people was called Shupat, meaning ‘Judgment’. All these vernacular Sumerian words are Igbo words. In Igbo (Owerri dialect), Ama ka nduu means ‘To roam is better than to settle’. Igbo equivalent of Nudun (‘Excavated Resting Place’) is Onu Nduu, and has the exact same meaning with Nudun. Onu means in Igbo ‘mouth/excavated hole’, while nduu means ‘to rest/to sit’ in Owerri dialect. The Igbo equivalent of Sumerian Shupat (‘Judgment’) is Ishi ikpe, which also implies ‘Judgment’. There is a clan in Anambra State in Igbo land called Dunukofia. The name means ‘To settle is better than to roam’.
Sumerian texts say that the first city built by the gods on earth was called Eridu. There they placed the members of Adam’s family. Adam’s great grandson was named Yared, meaning ‘He of Eridu’, ‘person from Eridu’. Its Igbo equivalent, with the same meaning, is Oye Eridu. The father of Yared was Enosh/Enu-Esh. His name meant ‘Master of humankind’, for the first people were called Esh, Adam too was called Esh in vernacular Hebrew. In Sumerian this sacred word Esh means ‘Righteous Shepherd’. All Sumerian kings bore the title Esh. Equally in Igbo land Esh/Eshi/Nshi is a sacred word implying divine origins of the first people, who indeed were wielders of supernatural powers. Igbo people from the area occupied by the autochthons (Orlu and Okigwe) begin time reckoning with ‘Kamgbe Eshi’ – ‘From the time of the Eshi’. The term ‘Oha-eshi’ refers to the generality of the people descended from the autochthons. These would tend to suggest that the Hebrew Esh (‘first people’), Igbo Esh (‘First People’) and Sumerian Esh (Sumerian kings who bear the “ESH” title do so in other to legitimize their reign through association with the autochthons of Igbo land) all have the same root. In fact Sumerians called themselves ‘Black-headed people’ to distinguish themselves from the Egyptians, who were called ‘Black-footed People”. King Assurbanipal was said to have claimed to posses the secrets of writing “from the days before the Flood”.[19]
Sumerian word ommia means ‘expert’. Igbo omaya means ‘the one who knows it well’. Sumerian town of Kish, according to Sumerian records, was where the gods first handed down kingship to men. Igbo Ki ishi means ’The First’ (Orlu dialect). Actually the anglicized spelling ‘Orlu’ is derived from a word pronounced Ele. The people of Orlu town in Orlu local government believe that they are descendants of an ancestor known as Okwara Ugwu-Ele – ‘Heir of the Hill of Ele’; Ugwuele being the very place of habitation of the Homo Erectus autochthons.
Sumerian word Tug means dress. Igbo tuiga means ‘dress up’ (Orlu Dialect). Like the Igbo Sumerians also wore wrappers for total wrap-round cover-up, which were called Tug-tu-she, which in Igbo (Orlu Dialect) would be pronounced tuiga tushie ‘cover-all dressing’. Dr. Acholonu demonstrated in They Lived Before Adam that Sumerian customs, religious practices and traditional ways of life as described by Wallis Budge[20] was the same in most details with those of ancient Nigerians.
Hebrew word hyssop (‘to cleanse’) derived from Sumerian word zupu (‘to clean’). Both go back to the Igbo word hisapu and sapu – ‘to clean off’ or ‘wash clean’ (Orlu Dialect). In They Lived Before Adam Dr. Acholonu listed several Akkadian, Canaanite and Hebrew words along with Sumerian ones which derive from Igbo, with several place names in Hebrew – including names of rivers and mountains. These all fall under the Semitic group of languages, leading us to conclude that Semitic languages are of Igbo extraction and that Igbo is the mother of Semitic. Cosmic words like Greek cosmos and Gaia are both derived from Canaanite qsm and gweye respectively. These two words have the same meanings in Canaanite and in Igbo, respectively: Canaanite qsm and Igbo kwasama (Owerri dialect) both mean ‘to arrange outwards’; Canaanite gweye and Igbo ngwo iyi both mean ‘ravine of water’. Greek Gaia, derived from gweye, is the name of the ancient planet which according to Sumerian prehistoric sources existed several millions of years ago, and was the mother planet of all the planets in the solar system! And Igbo goes so far back!
If Igbo language goes this far back, is there any wonder why it was the language in which the creator gods uttered the words that brought creation into being in Eden. For in the Torah the vernacular Hebrew words which describe the words uttered by God during creation in Eden were Igbo words. This leads us to the conclusion that the Jews were migrants from Igbo land. These words from Eden[21] include:
Hebrew amar (‘commanded’), Igbo hamara ‘commanded’
Hebrew hayah (‘Let there be…’); Igbo haa ya (‘Let it be…/let there be’)
Hebrew hayah uwr (‘Let there be Light’), Igbo haa ya owuru (‘Let it be allowed to be’)
Hebrew towb (‘it is good’), Igbo Otu obu ‘It is as it should be’)
Hebrew Hayawu (name of the creating deity), Igbo Anyanwu (‘Sun’). This links up with the Igbo word Ora (Sun) being the name of the Igbo god known among the Egyptians as Ra (Sun). Our research shows that this name was first borne by the Hidden god Amun (Amana) before it was usurped by the son of Enki. This would suggest that it was this God lodged inside the bowels of the earth that carried out the act of creation described in Genesis. Our findings equally suggest that the hidden God was the same being known as El (Ele among the Igbo and Ela among the Yoruba). The greater number of the Igbo words in the Genesis story belong to the Orlu/Okigwe dialectal language family, so too the words in the Sumerian group. This suggests that Sumerians were mostly of the autochthonous Igbo group, the Pre-Adamic group, and descendants of the Homo Erectus migrations. The Egypt group of Igbo words however derive mostly from Anambra dialects of latter-day Igbo land, which agrees with the Igbo/Benin/Yoruba mythology of a Post-Deluge civilization founded on a raised plateau land by a god-man called Eri, whose history and characteristics agree with those of Thoth as recorded in his book The Emerald Tablet of Thoth the Atlantean.[22] Thoth’s work demonstrates a post-deluge migration from Atlantis to Nigeria, which agrees with Egyptian mythological records of the coming of Osiris and Isis to Egypt from a sinking planet – a story taken up by Plato in Timaeus and Critias and narrated in greater detail in the Emerald Tablet of Thoth the Atlantean.

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

Part 4

Considering that Abraham’s origins were in Sumer (Ur of the Chaldees is another name for Sumer), it is tempting to believe that Sumer, and not Shem, might have been the actual origin of the word ‘Semitic’. Sumer was a place unknown, however. Its origin stems from copies of “Olden Texts” assembled in the Nineveh library of Assurbanipal, many of which list kings who call themselves “king of Akkad and king of Sumer”.[23] This led to early researchers on these texts opting to call the people “Sumerians” and their land “Sumer”. The texts actually speak of “Shumerian” and not Sumerian, while the Biblical Genesis says that Babylon, Akkad and Erech were in the land of Shin’ar. These terms are examined in A Pre-Deluge West African Civilization,” and it may be concluded that the origins of the Sumerian civilization lies in a land destroyed by the Flood, which later took root in West Africa only to be destroyed again, causing its inhabitants to disperse all over the world, some to Egypt and to Arabian lands, where they founded new cities with the same old names of their lost cities. This much is clear from the following text by Assurbanipal king of Nineveh:
“The god of scribes has bestowed on me the gift of the knowledge of his art
I have been initiated into the secrets of writing
I can even read the intricate tablets of Shumerian
I understand the enigmatic words in the stone carvings
from the days before the Flood…”[24]
The god of scribes is Thoth, who is also known among the gods of Sumer (though by a different name). In Igbo Nri mythology, he is known as Eri. In Igbo land as in Sumer, writing was a secret and sacred art of the gods, which only the initiates were allowed to indulge in. The clan of scribes of Igbo land was called Ar/Aro. They are also the guardians of the Mouth of the labyrinthine Cave where God/Chukwu/Ukpabi (a local version of the Supreme Being and of Egypt’s Hidden God Amun) dwells unseen. Characteristically this Cave is called Obini-ukpabi, which translates into ‘Tomb Palace of God’ or ‘Underground Dwelling of God’ – a sure reference to the Egyptian Duat home of Amun, which Thoth calls Amenti (‘Halls for Listening’- Igbo exact equivalent is Amanti). Our analyses of some of their writings on cloth (nkara) shows that the step-pyramid, the crocodile, the serpent, the three-hills (horizon), the sun, the moon and several other symbols and totems of Egyptian gods are regular features.[25] Apart from that, the Ar/Aro possess their own local and very ancient version of the Ark of Tutankhamun with the exact same shape.[26] The name of the secret society of initiates of the god of writing to which the Ar/Aro belong is called Ekpe. Their headquarter happens to be the monoliths[27] circle of inscribed stones in Alok (Enoch?), Cross River State, Nigeria, which as far as the natives can tell were made by Stone Age People – dwarfs who were of the “First Age Grade of humans” to inhabit the earth (Homo Erectus). Do all these not agree uncannily with Assurbanipal’s claim about a “god of scribes”, an “initiation into the secrets of writing” and about “enigmatic words in the stone carvings from the days before the Flood…”? As if these were not enough, Shin’ar the Biblical name of Shumer actually translates into Igbo as Eshi na Ar (‘People of the Sun and Scribes of the Gods’), while Shumer translates into Igbo as Eshi Umu Eri (Sun People, Children of Thoth). Since the word Ar literally means ‘Serpent’s comb’ Shen’ar also means ‘People of the Sun and the Serpent’. Thus the full meaning of Osiris’ Egyptian name Asa-ar is ‘Seven Serpents’ or ‘Serpent with the Seven Combs’.
Like the Igbo, Sumerians also have a river deity called Urashi. One of its names resh-eni means in Sumerian -‘where the waters have their source’. Igbo equivalent orashi enu also means ‘Source-waters’. The Sumerian word Babel means ‘Gate to El’s House’. The Igbo equivalent is Baa be Ele, ‘Entrance to Ele’s House’. Ele is the most ancient god of the Igbo autochthons. From Biblical sources it is known that the Babel incident that brought about the separation of languages from the one original mother tongue happened at Babel. The fact that in Sumer and in Igbo land, El was associated with the heights[28] and also in Hebrew, shows a common origin of both the god and the peoples that worship it. The ancient base of El in Igbo land, according to mythology was the same place where the Homo erectus habitation was found by archaeologists, namely Ugwu-Ele. Ugwu-ele means ‘Hill/Heights of Ele’! The Biblical term Beth-el means ‘House of El’ or ‘Lord’s House’, for El was the God whom the Jews called ‘Lord’. Its Igbo original was Be-Ele/Obi Ele ‘House of El’.
Since El/Ele was also a hidden God for the Jews, it seems that he was the same as the Egyptian god Ammun. All these converging pieces of evidence suggest that the Tower of Babel incident most likely took place in West Africa. A Recent book by Jewish historian, Jonathan Cook, When and How Was the Jewish People Invented, 2011, supports the thesis that the Jews were never a people of Palestine, and that their claim to a Palestine origin was a fabrication of Biblical scholars. Evidence that Dr. Acholonu amassed in The Lost Testament, shows that the Jews were a Nigerian tribe of scribes of the Igbo God Ele and an off-shoot of the Eri/Aro tribe of scribes, initiates and professional priests.
The Sumerian term Amurru (‘Westerners’)[29] is derived from Igbo Umu oru (‘People of the West’). West here implies West of the River Niger, for the Igbo distinguish between Oru and Igbo (Oru na Igbo) with ‘oru’ implying ‘those who live West of the Niger River, i.e. the Benin and the Yoruba’, and ‘Igbo’ implying those who live east of the Niger, i.e. the core Igbo and the Delta Igbo. From this term is also derived the etymology of the word Hebrew, whose literal meaning in Aramaic and in Igbo (Igbo Oru) is ‘Those who live on the Western Side of the River’! Igbo Oru actually means: ‘The Igbo Who Live West of the Niger’. This implies that originally the peoples of the Eastern and Western Niger were at least of the same political entity, before the rivalries of their gods separated them ideologically. All these linguistic piles of evidence are powerful testimonies that Sumerians and Hebrews, Benins and Yorubas were originally speaking an Igbo mother language, still spoken in Igbo land to this day, but not among the other nation states that were originally part of the mother-entity. They also suggest that the origins of civilization lie in ancient Nigeria in the area of the River Niger. One can venture further and adduce from the foregoing that the Great Benin Empire of Old and the Oyo/Owo empires of Yoruba land, of which nothing remains in present times, were perhaps offshoots of the original Pre-Deluge Sumerian civilization of ancient Nigerians.
As described in Zecharia Sitchin’s book When Time Began, by 2,000 BC the land of Ur, otherwise called Sumer was beset by a military disaster such that “Sumer itself lay prostrate and desolate, the remnants of its people spread in all directions: Sumerian doctors and astronomers, architects and sculptors, cutters of seals and scribes became teachers in other lands”… “For the first time there appears in Mesopotamian inscriptions the term Munnabtutu, literally meaning ‘fugitives from a destruction’” – what would today be called ‘displaced persons” or “stateless refugees”. The Igbo original of this term is Umunna obi ntitu, which literally means ‘Kindred from a Crushed Homestead’ or ‘Citizens of a Destroyed City’.
In They Lived Before Adam, Dr. Acholonu provided evidence that what destroyed the Prehistoric civilizations of West Africa was the war between the god Marduk, known in Egypt as Ra and the Supreme God of the autochthons, the Hidden God, El. In The Lost Testament, Dr. Acholonu provided initial evidence that Marduk/Ra was either backing or was himself the Yoruba God Oduduwa, the Nigerian equivalent of Egypt’s Seth, while El/Atum was the power behind Oduduwa’s rival brother, Obatala, the Nigerian equivalent of Osiris. In When Time Began, foremost oriental scholar of Sumerian cuneiform records, Zecharia Sitchen, provided added evidence from Sumerian records that indeed Marduk was the god behind the Western Nigerians (the Benin and the Yoruba monarchies).
While the Amurru (Umuoru) ‘Westerners’, followers of Marduk and Nabu [his son] poured into Mesopotamia and provided the rulers that made up the first dynasty of Marduk’s Babylon, other tribes and nations-to-be engaged in massive population movements that forever changed the Near-East, Asia [Eshi] and Europe. They brought about the emergence of Assyria to Babylon’s north, the Hittite kingdom to the northwest, the Hurrian Mitanni to the west, the Indo-Aryan kingdoms that spread from the Caucasus on Babylon’s north-east, and those of the desert peoples to the south and of the ‘Sealand people’ to the southeast…They migrated to the Indus Valley to repopulate and reinvigorate it. The Vedic tales of gods and heroes that [Aryans, later] brought with them were the Sumerian myths retold. The notions of Time and its measurement and cycles were of Sumerian origin mingled into the Aryan migrations. [They brought] mysteriously abrupt changes… in China without any gradual development…[and] transformed (China from a nation of] primitive villages to one of walled cities whose rulers possessed bronze weapons [the Igbo, Benin and Yoruba have been masters in bronze casting for as long as living memory goes][30] and chariots and the knowledge of writing. The cause, all agree was the arrival of migrants from the west [western hemisphere; West Africa], the same civilizing influences of Sumer… the migrations in the aftermath of the fall of Sumer.
[In China] writing was introduced together with kingship by the Shang dynasty [of little people, whose ancestors were probably the Igbo-speaking Nshi dwarfs who authored the monoliths of Nigeria].[31] Brackets mine.
In The Gram Code of African Adam, Catherine Acholonu pointed out that two Original Sumerian (proto-cuneiform) letters inscribed on the monoliths of Ikom, leading us to conclude that those who inscribed the monoliths were the founders of the Sumerian civilization, namely the dwarfs/autochthons who taught their sacred writings to the initiate scribes of ancient Nigeria. Igbo infusion into Chinese civilization can be seen in Chinese language which is monosyllabic and in their early writing whose letters were pictographic as in Igbo Ukwu bronze and pottery inscriptions. The Chinese I-ching divination system of trigrams has mathematical links with Igbo Afa divination system[32], and as listed in They Lived Before Adam, several Chinese monosyllabic words have same sounds and meanings with similar Igbo words. Sitchin records that consequent on the destruction original base of the Sumerian civilization, “throughout the steppes of Central Asia and all the way from India to China and Japan, the religious beliefs spoke of gods of Heaven and Earth and of a place [in the west] called Sumeru … at the navel of the earth - .”[33] Chinese mythology calls this western land of the migrant gods and god-men Hsi wang mu, which in Igbo reads Eshi nwa mmuo (‘Immortal Eshi/godmen’).
According to Professor E. E. Okafor, the Dean of Archaeology at the University of Nigeria, new dating of samples of slag and bloom from ancient industrial furnaces in Lejja, Nsukka in Igbo land sent to UK for dating by the Archaeology Department at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, recently returned with a shocking date of 4,000 B.C.! By 4,000 B.C. Sumerian civilization in the Middle East, which is supposedly older than Egyptian civilization, was in its infancy, while Igbo people were making metal in industrial furnaces and piling up masses of slag and bloom that question to this very day the generally accepted notions of the origin of civilization.

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

Part 5

INDIA / HINDU WORDS OF IGBO ORIGIN​

Evidence of an Igbo-speaking nation of migrant peoples who laid the foundation of Indian civilization also abounds in the Indian lexicon.
Manu (‘First Man’) Igbo - mmanu (human);
Kash (Kwash) – First People, god-men (Igbo: Akwanshi – ‘First People/god-men’); Kush, the name of the Biblical son of Khem/Ham was the clan name of all Indians (Hindu Kush), but also of all Nubians. Egypt was named Khemet after its founding father, Khem\Ham the post-Deluge settler of the African continent, whose name means ‘Black’.
Sindh (the largest and longest river in India and main source of life, agriculture, trade and sheer survival, from which originated the words India, Hindu) appears to have derived its name from the Igbo word Isi ndu ‘Source of Life’ (pronounced Isi ndhu in Orlu/Okigwe dialects).
An ancient pyramid complex in Kashi, the holiest city of India, had the name Bindhu Madhu, which translates into Igbo as Obi Ndhu Mmadu (Orlu dialect) ‘Mankind’s Sacred Dwelling Place of Immortality’. Kashi was India’s ‘City of Light’, the Igbo equivalent of this word is Oku Eshi – ‘Place of gods of Light’).
Sanskrit Kr means ‘to create/to make’, it is derived from Igbo kere (‘created’);
Sanskrit Dev (‘god/divine’) is derived from Igbo Ide Afa/Ava (‘Demi god of Afa’), pronounced Ava in some core Anambra dialects);
Sanskrit Om/Aum is said to be the first word intoned by god to bring about created life. Its Biblical equivalent is ‘I Am’. Its Igbo equivalent is Oom (‘I am/I am it/It is I’); Igbo Aum/Awu m equally means ‘I am’. Both are derived from Orlu/Okigwe dialect of the autochthons, indicating that Sanskrit, the so called Oldest language of humanity is equally owes some of its vocabulary to Igbo.
Indra is the name of the solar deity of India. His name appears to have derived from Afa word Ndu Ora (‘Life of the Sun’) or perhaps it is a collective name for solar deities – Ndi Ora – ‘People of the Sun’.
The India ancient city of Kashmiri is waterlogged most of the year. Its name appears to have Igbo connotations for miri means ‘water’ in Igbo and would tend to suggest a name such as ‘Kushyte Water People’.

INTERNATIONAL WORDS (INDO-EUROPEAN) THAT DERIVE FROM AFA CULT LANGUAGE OF THE ANCIENT IGBO PRIESTS​

Most European languages, including English, belong to the Indo-European family of languages. Common historical experiences have brought about borrowing across several European borders, such that most international words are found in almost all European languages. A few words are selected as examples, though there are many more of such words with Igbo roots across several European languages, both Eastern and Western Europe:[34]
Eve (Ava – ‘Living Soul/God as Mother, Creative Force’)
Nature (Nne Atu Ora – Mother of the Living Word of the Sun God)
Adam (Adaa m – ‘I have fallen’)
Order (Ora dere – cosmically established/god ordained)
Life (Ele ife – ‘Light of Ele’)
Love (Ele ovu/ofu – ‘Divine unity/oneness’)
Oracle (Ora okala – ‘Divination’)
Caesar (Ichie Eze Ora – ‘Most High Sun King’)
Faith (Ifu etu –‘to focus on divine order’)
Chief (ichie efu – ‘Non-initiate community head’)
King (ikenga – ‘anchor of manly force/power’)
Queen (akwu nne – ‘nest of mother essence’)
Equal/equilibrium (akwu ele – ‘divine balance’)
Mind (Omi ndu- ‘Depth of spirit’)
Human (oha mmuo ana – ‘community of earth-dwelling spirits’)
Meet (etymologically derived from Old English moot – ‘gathering of elders’ - Igbo ime otu–‘gathering of elders’)
Choir (Igbo Ukwe Ora ‘Group of singers’)
Cock (Igbo Okuko ‘cock’)
Animal (Igbo anumanu ‘animal’)
Say (Igbo saa ‘to say’)
Marine (Igbo miri ‘water’), etc, etc.

CONCLUSIONS​

From the foregoing, one can assume that it is possible to follow through with the demonstration of the origin of languages, peoples, cultures and civilizations right into the actual dialects of Igbo that birthed these civilizations. It is also possible to demonstrate which of these world civilizations belonged with the Proto-Kwa, and which ones belonged to the Post-Kwa dispersals. An originally IGBO-SPEAKING Proto-Kwa civilization - a Pre-Deluge, mother-pot civilization based in ancient Nigeria, peopled by the ancestors of today’s Igbo, Yoruba, Benin and related tribes, birthed great global civilizations like Egypt, Sumer Hindu-Cush, China, the Hebrew phenomenon and beyond. In The Lost Testament, Dr. Acholonu is able to demonstrate that the Pharaohnic Egyptian civilization was a product of the same culture that birthed Yoruba/Benin/Anambra-Igbo phenomenon, and that it was post-Deluge; whereas the civilization that gave birth to it was Pre-Delude. From this study, it is possible to see early signs of a Pre-Deluge Sumerian civilization that was an offshoot of the Adamic phenomenon of human development.
Ancient Nigerian languages, Igbo in particular, hold much information as to who did what where and when in the birthing and sustaining of global civilizations, much of which will become clearer in further research. New archaeological research has dated the Deluge before 11,000 BC and many new research works on the origins of Egyptian civilization are coming up with dates close to 11,000 BC. Dr. Atkinson’s work also comes closer to this date as the date of the dispersal of early agriculture. Our research on Igbo Ukwu’s lost civilization anchors its hay-days around 10,000 BC. All these call for serious research by Igbo scholars and serious governmental support for cultural, linguistic and historical research development and continuing education.

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

The Nri Kingdom
The Nri Kingdom (900AD - Present): Rule by theocracy - Think Africa
Kingdom of Nri - Wikipedia

HISTORY AND ORIGIN
Nri is widely asserted to be the motherland and cradle of the Igbo ethnicity. It is also generally believed and widely accepted that Eri was the founder of Nri. The origin of Eri however, is vague. One theory goes that Eri was a divine being sent by Chukwu (God), to make peace, cleanse abominations and provide foods for the Igbo people. Thus in this theory, he descended from the sky.

Another explanation of Eri’s ancestry, however, was that Eri is the grandson of the biblical Jacob, and his father is Gad, the 7th son of Jacob. Eri was a high priest to the pharaoh in Egypt. Before the scriptural mass Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt, he sensed the impending onslaught of the Egyptians against the people of Israel his people, as the Egyptians increasingly grew envious.

Eri therefore left Egypt, crossed the river Nile and entered southern Sudan from where he entered Chad. From Chad, he crossed the Benue river and came to Lokoja, then traversed the river Niger and came ashore near the confluence of the Ezu and Omambala Rivers called Agbanabo or Ezu Na Omambala[4], here it was spiritually revealed to him that he was to settle. This location is present-day Aguleri in Anambra state, though at the time it was not known as Aguleri. So Aguleri might have actually been the Motherland of the Igbos. This notion even becomes increasingly bona fide when you consider that in Igbo land it is a well-known tradition that no man can break Kola nuts at a gathering when an Aguleri man is present. That honour is entitled to him.
Another fact to bolster this claim is in most Igbo Communities before a King is coronated he must fulfil an age long tradition of visiting and paying homage to Aguleri with his entourage where they spend a compulsory seven days visiting sacred places and making sacrifices to certain deities in shrines. Another pointer is the ObuGad Temple that is situated in Aguleri which was built by Eri in honour of his father Gad.[5]
Eri had two wives by the time he arrived at the Ezu Na Omambala confluence, Nneamaku, and Oboli who were the first and second wife respectively. Nneamaku bore five children Nri-Ifikwuanịm-Menri being the first son also known as Nri, Agụlụ, Ogbodudu, Onogu, and Iguedo the only daughter, while Oboli the second wife bore an only child Onoja.
Onoja founded present-day Igala in Kogi state[6]. Eri’s first son Nri-Ifikwuanịm begot Agụkwu Nri, Enugwu-Ukwu, Enugwu-Agidi, Nọfịa, and Amọbia. His sister Iguedo begot Ogbunike, Ọkuzu, Nando, Ụmụleri, and Nteje which are known today as the Umu Iguedo clan. Onogu begot Ịgbariam.
Eri’s first son Nri-Ifikwuanim was a spiritual priest like his father. He left Aguleri and settled at a thick forest he called Agu-Ukwu Nri[7] which is the present-day Nri Kingdom. Here he engaged in hunting, farming and also performed priestly duties and demonstrated his spiritual prowess just as his father Eri did in Egypt, by the cleansing of abominations, expert use of herbs and roots and giving honourable titles to his subjects.
When Eri died Agulu took over leadership and that was how the Aguleri name came about. “Agulu” and “Eri” are often referred to being saying “Agulu Nwa Eri” in Igbo language meaning “Agulu, the son of Eri”. It was from that location that the Igbos multiplied, spread and founded other Igbo communities. When Nrifikwuanim-Menri grew old and was nearing his end, it was not his wish to die outside of his ancestral home; therefore, he instructed his children to take him back to present day Aguleri. There he eventually died and was buried. Till present day his grave site is still marked and can be seen at Okpu community in Ivite village of Aguleri. Oral history passed down from older generations in Aguleri tells of the magical springing up of three gigantic trees barricading the entrance to his grave, the trees are said to share a common root and are so enormous that to get a complete view one has to go back many miles.
The traditional Igbo believe Eri had some form of a very powerful spiritual knowledge or powers. This might have contributed to the discombobulation of his person with time after he passed on. He was atypical, and the mystical ability he possessed must have aided to establish his character as he faded into time as some kind of supernatural, mystical being; hence, the school of thought which relates that he was sent by God and came down from the sky. He passed on this ability to his son Nri-Ifikwuanim who founded the kingdom. Could it be that this was the bases as to why Nri kingdom was such a revered kingdom spiritually by its subjects.

The Kingdom of Nri (Igbo: Ọ̀ràézè Ǹrì) was a medieval polity located in what is now Nigeria. The kingdom existed as a sphere of religious and political influence over a third of Igboland, and was administered by a priest-king called an Eze Nri. The Eze Nri managed trade and diplomacy on behalf of the Nri people, a subgroup of the Igbo-speaking people, and possessed divine authority in religious matters.
The kingdom was a haven for all those who had been rejected in their communities and also a place where slaves were set free from their bondage. Nri expanded through converts gaining neighboring communities' allegiance, not by force. Nri's royal founder, Eri, is said to be a 'sky being' that came down to earth and then established civilization. One of the better-known remnants of the Nri civilization is manifested in the igbo ukwu artifacts. Nri's culture permanently influenced the Northern and Western Igbo, especially through religion and taboos.
The kingdom appears to have passed its peak in the 18th century, encroached upon by the rise of the Benin and Igala kingdom, and later the Atlantic slave trade, but it appears to have maintained its authority well into the 16th century, and remnants of the eze hierarchy persisted until the establishment of Colonial Nigeria in 1911 and represents one of the traditional states within modern Nigeria.

 

[Ezigbo Nwanyi]

Odinani
Odinani - Wikipedia

Ọdịnala (Igbo: Ọ̀dị̀nàlà), also Ọdịnanị, Ọdịlalị or Ọdịlala, comprises the traditional religious practices and cultural beliefs of the Igbo people of southern Nigeria.[1] Ọdịnanị has monotheistic and panentheistic attributes, having a single God as the source of all things. Although a pantheon of spirits exists⸺these being Ala, Amadiọha, Anyanwụ, Ekwensu, Ikenga, these are lesser spirits prevalent in Ọdịnanị expressly serving as elements of Chineke (or Chukwu), the supreme being or high God.[2] Chineke is a compound word encompassing the concept of chí is the creator (nà) is a verb meaning 'that' while ékè means create. Chineke therefore means the Creator or the God that created all things. The concept of Chúkwú ('supreme chi') was largely propagated by the Arọ-Igbo of Arọchukwu in eastern Igboland who wielded much spiritual force over the eastern Niger Delta in the 18th century due to their operating of the Ibini Ukpabi oracle.
Lesser spirits known as ágbàrà or álúsí operate below the high God Chineke and are each a part of Chineke divided by gender in their mind. These spirits represent natural forces; agbara as a divine force manifests as separate alụsị in the Igbo pantheon. A concept of 'the eye of sun or God' (ányá ánwụ́) exists as a masculine and feminine solar deity which forms a part of the solar veneration among the Nri-Igbo in northern Igboland. Alụsị are mediated by dibia and other priests who do not contact the high god directly. Through áfà, 'divination', the laws and demands of the alụsị are communicated to the living. Alụsị are venerated in community shrines around roadsides and forests while smaller shrines are located in the household for ancestral veneration. Deceased ancestors live in the spirit world where they can be contacted. Below the alụsị are minor and more general spirits known as mmúọ loosely defined by their perceived malevolent or benign natures. These minor spirits are not venerated and are sometimes considered the lost souls of the dead.
The number of people practicing Igbo religion decreased drastically in the 20th century with the influx of Christian missionaries under the auspices of the British colonial government of Nigeria. In some cases Igbo traditional religion was syncretised with Christianity, but in many cases indigenous rites were demonised by Christian missionaries who⸺for imperialistic reasons⸺pointed out the practice of human sacrifice and some other cultural practices that were illegal under the colonial government. Earlier missionaries referred to many indigenous religious practices as juju. Igbo religion is most present today in harvest ceremonies such as new yam festival (ị́wá jí) and masquerading traditions such as mmanwụ and Ekpe.
Remnants of Igbo religious rites spread among African descendants in the Caribbean and North America in era of the Atlantic slave trade. Igbo ọ́bị̀à was transferred to the former British Caribbean and Guyana as obeah and aspects of Igbo masquerading traditions can be found among the festivals of the Garifuna people and jonkonnu of the British Caribbean and North Carolina.[3][4][5][6]